Liberatory Innovation: Critical GIS as a Tool for Civic Imagination

Speaker: Nick Okafor, Founder and Executive Director @ trubel&co, and doctoral student at Stanford University 

Hosted by: Dr. Aaron Hipp, Professor of Community Health and Sustainability, Department of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism Management, and Associate Director of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Center for Geospatial Analytics

Summary: Technology holds immense potential to advance social outcomes and equity, yet without intentional design, it can also reinforce systemic inequalities. This session examines how critical GIS, guided by abolitionist strategies, can serve as a transformative tool to mitigate harm, amplify equity, and spark civic imagination. Drawing on examples of biased algorithms and data-driven solutions that fail to account for community needs, it highlights the risks of perpetuating harm when technology is developed without intention. Strategies in liberatory innovation can guide the creation of geospatial tools that center marginalized voices, enable collective repair, and prioritize community-led solutions.

About the speaker: Nick Okafor (he/him), a strategist and design researcher, is the founder of trubel&co, a tech-justice nonprofit that mobilizes the next generation to tackle complex societal challenges using equitable data analytics, responsible technology, and inclusive design. trubel&co builds youth power in the digital age by grounding career technical education with liberatory design and experiential learning, where its flagship program, Mapping Justice, teaches high school youth to design geospatial tools for social change. Nick is also a graduate student at Stanford University between the School of Engineering and the Graduate School of Education, where his research focuses on the practice and pedagogy of liberatory innovation. Previously, Nick was a Senior Associate at Sidewalk Labs (Google’s urban innovation arm), where he piloted and scaled emerging products that improve quality of life in cities. Nick holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering and sustainable development from Washington University in St. Louis. He is committed to ensuring the digital revolution can increase opportunity, mitigate harm, and create liberatory futures for all.