Amazon Robotics is primary sponsor of new Black in Robotics Boston chapter

At a virtual student event connected to the International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), Amazon Robotics and the recently established Black in Robotics (BiR) organization will announce tomorrow they’re collaborating to create BiR’s first regional chapter, the first of what BiR hopes will be many chapters established across the US.  

Amazon Robotics’ sponsorship includes financial support for events and other activities in the Boston area, as well as providing meeting and event space in Amazon’s offices in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The Boston chapter will help create opportunities for up-and-coming roboticists, and help enrich the company’s talent pipeline, says Tye Brady, Amazon Robotics’ chief technology officer. Amazon Robotics’ headquarters is located in North Reading, Massachusetts, just north of Boston.  The Boston chapter will help Black engineering and science students at Boston-area colleges and universities such as MIT, Harvard, Boston University, Boston College, Northeastern, the University of Massachusetts, Tufts, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Olin College, and Brown University, network and obtain mentoring and internship  opportunities from area academic and industry professionals.

“Black in Robotics is really about building community and advocating for diversity, and encouraging accountability,” said Ayanna Howard, chair of the School of Interactive Computing within the College of Computing at Georgia Tech, one of BiR’s founders, and a member of its leadership team. “We feel it makes sense to start in Boston because of the large robotics community that exists there, and because there are a large number of students there attending regional universities. It’s an ideal location to start because we can reach out to the students and reach engineers there, and establish a presence, and a blueprint for how we can build communities elsewhere.”

“If you’re an underrepresented minority student at one of the area colleges and universities, you might be only one of two or three people who look like you in your classes, and if you’re a professional working in industry, you might also be only one of two or three roboticists who look like you in your organization,” Howard added. “So this chapter is about building community, and helping students and professionals develop a network, and avoid the isolation they might otherwise feel.”

“We are really driven by the fact that we need to be the change we want to see,” added Monroe Kennedy III, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford University who is also a founding member of BiR, and a member of its leadership team. “African Americans especially, but minorities in general, are underrepresented in STEM, and in robotics. As members of the robotics community, we recognize how valuable being a member of the community is to every aspect of our lives. So our objective is to make that opportunity available to more underrepresented minorities.”

“The current and pervasive lack of racial, ethnic, and gender diversity in the technology ecosystem presents a significant national challenge,” says a report on women and girls of color in computing from the Kapor Center, and other contributors.

Brady says Amazon Robotics is excited to support BiR’s mission of bringing together researchers, industry professionals, and students in robotics to support one another, and help navigate academic, industry, and entrepreneurial paths. When Howard talked with Brady recently about how to address systemic inequities in robotics and the role Amazon Robotics could play in supporting the Boston BiR chapter, he didn’t hesitate.

“Ayanna is an amazing individual with deep technical chops.  Whenever she gets behind something, I pay attention,” Brady said. “I’m excited to support her and the organization’s mission.”

Brady believes it’s important to define the future of robotics with a mindset of diversity and inclusion.

“Why do I say that?  Three reasons,” Brady said. “First, we become more creative with diverse viewpoints and perspectives, which ultimately leads to better robotics. Second, diversity is the answer to adversity. By that I mean, teams become stronger when they’re diverse; they bring more opportunities, more experience, and more viewpoints to the challenge of tackling hard problems. And third, we can source talent from a much larger pool of talent. We’re constantly seeking the best and the brightest to help us reimagine the future, and that means including others than yourself. We really need to grow the talent pipeline in computer engineering generally, and robotics more specifically, and this is a great opportunity to do that.”

The importance of mentoring

Kennedy says the new BiR Boston chapter represents the deep commitment industry and academia have to increasing the number of underrepresented minorities within STEM professions.  He’s excited about the forthcoming opportunities for students, faculty, and industry professionals to learn from each other, and collaborate on projects together.

“This is really a great opportunity for academia and industry to come together, put everything aside, and really come together as roboticists who care about each other, and want to help one another.  This first chapter can really facilitate that vision,” Kennedy said.

The mentorship component of BiR’s vision resonated with Brady.

“I just think about my own experiences when it comes to having mentors, having people help you when you have an interest in something, but no experience,” Brady said. “I’m thankful to those people who extended a helping hand to me. I’m thankful to those companies who said, ‘I can help you; I can give you a chance.’ I’ve lived that, and it’s important to pass that experience on to others. This initiative provides a great opportunity to do that.  Not just for myself, but for our entire Amazon Robotics team.”

Kennedy says he, too, has benefited from many mentors in his career journey, and he’s pulled together different attributes from each to help guide his career and lifestyle choices.

“One thing that was lacking is there wasn’t necessarily one place I could go where these examples came together in a nice, cohesive way,” Kennedy says. “This is something Black in Robotics has to offer. We want to bring these individuals, these examples, together in a cohesive way, so students don’t have to look all over the place to get exposed to these positive examples, to find their heroes.”

Mentorship is a critical component of Howard’s role as a professor at Georgia Tech.

“My group at Tech is very diverse; it’s representative of the world and I hope all of them pursue a career in robotics,” Howard said. “I mentor them, not just academically, but socially as well. I introduce them to people, and I work to push them out front and promote them. And we just need more of that. That’s what resonates for me with this Boston chapter; it’s that ability to network with others that doesn’t happen naturally without this kind of organization. We’re creating the water cooler where people can come together, and networking will be a natural byproduct of that.”

Education and community outreach

Education and community outreach is another component of BiR’s mission.  This, too, speaks to Brady, who’s concerned not only by the lack of underrepresented minorities within the tech industry overall, and the robotics field more specifically, but with declining college enrollments in STEM-related courses.

“We have to get to the K through 12 kids sooner, and engage them in computer science, and science-related topics sooner,” Brady said. “That’s one of the things we hope to enable with this chapter. We want to create robotics ambassadors who can get engaged with K through 12 kids, and share their experiences and their passion for robotics. “Our entire community needs to get involved because we need more college graduates with computer science degrees, engineering degrees, and graduates who are STEM minded.  So that’s another aspect of this initiative that we’re really excited about.”

Howard agrees, though she emphasizes that the burden shouldn’t solely rest with Black roboticists to help drive change within the field.

“There has been a lot of progress; the needle has moved,” she says. “It just hasn’t moved at the rate is has in other fields like medicine or law. The way we’ve established this organization from the outset is that allies are a pillar. Our mission isn’t just to connect Black roboticists with other Black roboticists. We don’t believe that will move the needle. People like myself, who have been in this field for a while, shouldn’t bear the burden of fixing robotics.  That’s why our approach has been to bring in allies from the beginning; we’ve created an ally steering committee because this isn’t a Black or Brown problem, this is a robotics problem.”

“Some of this is also about calling ourselves out,” Howard continues, “to say ‘Look, this is as much our fault as it is society’s fault, and therefore we need to play a role in fixing it. Those of us who have more senior roles in our field have helped knock down some of the walls, but we need to make sure that even though we’ve knocked down some walls, the road for future roboticists is more comfortable to travel on.”

In addition to Howard and Kennedy, other members of BiR’s leadership team include Carlotta Berry, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology; Edward  Tunstel, group leader, and associate director of robotics at Raytheon Technologies’ Research Center; Quincy Kissiedu-Brown, cofounder of blackcomputerHER; Maynard Holliday, senior engineer, Rand Corporation; Yves Nazon II, a graduate research assistant at the University of Michigan; and Kwesi Rutledge, a PhD candidate in electrical engineering at the University of Michigan.

Howard says the Boston chapter’s first event is scheduled for January. Individuals interested in becoming a BiR member can visit the organization’s website.