Episode 6 - Town+Gown NYC Program

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Jie Ren
Hi, everyone. This is Professor Jie Ren, and welcome to my podcast, “When Tech Meets Ed.” We know that New York City is entering a new chapter with a new mayor. So today, I'm very happy to have Terri Matthews, the director of the New York City Town+Gown program, to join me to talk about Town+Gown. So, Terry, thank you very much for coming to my podcast.

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Jie Ren
Could you please introduce yourself?

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Terri Matthews
Sure. I'm Terri Matthews. I'm the director of Town and Gown colon NYC, which is a city-wide built environment research program. It's a platform. It's open to all city agencies. I connect agencies that have research questions with mostly master's programs, where the students get credit for their work. And then we have a master contract with 14 schools that Fordham is actually on as well.

00:01:16:22 - 00:01:19:19
Terri Matthews
And so that's what I do.

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Jie Ren
Nice. So, what is Town+Gown?

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Terri Matthews
Well, it's just okay. I've been at the city for a long time. I was at City Hall for a while. This was under Bloomberg, and I saw that people had questions, and they wanted to do more work. They had their jobs, but they were curious, like, why is, why can't it be another way? And they just didn't have time.

00:01:47:16 - 00:02:15:19
Terri Matthews
And when I was at City Hall, I didn't have time. So then when I got to D.C., I thought, well, I had been a master student at Wagner, and that's when I learned about the capstone method, which is where students, in their last year, instead of thesis, they do a capstone. It’s a real problem. Real, client. And it's a simulated consultancy.

00:02:15:21 - 00:02:43:15
Terri Matthews
. And, and I thought, well, I can definitely get students to work for agencies with questions. And it was a scaling it up so that we, the first year in 2009, we did ten projects over the academic year. So we do like 10 to 12 projects with students. Academic year. We've done 16 with Fordham, [Jie Ren: Nice, yeah.] by the way, since 2013.

00:02:43:17 - 00:03:20:08
Terri Matthews
And we have events, you know, we do the research, then we have symposium events where we talk about it, and it's a circular, it's called action research. That's what the recursive cast, sorry. Action research. So let's just leave that. [Jie Ren: Okay.] And then, we have some working groups because we've been following the circular pathway in certain areas for a number of years, and we just keep doing research and, that's what we do, which is a program.

00:03:20:08 - 00:03:23:06
Terri Matthews
You know, we're like a resource to agencies.

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Jie Ren
So Town+Gown in a nutshell. And I also like I got involved with the Town+Gown from the forums and for a couple of semesters. Right. So I'm like, first of all, I'm very thankful for giving us this opportunity for students to have this immersive learning experience. I totally agree with you. Right. So, so, like, students are looking for real-life problems to solve.

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Terri Matthews
Oh, we gave them a real-life, real-life data set.

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Jie Ren
Yeah, exactly. We will get into the details of those. But like in a nutshell, we know like Town+Gown is a collaboration between universities and also the city. Right. Like, giving students some universities opportunities to focus and analyze the data. I know that projects are not necessarily about analytics. It could be other projects.

00:04:06:16 - 00:04:08:00
Terri Matthews
They're all over the place.

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Jie Ren
Could you please introduce, like, some examples of concrete examples about this projects?

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Terri Matthews
Okay. Yeah. Okay. So, we had two projects in the fall with Columbia Information, Knowledge, and Strategy, and it's in their library program, and it was all about knowledge transfer, knowledge. It's like management, but focusing on knowledge. It’s a whole area that, you know, I didn't know there was a process. So we started working with them.

00:04:43:04 - 00:05:16:07
Terri Matthews
We do work with NYU Tandon, management of Technology. We had two projects with them. One had to do with, okay, I get this. I'm just just remember, this pyrolysis-to-biochar is the next big thing. [Jie Ren: Oh, no.] This is a very big thing. [Jie Ren: Okay.] So we had the management of technology students focus on pyrolysis equipment and the market for the biochar that comes out of it for a particular city agency.

00:05:16:09 - 00:05:47:16
Terri Matthews
Let's see, Wagner, I'm a graduate of Wagner. So we have we have two, one is on maternal health. The other one is on what we're calling plastic roads. Where you take the idea is, post-consumer plastics, you know, from a MSW mass of municipal solid waste. [Jie Ren: Yea.] It could go into. And people are talking different places or experimenting with taking that plastic and putting it in the asphalt as a binder.

00:05:47:19 - 00:06:04:20
Terri Matthews
Yeah. So that could be like a little circular economy where we're generating our garbage or trash or whatever we want to call it, recyclables. And some of it can go into the roadway program. But so those are the two Wagner projects. Oh, we have Cornell Engineering.

00:06:04:22 - 00:06:05:12
Jie Ren
Chronotype.

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Terri Matthews
Yeah. Just. No, no, this is Cornell up in Ithaca. The engineering school just got a presentation. We had 13 students look at designing a utilidor.

