Tech for Good: The Role of ICT in Achieving the SDGs

Instructor

Tech for Good Faculty

Tech for Good Faculty

Instructor

Dorothy Gordon

Chair

UNESCO Information For All Programme

Dorothy Gordon is the Chair of the UNESCO Information For All Programme and Board Member of the UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education. She has worked in the field of international development and technology for over thirty years and is recognised as a leading technology activist and specialist on policy, education, technology, and society in Africa. Her work as a leader, manager, consultant, and speaker has taken her to over 100 countries. She is a strong advocate of the ROAM principles (internet universality), building on her work with the Open Movement and Creative Commons. Leveraging her government, corporate, civil society, and UN policy and management experience, she currently works as an advisor and management consultant. Previously, as the founding Director-General of the Ghana-India Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence in ICT, she strategically positioned the Centre as a leading technology training and consulting partner on the African continent. During her tenure she actively encouraged greater participation of women in STEM, supported Ghana’s start-up economy, and built global tech partnerships to complement South-South cooperation with India. She served as a senior manager with UNDP in India and held other management and specialist positions in Geneva, New York, and Zambia. She mentors, volunteers, and serves on governing boards and award juries with a number of local and global initiatives working to define a better technology-mediated future. These include Chatham House, Creative Commons, IEEE WG-ICICLE, Kasahorow Foundation, Literacy Bridge Ghana, UNESCO, and the World Summit Awards. She holds degrees from the University of Ghana and the University of Sussex, Institute of Development Studies, where she trained as a development economist. She works in both English and French.

Instructor

Guilherme Canela Godoi

Chief, Section of Freedom of Expression and Safety of Journalists, Communication and Information Sector

UNESCO

Guilherme Canela holds the position of chief of the section of Freedom of Expression and Safety of Journalists at UNESCO headquarters in Paris. For 8 years, he held the position of Communication and Information Regional Adviser for Latin America and the Caribbean at UNESCO Montevideo Office. During those years, he performed as Regional Coordinator of the UNESCO Initiative for the Promotion of Democracy and Freedom of Expression in judicial systems in Latin America. He was also the Secretary of the Regional Committee of the UNESCO Memory of the World Programme for Latin America and the Caribbean, and focal point of the Organization for issues related to the safety of journalists. He has a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Brasília (UNB) and a Master’s Degree on Political Science from the University of São Paulo (USP). For 8 years, Guilherme coordinated the media and journalism research area of the News Agency for Children’s Rights (ANDI). In this period, he was responsible for several surveys that evaluated the news media coverage on issues such as children’s education, rights, violence, health, sexual abuse, human and social development, drugs, participatory democracy, entrepreneurial social responsibility, and human rights. He is co-author of 10 books and several brochures, magazines, and discussion texts. He was research consultant for the UN Latin American Institute for the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, and for the Ayrton Senna Journalism Award. Guilherme was senior member of the Working Group of the Ministry of Justice of Brazil to Provide Advisory Services to the Regulation of TV Programs’ Rating System and an associated researcher at the Nucleus for Studies of Media and Politics at the University of Brasilia. He was president of the Consultative Committee on Children and Media in Uruguay. Jointly with Solano Nascimento he published the book Access to information and public policies social control. He actively participated in the process of discussion and implementation of access laws in Brazil and Paraguay, and acted as an international observer in the Uruguay Open Government process.

Instructor

José Clastornik

Chief Executive, AGESIC

Office of the President of Uruguay

José Clastornik was appointed by the President of the Republic to lead the Agency for e-Government and Information and Knowledge Society (AGESIC) since its inception in 2007. With his leadership, Uruguay has consolidated as a leading digital government, globally recognized as part of the D7. Clastornik is member of the Boards of Directors of the regulatory units of Privacy, Access to Public Information and Electronic Certification. He was the President of the Public Procurement Agency from its inception until 2017. Prior to this appointment, he served as the CEO of HG, the IT firm of the government's Telco enterprise and held executive positions in multinational IT companies for more than ten years.

