{"id":1349,"date":"2025-12-18T02:33:25","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T02:33:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/paperprisons.org\/news\/?p=1349"},"modified":"2026-01-20T06:36:42","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T06:36:42","slug":"tech-bono-dec-18-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paperprisons.org\/news\/all\/news\/tech-bono-dec-18-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Tech Bono (Dec. 18, 2025)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Colleen V. Chien, Founder, Paper Prisons Initiative and Professor, Berkeley Law School<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What do the Supreme Court\u2019s landmark civil rights decisions have in common with the rescue of Healthcare.gov<\/a> or the delivery of effective digital services during the COVID pandemic?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Each transformed the lives of millions of Americans\u2014and each was made possible, in part, by skilled volunteers applying their expertise in service of the public good. Supported by their employers, lawyers and technologists have long taken short- or part-time \u201ctours of duty,\u201d leveraging their professional skills to advance justice, access, and equity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in law, pro bono service is institutionalized: embedded in legal education, supported by firms, coordinated by dedicated staff, and engrained in the culture. In tech and data science, skills-based \u201ctech for good\u201d\u2014what I call tech bono<\/em>\u2014remains largely ad hoc, driven by individual initiative rather than durable institutional pathways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This wasn\u2019t always true in law. Decades ago, legal pro bono looked much like tech for good does today: informal, opportunistic, and lacking professional status. Over time, it evolved into a core feature of the profession. Can the same thing happen in tech and data and what might this evolution look like?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This question is at the heart of a project I\u2019m excited to be launching with Chris Wiggins<\/a> focused on tech bono<\/em> and what it would take to build the set of cultural and institutional commitments that are required to make durable experiences in and pathways to serving others and the public ubiquitous in college and beyond \u2014 analogous to how pro bono operates in law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I worked with Todd Park<\/a> at the White House, he emphasized a simple but powerful idea: give any technologist who wants to help a clear way to do so, using their particular superpowers. Visionaries like Jennifer Pahlka<\/a>, Mikey Dickerson<\/a>, Erie Meyer<\/a>, Cori Zarek<\/a>, Mina Hsiang<\/a>, and John Paul Farmer<\/a> helped turn that idea into reality through programs like the Presidential Innovation Fellowship, US Digital Service, 18F, and US Digital Response. These efforts are extraordinary\u2014but in tech, they remain the exception. In law, comparable pathways are the norm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a law student at UC Berkeley<\/a>, I represented indigent clients, filed asylum petitions, and did research to support litigation to advance access to generic HIV drugs in South Africa. As a lawyer, I protected voting rights, helped clients win contract disputes, and filed clemency petitions\u2014experiencing what Bryan Stevenson of the Equal Justice Initiative<\/a> calls the transformative power of proximity, a north star for finding purpose that has served me throughout my 20+ year career. Not all lawyers do pro bono, but those who want to can choose from opportunities ranging from a few hours of direct service to decades-long commitments that reshape the law itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through the Paper Prisons initiative<\/a>, I\u2019ve also seen just how many computer science and data science students want to do for-good work\u2014and how few supported pathways exist for them. Important efforts are emerging (including PIT-UN<\/a>), and as AI puts long-standing goals like access to justice and equal opportunity within closer reach, it feels like the right time to elevate what\u2019s working and identify what still needs to be built.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m thrilled to be partnering with Chris, a Columbia University<\/a> data science professor, NYT Chief Data Scientist, co-founder of the The Data Science Institute at Columbia University<\/a> and co-founder of hackNY.org<\/a>, which he co-launched post-financial crisis to \u201ckeep kids off the street\u201d – meaning Wall Street, given that so many had witnessed the crumbling of the American dream at the hands of data science.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our shared goal: help ensure that tech students and professionals who want to make a positive difference are supported in their journeys. A few of our initial conversations with changemakers have underscored the stakes and possibilities:<\/p>\n\n\n\n