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Jie Ren
Are you connecting with them online, or they are coming there, to here to the city?

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Terri Matthews
Well, you know, in the old days, before COVID, everything was in person.

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Jie Ren
Oh, okay. That’s a lot of effort.

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Terri Matthews
Because, well, the thing is, we weren't set up in government. We were not. I think they had screens, but no one knew how to use them. I mean, like, we just didn't do it. And then Covid happened and was like, bingo, we're in business. So, certainly, doing the work from home, everything was online. And it kind of was easier in a way.

00:06:51:14 - 00:06:57:18
Terri Matthews
But then you didn't get the interaction. Like, I met with your students when I came up every week.

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Jie Ren
Yes.

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Terri Matthews
And I think it's better.

00:07:00:21 - 00:07:02:21
Jie Ren
Yeah. You need that in-person interaction.

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Terri Matthews
If you're working with a school, for example, up in Ithaca, you can't do that. And so, but if the students and I, I try to, I try to, like maybe every two weeks, every three weeks, we come together in person. I just think it's it's good. Yeah. But some days it's like. I mean, I have like, ten projects this semester, and, yeah, there was no way we were going to do all of them in person, but yours was in person.

00:07:31:14 - 00:07:34:00
Terri Matthews
We came up here every Friday afternoon.

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Jie Ren
Thank you so much for that.

00:07:35:18 - 00:07:56:09
Terri Matthews
Anyways, so, put us all over the place. The built environment is a discipline. It's an interdisciplinary.. And it involves architecture, engineering. It involves tech, by the way, which has always thrown me for a loop—economics, management.

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Jie Ren
Okay. [Terri Matthews: Management, management.]

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Terri Matthews
And, there are a couple other fields. I have a graphic for that up on the website, but it's, we can do anything. You know, as long as it isn't metaphysical, that's that's where I draw the line. Metaphysics. We're not doing that.

00:08:13:22 - 00:08:28:13
Jie Ren
Okay, so, from what I just heard, it's all over the place, right? And then, like, definitely, that varies in terms of the nature of the project. So how did you make that decision in terms of what projects to, to like to use in collaboration?

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Terri Matthews
It's pretty much. I don’t, like I don't turn anything down if an agency comes to me. And so every year I do an outreach, give me your questions and, and people know the program. So they come to us throughout the year. And so I keep lists, because, you know, you have to hit the schools when they're thinking, like, we started this class last spring.

00:08:57:16 - 00:09:26:18
Terri Matthews
I mean, we were working on it over the summer. Yes. So there's like a, what do you call it, preparation period. [Jie Ren: Planning.] Planning and, basically agencies, you know, I beat the bushes, agencies come to me and I like 10 to 12 projects every year. I manage to make the connection with the program and students, and sometimes the program likes it. They go, oh, this is great.

00:09:26:20 - 00:09:48:18
Terri Matthews
And then you have to go, and it's the dog and pony show for the students, and they get to pick. And some years the students are not interested in what students four years earlier were interested in. It's the it's a little like fashion. It just keeps changing what they're interested in. But when we make the match, we do it.

00:09:48:20 - 00:10:27:05
Terri Matthews
And if the A project is related to a working group, I post it directly. I don't Pasco, I just put it up on the website. So for example, the three presentations from December are up on the website. Anyone can look at them. And and then the things that don't go into a working group, I keep everything, so I know where everything is, and the work from other projects is can be like a resource for new projects.

00:10:27:07 - 00:10:55:07
Terri Matthews
Like if you got a new student group doing something, it was like, I remember we did this and we did this, and I just send it to them. And then we do events. This last year, we did an event on the subsurface in June. That was a big one. And then, in November, we did, an event on dredge, navigational dredge, with the US Army Corps of Engineers.

00:10:55:07 - 00:11:05:13
Terri Matthews
It was pretty cool. And then, we have an ongoing, partnership with the Vision Zero task force. And so every year they do a research on the road event.

00:11:05:15 - 00:11:07:10
Jie Ren
I remember I received the newsletter. [Terri Matthews: Yes,]

00:11:07:14 - 00:11:40:14
Terri Matthews
and you can come. So, hello. So, I've never lacked for projects. And if I can't get the project the year it comes in, we do it the following year, as long as it's still of interest. And, I'm very creative and very, persistent. [Jie Ren: I know.] And so, but and I think generally it's a good experience for you.

00:11:40:14 - 00:12:01:14
Terri Matthews
Got it. It's got to be good for the students. They've got to have learned something, and it's got to be valuable to them. But we and we need a work product that the agencies can take back and go, oh, this is all very interesting. Let's think about this. And I think, by and large, we've done that, rather well.

00:12:01:14 - 00:12:02:02
Terri Matthews

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Jie Ren
Yeah. I really like that. You mentioned the work product in the end, right. So kind of like students are these consultants in a way, right? They are trying to, raise the city government together to figure out what is the situation, what could be the solutions. So from your past experiences, did the government use any of the solutions in terms of decision making.