Instructor

Doreen Bogdan-Martin

Secretary-General

International Telecommunication Union (ITU)

Doreen Bogdan-Martin took office as Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) on 1 January 2023. She has nearly 30 years of work experience in the ICT sector in policy and strategy development, analysis and execution. She is also an affiliate of the Harvard University Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society, and currently serves as the Co-Chair of the United Nations Strategic Planning Group, Chair of the Academic Council for the Swiss Network for International Studies, and is a member of the Board of Governors of the UN Staff College.

Instructor

Chief Nathaniel Ebo Nsarko

Country Director, Ghana

Millennium Promise Alliance & the 1mCHW Campaign

Chief Nathaniel Ebo Nsarko is a Ghanaian and currently the country director of Millennium Promise Alliance and the One Million Community Health Worker Campaign where ICT and innovations are explored to advance healthcare to the door steps of the rural poor. He holds Master’s degrees in Community Health and Development Communication, an MBA in Public Health Management from Robert Kennedy College, Zurich, Switzerland and an Master’s in Communication Studies (Development Communication) from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana and B.F.A and Dip. TEC degrees from University of Ghana - Legon Ghana. Chief Nat has over 15 years of practical field experience as community based health communication expert, development and social engineer coupled with various managerial positions at the national, regional, district and community levels in Ghana. He has several ambassadorial roles to his credit including Peace ambassador for Ghana 2008/ 2013, SDG 3 Ambassador from Lavazza Foundation 2017 and serves as a chief advisor for the UN Youth Ghana. As a community health communication and mobilization expert, development communications and sustainable development project concept designer, Chief Nat has demonstrated a high level of commitment and excellence. His rich experience has earned him deep involvement with Ministries of Health, Employment and Local Government and Rural Development, Ghana Health Service and many other agencies and organizations in Ghana over the years.

Instructor

Eduardo Diniz

Professor

Fundação Getulio Vargas

Eduardo Henrique Diniz is an electrical engineer and has been a professor at Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo at Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV-EAESP) in São Paulo, Brazil, since 1999. He has been Head of the Department of Technology and Data Science since 2018. Eduardo is also a researcher at the FGV’s Center for Financial Inclusion Studies. He was a visiting scholar at University of California, Berkeley, from 1997-98, at HEC Montreal in 2007, and Erasmus University in Rotterdam in 2016-17. He has been also Bellagio Fellow since 2014. Eduardo has conducted research on technology in banking since 1991 and published several papers and articles on the subject. From 2009 to 2015, he served as the Chief-Editor of Revista de Administração de Empresas. He holds an MSc and PhD in Business Administration, with a focus in Information Systems Management.

Instructor

Luis Gonzalez Morales

Chief, Web Development and Data Visualization Section

UN Statistics Division

Luis Gonzalez Morales is Chief of the Web Development and Data Visualization Unit and focal point on Data Revolution for Sustainable Development at the UN Statistics Division. He is part of the Secretariat's team organizing the UN World Data Forum and supporting the High-level Group for Partnership, Coordination and Capacity-Building for statistics for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and co-leads initiatives in data interoperability and integration of geospatial information and statistics for the SDGs. Since he joined the Statistics Division in 2005, Luis has worked with national statistical offices and international partners on methodology and capacity development projects, particularly in the fields of economic statistics, data quality, development indicators, and the coordination of national statistical activities for the SDGs. He has a PhD in Economics from the University of Bochum in Germany and an MSc in Statistics from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Studies in Mexico.

