ETC Magazine’s mission is to foster an awareness of the lives of the Bucknell community. Through the publication of a print and digital magazine that incorporates personal stories and visuals, ETC Magazine will highlight the culture formed through the interactions of students, faculty, and community members in a college campus setting. A large emphasis on design and visuals, accompanied by engaging writing in a print and digital edition will make different perspectives on campus more accessible.
ETC Magazine will create new nodes that have the potential to develop into ideas and projects when readers take initiative to act on inspiration from the stories they’ve read. ETC Magazine will encourage this action, thus enhancing Bucknell’s innovative ecosystem. In itself, ETC magazine will be an interdisciplinary collaboration. Through tying together emphases on editorial writing, photography, and design, we hope to bring the best of each component together under one publication, thus bringing students across disciplines with varying interests together.
On Friday, April 29th from 2:00PM-4:00PM, approx. 15 female-identifying students took part in a workshop that began in the Bucknell Golf Club with an overview of the sport (equipment, mechanics, etc.) and how golf relates to the business/professional career world. This program brought multiple areas of campus together-CDC, ACS, School of Management, Bucknell Golf Club, College of Arts & Sciences. This was a pilot program itself designed as part of the Life After Bucknell Series which aimed at assisting Senior Students gain skills that will be useful in their lives after leaving Bucknell. The weather wasn’t ideal, but the experience was.
In the spring of 2013, students in a course called Markets, Innovation, and Design 300 created websites for local organizations. This project was developed by Professors Doug Allen and Joe Meiser to offer students a real world learning experience in the application of design strategies and marketing theory to create value for clients. Professors Allen and Meiser first decided to co-teach this course together during a BIG meeting, and the active learning provided in this project and focus on innovation are certainly consistent with the mission of BIG. The Daily Item, a local newspaper, wrote an article on the project that is included below.
http://www.meetup.com/Tech-Meetup-Lewisburg/
… bringing interesting, talented, and motivated people together to network, share ideas, and start making innovative new products with cool new technology.
4th Tuesday of every month, at noon
Bucknell’s Entrepreneurs Incubator
416 Market Street (across from the campus theatre)
Join in to explore and populate the intersections of Technology & Entrepreneurship and of Bucknell and the Community!
For more information, contact Steven Stumbris: sstumbri@bucknell.edu
http://www.departments.bucknell.edu/sbdc/Innovation_Workshop_2013_BucknellSBDC.pdf
7/10 and 7/31, 2013
Through Bucknell’s Small Business Development Center (SBDC), Prof. Seth Orsborn will offer summer workshops guiding area firms through ideation, opportunity identification, and product development exercises to to start them on the path to innovation, launch and growth. Faculty, staff, and students are invited to contact Steve Stumbris at the SBDC <sstumbri@bucknell.edu> to learn of ways to participate and opportunities to collaborate with companies and entrepreneurs throughout the area.
Participants will learn how to lead innovation effectively by:
* Analyzing Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT)
* Exploring Societal, Economic, and Technological (SET) factors
* Identifying Product Opportunity Gaps
Project Description:
The “Square Peg Round Hole” workshop, hosted by the Department of Theatre and Dance, explored the world of Autism and Autism Spectrum Disorder with the internationally renown theatre Company The Tectonic Theatre Project. Through the generous support of the Bucknell Innovation Group and The Geisninger Health System who co-sponsored the workshop, we had an exciting and successful week culminating in a final showing and reception on Friday, May 26 2012 for Bucknell Faculty and Geisinger professionals. Our audience shared with us their responses in a talk back following the presentation. Comments were enthusiastically positive and many shared how moved they were by the engaging and theatrical approach the company used to approach the sensitive topic of Autism Spectrum Disorder. This interdisciplinary project brought together Bucknell faculty, alumni and students from several different departments in order to develop a work that promises a full production in NYC through the Tectonic Theatre Workshop in their 2013-2014 season. Below is a list of cast/workshop participants for the project, which include representation from the Departments of Biomedical Engineering, Music, Dance, Art, Philosophy, Theatre and Neuroscience. Thanks to BIG, initiatives like this have the opportunity to impact our community and others in many new and exciting ways. Thanks BIG!