00:12:23:02 - 00:12:24:09
Jie Ren

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Terri Matthews
Okay, well that's okay. This is called action research. And the idea is you do the research you reflect. This is all in the literature. I read this when I started doing you research you reflect. And when you do the research the academics and the practitioners are equal partners. This is not like you study us and then you go off and do whatever you want.

00:12:47:01 - 00:13:12:13
Terri Matthews
And we're in this together with you. And that's the same for the, funded research projects under the master contract. So you do the research. This is experiential. You reflect. That's where we have the events, and you talk, and you explore, and then you go, and this happened. We did a lifecycle cost-benefit, for the sustainable streets.

00:13:12:17 - 00:13:40:15
Terri Matthews
This was like in 2009, maybe 2011. And we couldn't get any data. Okay. We just couldn't. So we had an event and we talked about the data gap. And that led to someone saying just out of nowhere saying, well, blah, blah, blah, blah. So we went, oh, so we need to focus on this. It turns out we had a focus on the regulatory for the private utilities.

00:13:40:17 - 00:13:57:05
Terri Matthews
And so you don't end up with a ,you know, huh we’re going to do this. It is just a continuing moving forward with people understanding the situation. But let's see.

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Jie Ren
It's very much like the, you know, the students, the Fordham students did their presentations in the city hall. I know that it was a, full house. We got the the people from like audience from different agencies, different departments. I'm sure they got like inspired.

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Terri Matthews
[Jie Ren: Right.] Well, it was the

00:14:14:05 - 00:14:16:08
Jie Ren
Solutions.

00:14:16:10 - 00:14:22:05
Terri Matthews
Your students did this. We learned a lot. I'll try not.

00:14:22:05 - 00:14:23:11
Jie Ren
Students learned a lot.

00:14:23:13 - 00:14:52:16
Terri Matthews
No, but we learned a lot about the data set. We I mean, and so and people in the audience were asking a lot of the same questions we were struggling with. So, we posted it, because and so what do we do? Well, Will and I or, you know, sorting it into infrastructure and public buildings. [Jie Ren: Yes.] And then doing the typology.

00:14:52:16 - 00:15:06:12
Terri Matthews
Yeah. So Will thought maybe there could be a machine learning exercise, kind of like some of the ones we did with you couple of years ago to see if we could create some rules so that, you.

00:15:06:16 - 00:15:08:03
Jie Ren
Know, classifications. Yeah.

00:15:08:03 - 00:15:13:04
Terri Matthews
Yeah. We're, we're, we're going to try to do it, you know, in-house on our own.

00:15:13:06 - 00:15:14:21
Jie Ren
But maybe in the future. [Terri Matthews: But, but.]

00:15:14:21 - 00:15:24:12
Terri Matthews
By the time the, fall, if we do it again we could do that. Plus there'll be more reporting periods. So this.

00:15:24:14 - 00:15:25:17
Jie Ren
Data is fuller.

00:15:25:19 - 00:15:56:17
Terri Matthews
And that we couldn't go back to the completed projects. Going back to the 2013, there were so many things we could have done. So we learned we talked about it. Can I just say it's not nothing? I mean, that's an important thing. [Jie Ren: Yes.] People taking the time out of their day to have a conversation about whatever it is we're talking about, and we just keep going and going, and we keep posting, and we have events.

00:15:56:18 - 00:16:26:01
Terri Matthews
And, so in terms of action, how we think this is not; if you need something right away, like you don't come to this program like right away. [Jie Ren: Yeah.] This is this is not right away stuff. You hire a consultant and get the answer. [Jie Ren: Yes.] If it's a right away kind of thing. But this is sort of like the simmering, long-term things that never quite get resolved.

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Terri Matthews
The kind of real they're important. But can you live and do the work without it? But if you can eventually get further along, I can't really. It's well, you know, this is a different thing. We could talk about the utilidor working group, but I don't think we want to do that. That's moved ahead a lot over the years,

00:16:50:18 - 00:17:00:03
Terri Matthews
and now that we have, now that we have the database, every city project. [Jie Ren: Yes.] We can keep doing this work. 

00:17:00:05 - 00:17:00:08
Jie Ren
Yes.

00:17:00:10 - 00:17:23:22
Terri Matthews
With you, your students, because I was thinking one of the questions you asked me was, what about what can business students lend to these kinds of projects? And I work with engineering students, public policy students, design students. Business students.

00:17:24:00 - 00:17:49:11
Terri Matthews
That the public instruction, one of our best commissioners said to me, I look at it as a business. And I went, wow, that's that's very interesting. It is a business. [Jie Ren: It is.] It's not a for-profit business, but it's a business [Jie Ren: It is.] And we engage with firms that are for-profit. [Jie Ren: Yes.] You know, the contractors, which is a whole other kind of thing that needs to be studied.

00:17:49:11 - 00:18:18:01
Terri Matthews
But because I don't, being a contractor on public or on any job, it's a really tough business. But this is a business. We couldn't give this data set to engineering students, like they understand infrastructure. They understand, and our architects understand public buildings. But the kind of data that's in that data set, it's business data.

