HIGHER ED TODAY
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Researchers from the City University of
New York have developed a device that integrates
indoor navigation with augmented reality
to help emergency responders find their
way through poorly lit, potentially dangerous
spaces to evacuate people in danger.
The group of researchers, composed of
faculty, staff and a graduate student from The
City College of New York, Borough of Manhattan
Community College and the CUNY Office of
Research are currently refining the technology
that one day could save lives. Their invention
will be marketed as a smartphone app, providing
real-time maps and turn-by-turn navigation,
and eliminating the need for the costly
sensors and 3D scanners currently on the market.
The minds behind this exciting project received
training and funding from the National
Science Foundation (NSF) and are the beneficiaries
of CUNY’s decade-long push to provide
academic researchers with the acumen, resources
and networks needed to translate their
inventions into commercially viable ventures.
The thinking is that if CUNY’s brightest
scholars in the sciences, engineering and tech
can produce breakthroughs that address realworld
problems, their discoveries will have
multiple benefits — diversifying the STEM
workforce, establishing new pathways to employment
for our graduates and in turn, driving
a more equitable, inclusive economy.
CUNY’s focus on leveraging the creativity
of its research community can be seen in an array
of new university programs that advance
these goals to the benefit of society and our region’s
economic development.
City College recently won a $750,000 “Build
to Scale” grant from the U.S. Economic Development
Administration (EDA) to fund the
creation of the Center for Co-Innovation and
Medical Technology, which seeks to translate
product concepts to the marketplace through
the development of medical technologies that
address unmet clinical needs. The project,
which will bring many new STEM-related jobs
to Harlem, will also receive $750,000 in local
matching funds from City College and a philanthropic
donor.
The same enterprising spirit can be seen in
the Blackstone Charitable Foundation’s summer
announcement to bring its Blackstone
LaunchPad entrepreneurship and skill-building
program to nine CUNY colleges, a $6 million
commitment to support career mobility.
Students will receive resources and guidance
to expand their mentorship networks, enabling
Caribbean L 18 ife, OCT. 29-NOV. 4, 2021
them to pursue job opportunities and create
their own start-ups.
Leading the Push
And notably, starting in January, CUNY
will oversee the New York Region Innovation
Corps (I-Corps) Hub, an exciting, $15 million
federally-funded program established by the
NSF to provide entrepreneurial training and
mentoring to diverse academic researchers.
The award is the largest the NSF has ever conferred
to CUNY and will allow these inventors
to develop their scientific and engineering discoveries
into products and build the enterprises
needed to bring them into the marketplace.
The New York Region I-Corps Hub has a related
objective: giving our brightest minds the
guidance they need to bring their innovations
out of the laboratory and into the marketplace.
Through it, CUNY will lead a consortium
of eight local colleges that includes Columbia
University and New York University, which
will work together to identify product opportunities
and spearhead the creation of student-
and faculty-run startups that address realworld
concerns.
Working in teams, guided by industry professionals
and buoyed by seed money from the
NSF, faculty and student researchers will work
to identify promising product opportunities
and form start-up ventures to commercialize
them. CUNY will oversee approximately 30 ICorps
teams after the program launches.
The I-Corps Hub will enable faculty and
graduate student researchers like those who
produced the indoor navigation system to
sharpen their technological discovery, scale
its production and bring it to market. Their experience
illustrates the I-Corps program’s immense
value.
Initially, they conceived the technology as
a tool to help the blind and visually impaired,
but a seven-week I-Corps workshop last spring
guided them through a rigorous process of customer
discovery, which showed a limited market
for such a product. Through more than 100
interviews with architects, building managers,
construction workers and firefighters, however,
they determined their product could fill a great
need for safe navigation by emergency responders.
The inventors adapted the technology and
it is being piloted at 10 sites across New York
State. They are now seeking a patent.
It’s a great example of our work to harness
the ingenuity of CUNY’s community, and to expand
access and support for entrepreneurs at
a time when their innovations can be vital to
our region’s pandemic recovery and long-term
growth.
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Education
Adams visits Life’s
WORC’s group home
Victoria Schneps and Democratic mayoral candidate and Brooklyn Borough President Eric
Adams tour the Geraldo Rivera Home. Photo by Gabriele Holtermann
BY ANGÉLICA ACEVEDO
Borough President and mayoral
candidate Eric Adams joined Life’s
WORC’s Founder and Honorary Board
Member Victoria Schneps, Life’s
WORC CEO Janet Koch, Board Chairperson
Lynne Koufakis and others
earlier this month to tour the organization’s
fi rst group home, located in
Little Neck.
The group home is named the “Geraldo
Rivera Home” in honor of the
noted journalist who played an important
role alongside Schneps and other
activists in exposing abuses at the Willowbrook
State School on Staten Island.
Rivera’s reports of Willowbrook’s
infamous history of mistreating and
neglecting thousands of disabled residents
brought about public outrage,
and eventually led to the facility’s closure,
with its residents relocated to
smaller group homes.
In fact, the fi rst residents at the Geraldo
Rivera Home were former Willowbrook
residents.
Life’s WORC is dedicated to supporting
people with intellectual and
developmental disabilities as well as
autism, and has group homes throughout
New York City.
There was a reaction from the advocates
to close down Willowbrook,
deinstitutionalize those who needed
around-the-clock services, but we
didn’t balance that with real programs
to give it to them,” Adams said in that
interview.
Adams later clarifi ed through a
spokesperson that while he was “disturbed
by the mistreatment at Willowbrook
decades ago,” he meant that
“since then, New York has systematically
eliminated mental health beds
that can be greatly benefi cial to those
who need constant care, leaving our
city unable to provide for them,” according
to amNew York Metro.
Schneps, whose daughter Lara
had been a patient at Willowbrook, invited
the Brooklyn borough president
to learn more about Willowbrook and
Life’s WORC.
During his visit Saturday, Adams
again referred to his comments about
Willowbrook, saying that he felt that
after the institution closed, the city
and state “did not give support to the
families.”
“I just really felt as though the city,
the state just abandoned those families
with children with special needs,
because behind every child with special
needs is a special parent,” Adams
said. “The challenge of what it takes
— that love and nurturing and you
just want your child to have the dignity
and respect that they deserve, and
that’s what every parent wants. And I
believe in it.”
During his visit at the Rivera home,
which included a tour of the inside and
outdoor facilities, Adams met with residents
of the home and spoke with staff
about the many services they offer beyond
their residential group home, including
behavioral analysis services,
community habilitation, customized
employment services, day habilitation,
school-based services, respite
and family support services, and trust
and fi nancial services, as well as the
programs and services offered by its
Family Center for Autism.
The Life’s WORC team spoke with
Adams about the challenges they face,
particularly relating to workforce
shortages. Adams offered to set up an
advisory committee to help address
some of these challenges at the city
level, if elected mayor.
“If we could put together a group
like this, a cross section … and just
say, ‘Eric, here are the low hanging
fruits that we can do now, here
are some of the things that we can do
later,’ and just start putting us on a
pathway,” Adams said. “We need to be
pouring our resources into those who
have barriers.”