An Exploration of “Hyper-Local” Community-University Engagement in the Development of Smart Cities

ABSTRACT

The use of big data in smart cities poses new questions about higher education and community-university engagement practices in addressing longstanding social and economic exclusion in urban communities. Drawing on transdisciplinary ideas in higher education, cultural theory, and science and technology studies, primary concerns in the era of big data are considered with current conceptualizations of higher education engagement and anchor institution purposes. Tensions in the narratives of civic engagement and democratic practice for community well-being are juxtaposed with tensions in the smart citizen narrative implied by the idealized smart city design. A new framing of community-university relations under what I term “hyper-local” engagement is suggested for more justice-oriented and democratic practices when universities interact with their surrounding communities given the impending and sweeping changes occurring from the use of big data in social policy.

Acknowledgments

I am especially grateful to Dr. Ezekiel Dixon-Román for introducing me to core concepts in the cultural critique of big data that inspired this topic. I also thank Dr. Laura W. Perna and peer reviewers for their insightful and helpful feedback that greatly strengthened this article.

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Notes on contributors

Elaine W. Leigh

Elaine W. Leigh is a Higher Education Ph.D. student, pre-doctoral Fellow at Penn AHEAD, and Moorman-Simon Fellow at University of Pennsylvania's Graduate School of Education. Her research interests include policies and practices that address inequity in college access and completion for underrepresented students, the role of higher education in community and economic development, and critical approaches to big data use in education and social policy.