00:18:18:01 - 00:18:20:17
Jie Ren
Yeah. And especially it's about project management. Right.

00:18:20:18 - 00:18:51:06
Terri Matthews
It's manage, it's it's a lot of things. But business students look at an organization as a thing that has inputs and outputs. And for the entity to keep moving, it's got to make a profit. Not for profits. Don't make a profit. They have a fund balance. But if you want to keep an organization moving forward, you've got to look at that entire financial thing.

00:18:51:06 - 00:19:22:18
Terri Matthews
And this data set is cost and schedule and business students. Once you introduce them to the setting, which most people fall into construction industry, it's a fascinating business. It's a fascinating industry. But, but the business students. So, that's why I think we've done a —I have it here —I counted them out—16 over from 2013 to 2025.

00:19:22:18 - 00:19:45:00
Terri Matthews
[Jie Ren: Yea, that’s a lot of projects.] Yeah, yeah. And some years we did as many as four with different groups of students. And they've all been good. I mean, really, it's it's been a pleasure working with the Gabelli students, and I love Fordham. I went to Boston College, so there's like that thing.

00:19:45:05 - 00:20:04:22
Terri Matthews
[Jie Ren: Yeah.] So, so that's why I think business students can analyze things that most people think, engineers, architects, planners. It's management. You're right. And that's one of our disciplines.

00:20:05:03 - 00:20:28:05
Jie Ren
Yes. And then since now we are talking about students. Right. And then let's talk about like the skill sets that students could bring to the table in addition to their domain knowledge. Of course the projects vary. Some in nature, some some of them are more engineering orientated, some of them are more business or analytics orientated. Right. So what skill sets are you looking for from students?

00:20:28:07 - 00:20:30:02
Jie Ren
[Terri Matthews: Well,] A soft skill,

00:20:30:02 - 00:20:55:10
Terri Matthews
[Jie Ren: hard skill.] Well, I don't know the difference. But basically with this program you can analyze this s*** out of anything. I mean this they can and that's what we need, the data. It's not like, I don't know, I'm trying to think of, like, it's not a sexy area. We're talking about basic cost, schedule, time, and money.

00:20:55:10 - 00:20:58:19
Jie Ren
spending and also time spent.

00:20:59:00 - 00:21:10:18
Terri Matthews
But it's in the relationship between cost and spending is something that's we know, spending, cost, schedule, quality. They're all.

00:21:10:19 - 00:21:12:18
Jie Ren
Yeah.

00:21:12:20 - 00:21:54:02
Terri Matthews
And so if you have basic administrative and this is administrative work of collecting this data and present, it's part of our work. So it's administrative data. We're not producing it to study it. We're doing the work and it's like a corollary. It's a collateral. Right. So it's administrative data. And as long as you have, people who can analyze it but have to understand the domain, they have to, like, have they have to be willing to spend a little time understanding construction.

00:21:54:07 - 00:22:02:21
Terri Matthews
[Jie Ren: Yes.] And the whole process. So it's, I mean, are the analytical skills hard skills or soft skills?

00:22:03:00 - 00:22:05:21
Jie Ren
Hard skill? It really depends on like what techniques you are talking about.

00:22:05:22 - 00:22:15:00
Terri Matthews
So it's it's the hard skills, you know, we come to you because we got a we got data, we want it analyzed. And I guess the soft skills.

00:22:15:05 - 00:22:22:11
Jie Ren
For example, communication skills and ability, the people skill, the ability to interpret the data in terms of relating that to the context.

00:22:22:12 - 00:22:35:11
Terri Matthews
Right. And so that's important. And in this kind of this kind of data set, the domain, you have to be. Yeah. We met with them every week.

00:22:35:11 - 00:22:35:17
Jie Ren
Yes.

00:22:35:17 - 00:22:37:21
Terri Matthews
I was sending them emails all the time.

00:22:37:23 - 00:22:38:03
Jie Ren
Truely even more so.

00:22:38:03 - 00:23:02:16
Terri Matthews
You have to do you have to be in there with them. And this is not just this project. It's a lot of them. I am on a weekly cadence on all the projects, definitely at the beginning, because it's just, there's so much they have to understand before they start. I mean, they just wanted to, there's a program.

00:23:02:16 - 00:23:21:18
Terri Matthews
I'm not going to mention it. They're really, really smart. They're really, really good, and they're data scientists. And if you give them the data set before you meet with them, the next thing you know, they they've they've already come up with predictive analysis. And it's a little crazy because they don't know what the data set is coming from.

00:23:21:20 - 00:23:48:12
Terri Matthews
We try to avoid that one time that happens. Like what? [Jie Ren: Too far.] Because they can because they. But this is the thing about when I learned statistics a million [censored] years ago. And you can delete that, but I don't think you want to, because it's really that we learn statistics. You have to have a hypothesis. The problem at the time, you had to do research, you had to design your regression and had to get the data.

