As more employers turn to sites like LinkedIn and CareerBuilder to recruit talent, job seekers from low-income areas or who have limited education often are left out. Tawanna Dillahunt, assistant professor at the U-M School of Information and College of Engineering, hopes to change that. Dillahunt has received a $499,729 National Science Foundation grant to help improve digital employment recruitment tools for these job seekers.
The rapid growth of information and communication technologies has created a “digital recruitment divide that works to the detriment of these underserved job seekers,” Dillahunt says. “Organizations save money by automating their employment practices. This is a win for the organization, but this solution excludes those with limited technology access, low digital literacy, and those who have limited confidence in the use of technology.”
