Town+Gown NYC Program

In this episode, Prof. Jie Ren speaks with Terri Matthews, Director of Town+Gown: NYC @ NYC DDC, a citywide research program in the built environment, about how Town+Gown connects student-led experiential learning programs at academic institutions, like Fordham University, with NYC agencies with real research needs.  These projects help tackle real-world public-sector challenges through evidence-based research. Together, Prof. Ren and Terri Matthews discussed how insights from student-led research projects may play into practice and policy changes over time, the technical and soft skills needed by students for impactful civic analytics, and how AI adoption is reshaping expectations for the next generation of students and public-sector analysts.

Host and Executive Producer: Jie Ren
Producer: Olakunle Davies
Additional Production: Victoria Ilano, Jeffrey Haynes
Cover Art: Paola Curcio-Kleinman
Artwork: "Emotion and Logic" by Jie Ren
Marketing: Paola Curcio-Kleinman
Music: ”The Epic Hero” by Keys of Moon