Jungwoo Chun

Jungwoo Chun is a Lecturer in Climate, Sustainability, and Negotiation in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

He is the Co-Director of the MIT Cybersecurity Clinic, supported by Google.org and the Tides Foundation. He leads community client recruitment and engagement efforts in the public sector, mainly focusing on municipalities and hospitals in New England. Additionally, he manages curriculum development for the Clinic, which is also offered as a 12-unit course at MIT for both undergraduate and graduate students (11.074/11.274). The Cybersecurity Clinic partners with 8 to 10 client communities annually, conducting cybersecurity risk assessments and recommending low-cost measures these communities can implement. Since 2018, the Clinic has served nearly 35 municipalities and hospital networks. Its success has led to the creation of a Consortium of University-based Cybersecurity Clinics modeled after the MIT Clinic (https://cybersecurityclinics.org/).

He also serves as the Co-Director of the MIT Renewable Energy Clinic (https://renewable-energy.mit.edu/), initially supported by the Preston Werner Ventures Foundation. He helped launch the clinic in summer 2023, training MIT students to support MIT’s social responsibility by assisting and working collaboratively with community members on the siting and permitting of renewable energy facilities. The Renewable Energy Clinic is a 12-unit course (11.092/11.592) available to MIT students. Since fall 2023, the clinic has helped over 10 local U.S. communities facing public opposition to proposed renewable energy projects and related infrastructure like transmission and storage. The clinic’s goal is to help the community reach agreement on a proposed project, serving as a foundation for drafting legally enforceable community benefits agreements (CBAs).

Jungwoo is the Assistant Director of the MIT Science Impact Collaborative (SIC), working to advance research, teaching, and public service in managing public interest technology (PIT). Pedagogically, he aims to enhance the clinical approach to education in applied social sciences and planning theory and practice. This approach promotes knowledge co-creation, mutual capacity building, and the co-production of science-technology-informed, context-specific, actionable solutions.

Thanks to generous support from the Office of Experiential Learning and MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI), Jungwoo has supervised numerous graduate students and over 40 undergraduate researchers (UROPs) each academic year. These projects include delving into state-level siting and permitting regulations for renewable energy development and assessing municipal cybersecurity preparedness, all under the umbrella of sustainable infrastructure and resilient community development. He emphasizes the relevance of the various HASS concentrations at DUSP, including the Public Interest Technology concentration, especially for students in his courses: 11.074 Cybersecurity Clinic and 11.092 Renewable Energy Clinic.

He has taught several courses at DUSP, such as 11.601 Introduction to Environmental Policy and Planning, 11.255 Negotiation and Dispute Resolution in the Public Sector, and 11.382 Water Diplomacy: The Science, Policy, and Politics of Managing Shared Resources. He continuously seeks ways to improve teaching strategies, including integrating online tools with in-person instruction. For many years, he has developed content and taught online courses through MIT xPRO and edX/MITx, which have enrolled over 20,000 learners worldwide. He has co-authored around a dozen publications in journals like Energy Policy, Energy Research & Social Science, and Cell Reports Sustainability.

Jungwoo was a former Postdoctoral Impact Fellow at the MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium (MCSC), leading research on corporate social sustainability (CSS)—aiming to refine the framework to better understand the social impacts of corporate sustainability initiatives. He holds a Ph.D. in Environmental Policy and Planning.