IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2017 - 69

traditional consulting or strategic companies and firms -
are too expensive for many such groups to afford [23].
(See Figure 3.)
https://incipe.ca/

Be Collective
Described as a "social network for doing good," Be Collective is building digital infrastructure for social
change. Not just a new platform, it is a networked multifunctional software for purpose driven social impact connecting civil society and creating positive change. It
brings together all strands of society - individuals,
businesses, community groups, schools, charities, and
government - with the collective purpose of making
things better for everyone.
Be Collective taps into the desire for change by
providing the digital tools and infrastructure for happier, healthier communities. It's a movement, and
you're invited. (See Figure 4.)
https://becollective.com/landing#login

building systems that support communities as they
overcome significant challenges.

Synthesis
It is not easy to gauge whether or not ICT is beneficial
for well-being and for the construction of social capital
because these questions tend to be multi-faceted and to
contain subjective elements. When you can "measure
what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it ... [otherwise] your
knowledge may have of a more meager and unsatisfactory nature. It may be the beginning of knowledge, but
you have scarcely in thought advanced to the stage of
science (Lord Kelvin, 1824-1907, cited in [4]).

Penn State Humanitarian Engineering and Social
Entrepreneurship Program (HESE)
HESE students take information, test research designs
and bring back what they learned from communities
to improve their designs. It's a wonderful example of
engaged scholarship [21]. HESE challenges students
and faculty from across campus to break down the
barriers between their disciplines and truly collaborate to develop technology-based solutions to address
the most compelling problems facing humanity today.
(See Figure 5.)
http://sites.psu.edu/hese/

FIGURE 4. Be Collective.

Institute for People & Technology (IPaT)
(See Figure 6).
http://ipat.gatech.edu/about

Empowering People Through HumanCentred Technologies
The Institute for People and Technology connects
industry, government, and nonprofit leaders with Georgia Tech's world-class researchers in an effort to transform five vital sectors of society: media, health,
education, enterprise, and humanitarian systems. By
integrating academic and applied research through living labs and multidisciplinary projects, IPaT delivers
real world solutions that balance people's needs with
the promise of new technologies. The IPaT Humanitarian Systems initiative is focused on developing novel
communication and information technologies to aid
communities during disaster and crisis situations by
examining the role of computers and communications
in social and political development with the aim of
DECEMBER 2017

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FIGURE 5. Penn State HESE.

FIGURE 6. Institute for People and Technology IPaT.

IEEE TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY MAGAZINE

https://www.incipe.ca/ https://www.becollective.com/landing#login http://sites.psu.edu/hese/ http://ipat.gatech.edu/about

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2017