Project Participants:
Andy Paris (Tectonic Theatre Company), Prof. Anjalee Hutchinson (Theatre), Anushka Paris-Carter (Tectonic Theatre Company), Christina Cody (Theatre ’12), C.J. Fujimura (Philosophy ’13), Prof. David Evans (Neuroscience), Diego Chiri (Theatre ’12), Prof. Heath Hansum (Theatre), Prof. Joseph Tranquillo (Biomedical Engineering), Prof. Joe Meiser (Art), Kaitlin “Sparky” Marsh (Theatre ’13), Katharina Schmidt (Theatre ’13), Prof. Kelly Knox (Theatre), Mark Hutchinson (Theatre), Prof. Phil Haynes (Music), Prof. Steven Shooter (Engineering), Prof. Sarah Martin (Theatre – Adelphi University).
On Friday, 4/27, a performance was held in the Langone Center’s first floor hearth space that included students and faculty from Biomedical Engineering, Sculpture, Dance, and the Bucknell Interdisciplinary Improvisation Ensemble (BIIE)—who converged on the theme of impulse and spontaneous action.
The Biomedical Engineering students created “bioinstruments” that recorded and transformed biological signals to MIDI code that was sent out to a sound system. The Sculpture 2 students presented wearable art that metaphorically enhanced or restricted impulsive action. BIIE, with its practiced approach to improvisational music and dance, brought another layer of evocative action to the exchange. Participating faculty included: Phil Haynes from the Department of Music, Dustyn Martincich from the Department of Theatre and Dance, Joe Meiser from the Department of Art and Art History, and Joseph Tranquillo from the Department of Biomedical Engineering. Special thanks to Mark Hutchinson, Heath Hansum, and Aaron Meyers for the technical support they provided in realizing this project.
*To read more and see a larger collection of photographs, click here.*
A fun clip of a workshop that Phil Haynes led with BIIE (the Bucknell Interdisciplinary Improvisational Ensemble) and Steven Shooter & Seth Orsborne’s IMPACT class earlier this spring.
Project Description:
The Makers Society will be a club organized and governed by students that emphasizes the development of the skills needed to design, and create original items. The club seeks to facilitate collaboration on extra-curricular projects between students from multiple disciplines and provide creative and practical opportunities for the students to develop new making skills. The club will provide students with skills and knowledge that complement their coursework, an opportunity to interact and collaborate with students from other disciplines.
The Bucknell University Makers Society hosted its inaugural meeting on Friday, April 6, 2012. This meeting included an “Egg Drop” competition with prizes for the winning designs. *Click here to see more photos of the event*
Project Participants:
Student Club Officers: Nick D’Esposito, John Puleo, Ben Schrock, Dan Flanigan, Abbott Cowen
Nate Siegel, Mechanical Engineering
Joe Meiser, Art & Art History
Heath Hansum, Theatre & Dance
Seth Orsborn, Management
Eric Kennedy, Biomedical Engineering
Project Description:
This project aims to infiltrate public spaces on campus with what might be termed “flash innovation.” Examples might include setting up interactive games for the university community to play and/or watch; teaching class sessions in residence halls to open up discussions to a wider community; and presenting Tina Cody’s Double-Take project in the LC Hearth Space or on the Academic Quad. The goal is to allow our entire community to see the different learning possibilities at Bucknell and to open up discussion about space needs and uses.
The photos above are from a BIG Space Infiltration that occurred on Tuesday February 14th with Steve Shooter and Seth Orsborn’s IMPACT! class, which was held in the Hearth Space across from the Bison. President John Bravman gave a guest lecture on creativity.
Tina Cody, founder of the “Doubletake” project, put on a show for the Late Night Series at 7th Street Café on Friday March 2nd. After a long semester of researching the campus climate and being overwhelmed by the social scene on campus, Tina asked the audience to take part in a discussion of hopeful stories from students and staff at Bucknell. The venue was packed, and after Tina performed some of the hopeful stories she’s gathered from interviews on campus she opened up the mic for the audience to take part and tell their stories about what makes Bucknell special. Over twenty people spoke including current students, alum, a staff member and student visiting from another University.