00:23:48:12 - 00:24:01:07
Terri Matthews
The problem is always the data. Yeah. Because, you know, I had to do surveys. I mean, this is and then the internet, and data, and data science, this was during the.

00:24:01:07 - 00:24:03:10
Jie Ren
Learning algorithms have been used more and more.

00:24:03:16 - 00:24:13:20
Terri Matthews
Well it's just the idea the data, open data. It's city government before Bloomberg. And this wasn't like right at the beginning. You should have seized,

00:24:13:22 - 00:24:14:02
Jie Ren

00:24:14:02 - 00:24:30:04
Terri Matthews
you could fill agencies. But we didn't share data. We were kind of there was a reluctance to share. And you had a foil. It was very. And then all of a sudden, you know.

00:24:30:04 - 00:24:32:00
Jie Ren
You always could open it

00:24:32:02 - 00:24:53:08
Terri Matthews
We have the open data portal, like, we're putting a lot of stuff. But the thinking at that time was, and I remember this because it's like, give us the data, will will analyze it and solve your problems. It's like, how do you know what we're doing? You they're they're these the old statistics, which is where. And that's the domain.

00:24:53:08 - 00:24:59:03
Terri Matthews
You got to understand the domain I guess. Spent time. You just can't like go at the data

00:24:59:05 - 00:24:59:15
Jie Ren
Yea, exactly.

00:24:59:16 - 00:25:11:02
Terri Matthews
and do stuff with it. So there is a need to slow down the process before you can let the what they all want to do predictive. [Jie Ren: And then they just prove]

00:25:11:02 - 00:25:13:08
Jie Ren
themselves, right? I can get that.

00:25:13:08 - 00:25:37:19
Terri Matthews
And so we always have to leave, room at the end of a project so that they could do the predictive. And at some point, if you keep doing it enough, especially if we keep doing it with your students and, and the build up of all of the stuff we've done in the past, the predictive analyses might actually be predictive, you know.

00:25:37:19 - 00:25:39:20
Jie Ren
Yea, like be very informative. Yeah.

00:25:39:21 - 00:26:10:20
Terri Matthews
Like you could go, oh, well, maybe we could do that. So, and the soft skills, you know, there's students. Excuse me. I mean, they're busy. I mean, when I was a student, I mean, when I, when I do anything, I'm, I'm not on my computer. I'm not on my phone because I hate my phone. And I'm always writing because that's how I came through.

00:26:10:22 - 00:26:37:23
Terri Matthews
And they're all on their tablets. I know they're taking notes, but you're talking and there's no, So, you know, there was a lot of getting to know you and but the soft skills, but the, you know, the engagement, which is why in-person is so important because you can't really do that. Really. But yes, the, is they know you.

00:26:37:23 - 00:27:13:08
Terri Matthews
You know them. You have these conversations where, you know, and some students are shy. You know, it's not every student is, gregarious. And there are usually some who are more, it's it's it's a mix. Yeah. But. And being curious, really interested, and asking questions when the students start ask questions, that's when you know you're having this mind meld kind of thing.

00:27:13:10 - 00:27:39:01
Terri Matthews
You know, Star Wars, not Star Wars, Star Trek, the mind meld, you know? [Jie Ren: Yes.] But when they start talking to you and asking you questions, you know, you've made that connection. So the soft skills, I mean, I keep saying to students, I say this to all of them, and this comes from my training as an attorney. When I first started working, a partner said, there are no stupid questions.

00:27:39:03 - 00:28:04:07
Terri Matthews
None. You ask because this is not new. You're the first person to think about it. Ask will tell you so you don't waste time in our client's money trying to figure it out. So I say to the students, there are no stupid questions. [Jie Ren: Yes.] Sometimes I feel like they are afraid to ask them because they think they're stupid, and they don't want to be judged.

00:28:04:07 - 00:28:35:06
Terri Matthews
And I said, look, we're not grading you. I want you to understand this [Jie Ren: Yeah.] And I think, you know, face-to-face meetings helps with that. It's really hard remotely because they're just they're presenting. Do you have any questions? But, trying to get them to ask. So I say no stupid question. And the only stupid question is the one you didn't ask that I could have answered earlier, and we could have been over that problem.

00:28:35:08 - 00:28:53:14
Terri Matthews
Yeah. But, you know, by and large, all of these programs I work with, the students are great. And I think it's because they have something real [Jie Ren: Yes.] as opposed to their other programs, where to have a capstone is going to come from

00:28:53:14 - 00:28:56:13
Jie Ren
[Terri Matthews: the professors.] Could be a made-up scenario.

00:28:56:13 - 00:29:18:04
Terri Matthews
It's more made. And, I've tried unsuccessfully. So really, you know, what a question from an actual agency. Now it's got to come from the professors, and I've tried to work with them, and they're not bad projects. I mean, they're still good for the students, don't get me wrong, but they're not real. They come up with kind of ideas.