Instructor

Jessica Espey

Senior Adviser

UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network

Jessica is a Senior Advisor to the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is the Head of the TReNDS program, SDSN’s Thematic Research Network on Data and Statistics. Before moving to Cambridge she was Associate Director and Head of SDSN’s New York Office. Jessica’s current research includes a study on the return on investment from improved data systems, and case study research on the legal and institutional structures required for public-private data sharing to support the achievement of the SDGs. Jessica is a member of the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data’s Technical Advisory Group and the Group on Earth’s Observation’s Expert Advisory Group. Prior to joining SDSN, Jessica served as a special adviser on the post-2015 agenda within the Office of the President of Liberia. She has also worked as a senior researcher at Save the Children UK, the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), and the British Institute in Eastern Africa (BIEA). Her research interests are varied and include data systems for sustainable development, evidence-based policy-making, sustainable urbanization, and the study of horizontal inequalities.
Jessica holds a Bachelor of Arts degree with Honours in Modern History from the University of Oxford and a Master of Sciences degree in the Political Economy of Development from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Over the past 12 years she has lived and worked in Liberia, Kenya, Rwanda, the UK and the US.

Instructor

Sara Rendtorff-Smith

Independent Consultant

Data-Driven Governance and AI Policy

Sara Rendtorff-Smith is the Applied Research Lead for Data-driven Governance and AI Policy at MIT. Her work supports public officials, nonprofits and journalists in accessing probabilistic AI to advance public interest, social equity and justice. She joined MIT after working for nearly ten years on political, economic and social challenges facing countries in the immediate aftermath of armed conflict. She started her career with an international humanitarian NGO in Afghanistan and has since worked across the political, development and peacekeeping pillars to ensure that peacemaking is inclusive and international recovery and statebuilding efforts contribute to sustainable peace. Sara has led program and policy initiatives in the Central African Republic (CAR), Darfur, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Liberia, Mali and South Sudan and has contributed to drafting UN institutional guidance on civilian protection, conflict management, economic governance and support to institution building in post-conflict settings. At UN headquarters, she served on special planning teams for transition scenarios in Syria and the establishment of a peacekeeping operation in the CAR. Sara is particularly interested in applying insights from system dynamics, behavioral sciences and data science to addressing the challenges of criminal justice reform, socio-economic inclusion and urban sustainability and resilience.

Instructor

Katina Michael

Professor of Computing and Information Technology

University of Wollongong

Dr. Katina Michael is a professor in the School of Computing and Information Technology at the University of Wollongong. Until recently she was the Associate Dean – International in the Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences. Katina is formerly the long standing IEEE Technology and Society Magazine editor-in-chief (2012-2017), and presently an IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine senior editor. Since 2008 she has been a board member of the Australian Privacy Foundation, and formerly the Vice-Chair. Katina researches on the socio-ethical implications of emerging technologies. She has written and edited six books, guest edited numerous special issue journals on themes related to radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags, supply chain management, location-based services, innovation and surveillance/uberveillance. In 2017, Katina was awarded the prestigious Brian M. O'Connell Award for Distinguished Service to the IEEE Society on the Social Implications of Technology (IEEESSIT).

Instructor

Jeffrey D. Sachs

Professor

Columbia University

Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 100 countries. He is the co-recipient of the 2015 Blue Planet Prize, the leading global prize for environmental leadership. He has twice been named among Time Magazine’s 100 most influential world leaders. He was called by the New York Times, “probably the most important economist in the world,” and by Time Magazine “the world’s best known economist.” A recent survey by The Economist Magazine ranked Professor Sachs as among the world’s three most influential living economists of the past decade. Professor Sachs is widely considered to be one of the world’s leading experts on economic development, global macroeconomics, and the fight against poverty. His work on ending poverty, overcoming macroeconomic instability, promoting economic growth, fighting hunger and disease, and promoting sustainable environmental practices, has taken him to more than 125 countries with more than 90 percent of the world’s population. For more than thirty years he has advised dozens of heads of state and governments on economic strategy, in the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. He was among the outside advisors to Pope John Paul II on the encyclical Centesimus Annus and in recent years has worked closely with the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences on the issues of sustainable development. Professor Sachs is the Director of the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) which launched in 2012, bringing together scientific and technical expertise from academia, civil society and the private sector to support and promote sustainable development problem-solving at local, national and global levels. The design and implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is an important part of its work.