Project Participants:
Mark Hutchinson, (Organizer) Theatre and Dance
Steve Shooter, Engineering
Ned Ladd, Physics and Astronomy
Heath Hansum, Theatre and Dance
Param S. Bedi, L&IT
Sue Ellen Henry, Education
Tina Cody, Student
Eve Carlson, Student
Project Description:
Our main goal is to give members of the Bucknell Community an opportunity to break out of their comfort zones and reach out to other people to get an insight into the aspects of Bucknell with which they are not familiar. Participants would be acquire responses to the prompt “What is Bucknell for you?” from five people that they are not acquainted with, preferably from groups on campus with which would not normally associate. We will use the boxes to build structures that spell out the letters “BUCKNELL” and display them across campus. Our aim is to unveil the structures during the Diversity Pride Week, which runs from April 7 – 12, 2012.
Project Participants:
Kelly Finley, Residential Education
The Bucknell community at large
Project Description:
This collaboration aims to generate mutually beneficial relationships among Bucknell students and faculty and surrounding communities that are particularly impacted by immigration. In collaboration with Central Susquehanna Intermediate Unit and Bucknell Elementary School, our students will meet and collaborate with youth from multicultural communities. This initiative will afford our students the opportunity to learn “beyond the classroom” and see multiculturalism and the impact of immigration in schools and communities, as well as learn to develop rapport with young learners from different social/racial/language and ethnic backgrounds while supporting them in their learning.
Project Participants:
Ramona Fruja, Education
Sue Ellen Henry, Education
Juli Corrigan, Director of Outreach and Community Education, Central Susquehanna Intermediate Unit (CSIU);
Sue Stetler, Program Manager of Migrant Education and ESL Services, Central Susquehanna Intermediate Unit (CSIU);
Bucknell Elementary School, Fairfax, VA; (Tim Slayter, principal)
Students in EDUC327/627, Immigrant Youth in the U.S.
Students in EDUC 318, Multiculturalism and Education
Project Description:
The LPPP is a fundraiser, conducted each spring semester, to support low-income families financial access to the Lewisburg Community Pool for the upcoming swim season. This year, Panhellenic Council would like to work with students in EDUC 318/618 to co-sponsor the fundraising event, as part of their effort to philanthropic development in all sororities.
Project Participants:
Jackie Petrucci, Dean of Students Office
Sue Ellen Henry, Education
Panhellenic Representatives
Katrina Butt
Sarah Reid
Jess Morra
Caitlin McGilvery
Emily Andrews
Students of EDUC 318/618
Project Description:
In a success-driven society such as ours—and especially at a high-ranking liberal arts college such as Bucknell—to speak of professional or personal “failure” remains something of a taboo. This project seeks to acknowledge, understand and even, to an extent, confirm and validate failure as part of the teaching and learning process. We are especially keen to explore the meanings and implications of “failure” across academic divisions and disciplines, especially as it relates to taking risks.
Project Participants:
Doug Allen, Management
Craig Beal, Mechanical Engineering
Karen Castle, Chemistry
David Cipoletti, Mechanical Engineering
Skip McGoun, Management
Seth Orsborn, Management
James Shields, Comparative Humanities
Project Description:
This initiative seeks to develop a residential late-night programming series that encourages faculty/staff and student engagement outside the classroom and will provide an outlet for creativity and collaboration. The sessions will offer students an opportunity to exercise their creativity, explore problem-solving techniques, and develop communication skills. Events will take place on Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday evenings as an alternative social option.
Project Leader:
Amy Badal, Associate Dean of Students
Project Description:
These faculty and staff plan to create a course that studies New Orleans through a variety of disciplines, including at least music, civil engineering, and socio-cultural studies. Our course could be taught in a regular academic calendar, but is currently being crafted as a three-week intensive course that would include travel to New Orleans and a tour of the new Army Corp Levee Projects, a variety of musical venues and a geographic and historical orientation to the city. Their goal is to recruit students from both Colleges and provide them with a truly interdisciplinary experience.