00:29:18:04 - 00:29:31:07
Terri Matthews
It's like, well, this is interesting, but this isn't, you know, gonna help. And I think when you, give students something that's actually real, it makes a difference.

00:29:31:09 - 00:29:38:22
Jie Ren
Okay. So, maybe let's kind of shift our conversation a little bit because we know that AI is transforming the society.

00:29:39:00 - 00:29:40:10
Terri Matthews
Oh. Okay. Yeah, that was a.

00:29:40:12 - 00:29:41:23
Jie Ren
That's a question.

00:29:42:01 - 00:29:45:10
Terri Matthews
The answer is, I don't know. Okay. Okay, I don't know okay.

00:29:45:10 - 00:29:46:09
Jie Ren
Maybe we don't talk about.

00:29:46:09 - 00:30:28:08
Terri Matthews
No, no but okay okay. So I hate my phone. I'm not fond of the internet. You know, I'm I'm just. But this AI thing is happening. I'm like, Yeah. Soon this project, this, FFall with the Columbia IKNS Information Knowledge Strategy program, which is about knowledge transfer. So we have at the city a multi-agency initiative that has been going on for several administrations.

00:30:28:08 - 00:30:53:04
Terri Matthews
Okay. And what they wanted, you know, that we they learned things. There's this back and forth with researchers, and they wanted to get ahead of a curve. They wanted us. How can we learn about what's going on, new emerging tech, what's going on in other cities or places where we don't know the language? So they, we're talking about that.

00:30:53:04 - 00:31:15:04
Terri Matthews
Listen, I, I think we could do this as a project. So we started that project and that's when I understood the value of AI. And it kind of actually reminded me of one of the presentations I heard for, this is years ago with the UN project. The AI

00:31:15:06 - 00:31:17:18
Jie Ren
They’re building a localized Chat GPT command for that

00:31:17:18 - 00:31:53:20
Terri Matthews
Yes, it like I remember learning that and then it’s like, oh that’s it. Oh fascinating. [Jie Ren: Yeah.] And and then it like kind of clicked and I realized that it’s a tool and and we so I think but, the city isn’t quite there yet to, let the agencies use it, because it’s a big city, I think like 46 agencies.

00:31:53:22 - 00:31:56:06
Jie Ren
It could also be like data privacy issues, right? Some of the data that

00:31:56:07 - 00:32:15:00
Terri Matthews
But we have an agency is called, Office of Technology and Innovation. They are the agency. Like there's OMB that does the budget for all the agencies. There's Mayor's Office of Contracts, all the procurement. OTI does all of the policy for tech,

00:32:15:05 - 00:32:15:22
Jie Ren

00:32:17:03 - 00:32:47:23
Terri Matthews
new tech, you know, supporting innovative tech, but also the tech for all of our agencies to make sure everything is secure. So the rolling out of this is on its way. And I've had conversations and I know they're they're thinking about it, but I get it. I think if done properly, which I have every I, I know that we're careful in.

00:32:48:01 - 00:32:50:22
Jie Ren
We agree with you with caution there.

00:32:51:00 - 00:33:08:04
Terri Matthews
And, you know, the there's a whole lot of stuff, but once it rolls out, I think there could be, agencies are ready to use it because it will help, do things faster. [Jie Ren: Yeah, it’s just like]

00:33:08:06 - 00:33:19:01
Jie Ren
five, ten faster, for example, more info, informative. And also, like automated. Right. So that [Terri Matthews: but, you know.] faster. Yeah. But there are concerns as well. 

00:33:19:01 - 00:33:44:06
Terri Matthews
[Jie Ren: Of course.] But you have to. Okay. I wrote an article, it got published with another professor and it was painstaking and, and and it was it's original work because it came out of my head. Right. And I'm working. I have another article that I'm thinking about, which is a follow-up. And then all this AI comes out,

00:33:44:08 - 00:33:50:19
Terri Matthews
There's a part of me that actually feels like if you have AI, write something for.

00:33:50:23 - 00:33:52:22
Jie Ren
You don't get to read or.

00:33:52:22 - 00:33:55:06
Terri Matthews
Score or synthesize.

00:33:55:09 - 00:33:55:19
Jie Ren
For you.

00:33:55:20 - 00:34:16:19
Terri Matthews
Because I think it's cheating. I actually there was a little teeny part of me that thought, well, okay, I'm going to do this new article because you learn, you synthesize. It is your work. You cite properly to everybody else, but you're putting it together. [Jie Ren: Yes.] is your work. And this is true of all of the students’ work.

00:34:16:19 - 00:34:47:19
Terri Matthews
They do literature surveys, and they synthesize it. And and, by the way, I tell them, everyone I know AI on your papers, it's got to be work. And I can tell it's their work because. Yeah, I can tell. But that's how you learn. You can, but maybe so I thought, well, after I write this article, which hasn't happened yet, it's like, maybe I just ask AI to write that article and see what the difference would be.

