Political & Advocacy
ColorCode was started in the 2014-2015 school year as a project of the Intercultural Resources Center, a special interest community oriented towards social justice. Our mission has therefore always been political in nature. We aim to use technology and entrepreneurship as tools to envision and build anti-racist, anti-sexist, anti-oppressive futures.
Our work over the past year has been centered around three tenets in order to accomplish this mission: 1) building the skills of Black and Brown student technologists at this school and in the Harlem community, 2) supporting the ideas and projects of Black and Brown students, 3) advocating for an anti-racist, fully inclusive technology curriculum at this school, particularly in the Computer Science Department and in SEAS, and 4) building deep and meaningful coalitions with other groups on campus who serve underrepresented people in technology. ColorCode therefore fills a niche on campus that is not covered by existing technology- or identity-based groups because we believe that in order to build technology to serve communities, we not only need more people of color going into tech (representation), we also need to change the very nature and purpose of the work that the tech industry does to be more accountable, responsive, and pertinent to working class communities of color (transformation). Examples of our work up to present: Hosted weekly meetings for general membership on issues relating to people of color for tech. Co-founded SISTEMIC a coalition of tech organizations serving underrepresented students. Hosted a “Let’s Make a Website” workshop to teach students how to build their own personal website hosted by Columbia servers. Brought a Stanford professor to campus to discuss applying to graduate school for engineering. Ran a technical interview prep session in anticipation of interview season for summer tech internships and full-time tech jobs. Hosted an introductory workshop on web security practices.Held accountable a professor who issued a racist “robo-cop” assignment in a Machine Learning class.Applied for and received SGB co-sponsorship to bring Stefan Grant, founder of NoirBNB, to campus for an anti-racist tech talk (scheduled for mid-November)
Our work over the past year has been centered around three tenets in order to accomplish this mission: 1) building the skills of Black and Brown student technologists at this school and in the Harlem community, 2) supporting the ideas and projects of Black and Brown students, 3) advocating for an anti-racist, fully inclusive technology curriculum at this school, particularly in the Computer Science Department and in SEAS, and 4) building deep and meaningful coalitions with other groups on campus who serve underrepresented people in technology. ColorCode therefore fills a niche on campus that is not covered by existing technology- or identity-based groups because we believe that in order to build technology to serve communities, we not only need more people of color going into tech (representation), we also need to change the very nature and purpose of the work that the tech industry does to be more accountable, responsive, and pertinent to working class communities of color (transformation). Examples of our work up to present: Hosted weekly meetings for general membership on issues relating to people of color for tech. Co-founded SISTEMIC a coalition of tech organizations serving underrepresented students. Hosted a “Let’s Make a Website” workshop to teach students how to build their own personal website hosted by Columbia servers. Brought a Stanford professor to campus to discuss applying to graduate school for engineering. Ran a technical interview prep session in anticipation of interview season for summer tech internships and full-time tech jobs. Hosted an introductory workshop on web security practices.Held accountable a professor who issued a racist “robo-cop” assignment in a Machine Learning class.Applied for and received SGB co-sponsorship to bring Stefan Grant, founder of NoirBNB, to campus for an anti-racist tech talk (scheduled for mid-November)
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