Project Participants:
Brian Gockley, Teaching and Learning Center
Kevin Gilmore, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Phil Haynes, Music
Project Description:
These faculty members will develop and run a course designed to help ENGR, MGMT, and other students learn how to identify and develop innovative business ideas. Through the course the students will develop a business strategy including business plan, business model, and feasibility evaluation. They will also have to identify a customer base and do some basic market research, including surveying if appropriate. The course is scheduled to run in Fall 2012.
Project Participants:
Erin Jablonski, Chemical Engineering
Brandon Vogel, Chemical Engineering
Seth Orsborn, Management
The lights went out on Bucknell’s Main Quad for an evening of jazz music and astronomy on Friday, 8 June. The quartet “Free Country,” led by BIGster Phil Haynes performed jazz-inspired interpretations of tunes from America’s musical past, while fellow BIGster Ned Ladd trained telescopes on Saturn, Mars, and other celestial sights for public viewing.
“Free Country is an acoustic, jazzy, ‘NPR friendly’ string band specializing in the history of American popular music,” said Haynes. The program included Negro spirituals, Revolutionary and Civil War Hymns, Stephen Foster, Aaron Copland, Hollywood’s Western movie soundtracks, the Beatles and 1960s Rock revolution’s anthems.
More than 200 people attended the late-night outdoor concert and star party. “Jazz music and astronomy go so well together,” said Ladd. “They’re both highly technical, but also pull so strongly on our emotions. Both endeavors are about exploration — seeing what’s possible out there.” Throughout the evening, conversations ranged from “Free Country’s” stringed interpretation of “Day Tripper” to discussions of the science of black holes and why Saturn has rings.
Joining Haynes in “Free Country” were Hank Roberts, cello and vocals; Jim Yanda, guitar; and Drew Gress, bass.
Project Description:
The goal of this initiative is to Introduce STEM concepts to elementary school children in an engaging, interdisciplinary way. Will have Bucknell students (both from the STEM fields and possibly education) take the concepts to the schools that are most in need of STEM education (e.g. Milton, Sunbury). We will attempt to pair the STEM students with Education students for training/planning of the modules.
Project Participants:
Emily Geist, Mechanical Engineering
Katie Bieryla, Biomedical Engineering;
Donna Ebenstein, Biomedical Engineering
Michelle Oswald, Civil and Environmental Engineering
Sue Ellen Henry, Education
Project Description:
The primary goal will be to bring together arts and technology faculty, staff, and students to share ideas about the intersection of the arts with technology. This meshes well with one of the goals of the Presidential Arts Initiative as well. As an institution that combines an excellent College of Arts and Sciences with a top-notch College of Engineering and School of Management, Bucknell is uniquely equipped to take advantage of the intersection between the arts and technology, an area critical to success across disciplines in the digital/electronic age.
Project Participants:
Paula Davis, Theater and Dance
Felipe Perrone, Computer Science
Roger Rothman, Art and Art History
Joe Meiser, Art and Art History
Nathan Siegel, Mechanical Engineering
Project Description:
Innovation/collaboration often needs incubation. This team proposes establishing a weekly lunch table at the Refectory and a monthly Social Hour. These will be minimally billed as “Bucknellian mixers”, but may leave open the possibility for themes, i.e. folks looking for IP opportunities or talking about project-based learning. The primary goal is simply to provide a context conducive to meeting new faculty and staff outside of usual circles.
Project Participants:
Mathew Slater, Philosophy
Jordi Comas, Management
Nate Siegel, Mechanical Engineering
James Shields, Comparative Humanities
Joe Meiser, Art
Katie Beiryla, Biomedical Engineering
Jackie Petrucci, Student Affairs
Beth Bouchard, Student Affairs
Project Description:
The goal of this project is to facilitate greater connectivity between Bucknellians (and the local community) about common aims and interests. Increased connectivity can help teaching, research, and institutional initiatives. The exchange will explore and experiment with effective tools for storing, building, and sharing Bucknellians’ interests and aspirations to help foster collaborative efforts. One aspect of the Exchange profile will be a five-minute snap talk by the individual. The snap talks will be shared in a public symposium and then posted on the Exchange.