00:34:47:21 - 00:35:04:21
Terri Matthews
But it'll be a million years before I write that article. But I just still think it's cheating. So if you can leverage it as a tool, but you always have to check the work, you always have to double-check because it's a machine thing.

00:35:04:22 - 00:35:07:04
Jie Ren
It could be like making up stuff.

00:35:07:06 - 00:35:28:17
Terri Matthews
It's well, it's what it's what it is. So you still need to train students in the basics, like for day statistics? Yes. Statistics, descriptive statistics, correlations. You know, the boring stuff before you get to predictive. Because if you don't go through those steps and understand the domain, you are not going to have end models that make any sense.

00:35:28:19 - 00:35:31:07
Jie Ren

00:35:31:09 - 00:35:42:01
Terri Matthews
It's you got to be careful. So so the answer is I think the city will be they’re just, they're working on it.

00:35:42:03 - 00:35:59:05
Jie Ren
Yeah. I agree with you in terms of the cautious attitude towards the use of AI, especially in the educational context. Right. So we want students, as an educator myself, like from my point of view, I want students to get exposed, exposed to the use of AI because a lot of companies.

00:35:59:05 - 00:36:00:02
Terri Matthews
They're going to need it.

00:36:00:02 - 00:36:20:09
Jie Ren
Yeah, they're going to need it. They're going to need it, for example, for ideation, for information, kind of, acquisition. But I, I at the end of the day, they also need to actually demonstrate what they can bring to the table. Right? So they cannot use AI to replace their learning. At best to facilitate their learning.

00:36:20:11 - 00:36:22:16
Jie Ren
There is a fine line though. [Terri Matthews: Yeah, it's]

00:36:22:17 - 00:36:45:18
Terri Matthews
It's when I first started out as a lawyer okay. This is the deal. When you would write legal memos, we had to go with the books. We were in the books, and there was this, term called jeopardizing you how to make sure that the case you were citing hadn't been overruled. And it was a very laborious process.

00:36:45:18 - 00:37:08:16
Terri Matthews
We all learned how to do it. And then at some point toward the end of law school, something called lexis came out, and the shepherdization could be done by machine. And, I was, on law review, so I couldn't get to use it. But when I went to the firms, they said, you can use it, but it was wicked expensive, right?

00:37:08:18 - 00:37:34:13
Terri Matthews
And so I did the Shepherd ization myself because I knew how to do it, and I knew I knew my work. And then I would run it to see if the machine caught something that I missed. So it was like a check. So that has always been my methodology with technology. I know how to do stuff. I know how to think, I know how to use resource.

00:37:34:15 - 00:37:41:04
Terri Matthews
So we all had to learn the research paper how to write a research paper.

00:37:41:06 - 00:37:59:04
Terri Matthews
We had to put things on notecards. There’s if you're writing a oh, it was awful anyway. And so the computer, you don't have to write a note card. You can take notes and you can file and then you can move things around. It was great when I finally learned, oh, you mean I can word processing? I don't have to write

00:37:59:04 - 00:38:01:05
Jie Ren
[Terri Matthews: everything speed up.] Right?

00:38:01:07 - 00:38:01:18
Terri Matthews
But you still have to

00:38:01:18 - 00:38:03:18
Jie Ren

00:38:03:20 - 00:38:29:22
Terri Matthews
know the work. You have to be able to check it. It's just that simple. You have to check that it's right and it's something. If it's got your name on it that you would have, it's your work product. It's otherwise, you know, so, so yeah. And so students need to know how to do it, but they need to know the skills.

00:38:30:00 - 00:38:31:14
Jie Ren
The fundamentals. [Terri Matthews: the fundamentals.]

00:38:31:14 - 00:38:36:02
Terri Matthews
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly I think so I could be wrong, but.

00:38:36:04 - 00:38:56:19
Jie Ren
I know I 100% agree with you. So you know me I also paint. Right. So I think I can use this as a metaphor. Like from my own experience, I feel like in order to be to be pursuing other styles in terms of like abstract impressionism, etc., etc., you have to set your foundation strong, which is coming from realism.

00:38:56:21 - 00:39:06:01
Jie Ren
Right. So it's kind of the same idea. Right. So you can know like how to use the different AI tools, but you have to make sure that you have the fundamentals covering the first, first.

00:39:06:05 - 00:39:08:09
Terri Matthews
Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah.

00:39:08:11 - 00:39:17:00
Jie Ren
So I have one final question. [Terri Matthews: Yes. Yes ma'am.] All right. So I the director of the program at Town+Gown Program. What is your future vision? [Terri Matthews: Yes,]

00:39:17:02 - 00:39:21:07
Terri Matthews
Okay. I saw that when I was like, oh geez.

00:39:21:09 - 00:39:23:00
Jie Ren
It's a big question.

