The Digital Equity Research Center (DERC) engages in community-based and participatory research to inform digital equity practice and policy at the local, state, and national levels. We work with individuals, organizations, and communities to advance digital equity and social, economic, and racial justice in New York City, Westchester County, and beyond.

We strive for our work to be asset based, power aware, respect focused, and justice centered. Learn more about the Principles guiding this approach.

Our Work

DERC is an applied research center that assumes that digital inequality research must include analyses of economic injustice, systemic racism, and other structural inequalities in order to understand and address the root causes of the digital divide. As critical internet studies scholars have noted, digital equity will not be achieved simply by distributing technology and internet access. In response, DERC uses critical theoretical insights along with participatory research methods to ensure those most impacted by the digital divide are included, whenever possible, in interventions to advance digital equity and social, economic, and racial justice.

We partner with academic institutions, community-based organizations, and philanthropy to produce high-quality applied research to inform digital equity practice and policy at the local, state, and national levels.

DERC works to pursue these goals through the following areas of research.