Project Participants:
John Hunter, Comparative Humanities
Mathew Slater, Philosophy
Param Bedi, VP of LIT
Jordi Comas, Management
Pete Mackey, VP of Communications
Roberta Sims, Digital Communications
Steve Shooter, Mechanical Engineering
Project Description:
The standardized formats of financial statements constrain their interpretation, regardless of their specific contents. This topic is rarely addressed in the academic literature. An interesting course might begin with speculation on how this occurs, that is, how human cognitive processes are unintentionally exploited to narrow the range of possible interpretations of the data. The course would then proceed to imagine how the same data might be presented in ways that target the other human senses – sculpture, music, and dance among them – thereby tapping into other parts of the brain and perceiving different patterns.
Project Participants:
Elton G. McGoun, School of Management
Project Description:
QR codes enable users to be directed to websites via the camera on one’s smartphone. Printing QR codes on adhesive would enable faculty and students to plant virtual worlds (websites; video/audio clips) all over the real world. Were QR codes to be placed on benches and outside classroom doors, users could access their information while waiting for “the main event” to occur. In effect, QR codes could be used to engage people during the many “interstitial” moments in the day. In addition, they could be hidden about the campus so that one might serendipitously stumble upon them.
Project Participants:
Paula Davis, Theater and Dance
Roger Rothman, Art and Art History
Mike Weaver, L&IT
Eric Kennedy, Biomedical Engineering
James Shields, Comparative Humanities
Matt Slater, Philosophy
Ned Ladd, Physics and Astronomy
Michelle Oswald, Civil and environmental Engineering
Project Description:
Community Corridor is a project that brings students out of the classroom and onto the historic Buffalo Valley Rail Trail in the context of an IP course. They will conduct research on the history of the corridor, oral histories, literal and non-literal mapping, agriculture, and architecture, among other subjects. After conducting and synthesizing their research, students will create virtual (and physical) artworks to build along the trail-way. Users of the trail would access these artworks via location-aware devices like smart phones or laptops. The creative works, whether auditory, visual, semi-permanent or ephemeral, would allow visitors to the trail to access hidden layers of reality, history, and local experience.
Project Participants:
Anna Kell, Department of Art & Art History
Alf Siewers, Department of English
Bucknell University sophomore psychology major Lindsay Zajac admits she felt a little nervous as she waited for an unknown face to appear on her computer screen.
“Brittany was the first to pop up on the screen, and I was like ‘Oh my goodness, it’s working,'” Zajac recalled.
Brittany is one of several fifth and sixth grade students from Bucknell Elementary school in Virginia participating in an online learning collaboration with Bucknell University. The elementary school is part of the Fairfax County Public School district, the eleventh largest in the country. It sits on land once owned by the University, hence the shared name. Using online educational tools, including technology similar to Skype, about 20 Bucknell University students have held virtual ‘face-to-face’ meetings with the elementary students… click here to read more
In spring, 2010, 18 students from Multiculturalism and Education (EDUC 318/618) initiated a service learning project aimed at responding to the tragedy of drownings of two local children, Assunda Rotolo (age 11) and Les Davis (age 8), when swimming in the Susquehanna River in August, 2009.
Built on the premise that no one should be denied access to the Community Pool because of finances, and that the river is an unsupervised location for recreation, the group devised an event to raise money for a dedicated fund at the Lewisburg Area Recreation Authority to support local families in purchasing pool passes. Again, a group of 20 students will undertake the task of coordinating a fundraiser to support this dedicated fund.
The students organized a Fun Walk/Run for Assunda and Les, which took place on April 25, 2010 in the Bucknell Fieldhouse. Over 260 individuals took part in the event; $4000 was raised to start the fund. