Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing (SERC)

The Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing (SERC), a cross-cutting initiative in the MIT Stephen A. Schwarzman College of Computing, is facilitating the development of responsible “habits of mind and action” for those who create and deploy computing technologies and fostering the creation of technologies in the public interest. Caspar Hare and Georgia Perakis were appointed the new associate deans of SERC, beginning September 1, 2022.

Through a teaching, research and engagement framework, SERC is working to train students, encourage research to assess the broad challenges and opportunities associated with computing, and improve design, policy, implementation, and impacts.

The mission of SERC is to incorporate humanist, social science, social responsibility, and civic perspectives into MIT’s teaching, research, and implementation of computing. SERC has brought together people from a broad array of disciplines to collaborate on crafting original materials such as active learning projects, homework assignments, and in-class demonstrations.

In 2021, 60 undergraduates, graduate students, and postdocs joined a community of SERC Scholars to help advance SERC efforts in the college. The scholars participate in unique opportunities throughout, such as the summer Experiential Ethics program. A multidisciplinary team of graduate students last winter worked with the instructors and teaching assistants of class 6.036 (Introduction to Machine Learning), MIT’s largest machine learning course, to infuse weekly labs with material covering ethical computing, data and model bias, and fairness in machine learning through SERC.

Through efforts such as these, SERC has had a substantial impact at MIT and beyond. Over the the first 3 years of the initiative, about 80 faculty members have been engaged, and more than 2,100 students took courses that included new SERC content in the last year alone. SERC’s reach extended well beyond engineering students, with about 500 exposed to SERC content through courses offered in the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, the MIT Sloan School of Management, and the School of Architecture and Planning.