00:39:23:02 - 00:39:49:05
Terri Matthews
Okay. So this has been going along for, I mean, we started it in officially. The first academic year was 2009, 2010. I've been doing this. [Jie Ren: For many.] 16 years now, and the year before we did a lot of incubation to get it started. [Jie Ren: mhmm] And the master contract, we're in the process of extending the last two for an additional five years.

00:39:49:05 - 00:40:21:15
Terri Matthews
They ran for ten years, and so they're going to be expiring. And I don't know that, I will be doing a new one. At some point, I think I might, I don't know, I could do this forever, but. But what's the future? Replication. This model, it's a university community partnership. And there are a lot of variations of university community partnerships.

00:40:21:15 - 00:40:33:06
Terri Matthews
But this one solves two problems, solves the problems of academics, programs needing real questions. So we we got that. And it solves the.

00:40:33:11 - 00:40:35:07
Jie Ren
Data, for example, that data.

00:40:35:07 - 00:41:05:19
Terri Matthews
Real data, real questions, real real things, not pretend things. [Jie Ren: Yes. Yes.] And it solves the problem for agencies that just want to get a little bit better understanding of something that they just don't have the time to get to. And we solve the procurement problem because for agencies to access faculty directed research, it.

00:41:05:21 - 00:41:36:02
Terri Matthews
The master contract pretty much makes it as simple as it can be done. Those to the experiential learning model and the master contract are replicable. You could do it up in Boston. Sometimes I want to go up to Boston and say, hey, you want to do this? Yes. Or Philadelphia? I've have conversations with people in Philadelphia, but, and I go around and I talk about it. I’m, I pretty much won’t shut up about it.

00:41:36:04 - 00:41:39:12
Jie Ren
It’s your baby. [Terri Matthews: Yeah, I’m proud of it.]

00:41:39:12 - 00:42:19:10
Terri Matthews
I think having it be replicated in different cities, because what it does is the universities that are clustered in an area are important to the economics of the place. If is the North Carolina Research Triangle as an example, Silicon Valley up in Massachusetts, the 128, the medical kind of thing? [Jie Ren: Yes.] In some places, the, the university and maybe with the medical center are kind of the only deal in town.

00:42:19:12 - 00:42:53:16
Terri Matthews
But and the town there's a we call a town and gown. Well, that's there's a negative part to that where the town feels the town doesn't appreciate, you know, there's a that there's that thing. But town and gown, can be a very fruitful. But there are barriers. There are procurement barriers. There are language barrier. I mean, researchers talk a certain way and agency people I've been on both sides and I kind of like go back and forth.

00:42:53:16 - 00:43:15:06
Terri Matthews
That's, you know, after they say something like that's what they meant. So just, you know, you're saying the same thing just with different words. It's the same thing. So the program, if I could, I could just find a city that wanted to do it. I went up to Boston about seven years ago and they all seemed really interested.

00:43:15:08 - 00:43:47:13
Terri Matthews
Philadelphia. They've called me a couple of times. So if I and, if I can find, another New York City group of agencies that have an issue area where they would like to have their own master contract for their issue. So I'm trying to, like, make it spread, [Jie Ren: Smarter] not like a disease, but spread, you know, and replicate.

00:43:47:16 - 00:44:16:00
Terri Matthews
Because I think I, I think we would definitely solve the procurement problem, which is like a big, impediment. And, and there are a lot of programs and I've worked with them that want to support towns and their universities and experiential learning. But,

00:44:16:02 - 00:44:36:17
Terri Matthews
I, I just think if you don't have the master contract in place while you're doing all this other getting people thinking and doing things, if the agency says, you know, now we're ready to move and do the real research, they won't have that thing to go to.

00:44:36:19 - 00:44:40:05
Jie Ren
You need the background information to be solid.

00:44:40:06 - 00:44:43:03
Terri Matthews
So replication is the future.

00:44:43:05 - 00:45:07:10
Jie Ren
Oh, yes. That’s amazing. So I know that definitely. You know like your vision, right, will be rolling out to other communities. Well I end up day right. So universities and also this city government what I mean, right. So so they're all, like, serving communities, right? We all need together. Right? So yeah. And I’m like, very much looking forward to working with you again.

00:45:07:12 - 00:45:13:12
Terri Matthews
Well, we're going to hit you next year. Yes, yes. So, so thank you.

00:45:13:17 - 00:45:21:06
Jie Ren
Thank you for being on the podcast. I had a pleasure talking to you. And, I need to know more about Town+Gown.

00:45:21:07 - 00:45:22:16
Terri Matthews
And, oh, we have a website.

00:45:22:21 - 00:45:24:12
Jie Ren
Yes, please. Talk about it

00:45:24:14 - 00:45:51:18
Terri Matthews
All you have to do is in your search engine. Right? Town+Gown, NYC. One word. You'll get there. There's landing page, and you can look around. It has a nice graphic of the action research cycle. So you go you look at my email address and my phone number. You can call you can email me. I, I, I'm always happy to talk to people about it.

00:45:51:19 - 00:45:54:22
Jie Ren
Nice. So check out this website then. Thank you so much.