Student Participation in the Collective Intelligence 2015 Conference

Regents Of The University Of Michigan - Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor MI

Investigators

Abstract

The 2015 Collective Intelligence Conference in Santa Clara, California, provides a unique opportunity for graduate students to interact with scholars and practitioners from universities, businesses, nonprofit organizations, and various government agencies. The term "collective intelligence" refers to the processing of information by a group of people and technological resources, in a manner comparable to but more extensive than the functioning of an individual human brain. Owing to its interdisciplinary origins, this nascent field attracts open-minded graduate students willing to step out of their academic silos. The conference itself will address cutting edge ideas including how collective intelligence emerges, social computing, crowdsourcing, collective search and memory, the use of technology to improve collective intelligence, and collective responses to emergencies and crises such as earthquakes and power outages. Attendance at the conference will offer students concepts, ideas, and experiences that will encourage them to do transformative work in their future careers. Special graduate student activities will play a distinct role in the 2015 Conference. A panel discussion on careers in collective intelligence will offer presentations by leaders in the academy, business, non-profit sector, and government, and will focus on four key dimensions: knowledge, tools, questions, and portfolios. In a collective intelligence syllabus project, students will work in teams to construct possible syllabi for an upper level undergraduate, interdisciplinary course. A graduate student challenge will involve students in constructing a set of crowdsourcing and collective intelligence challenges that can be used in the classroom.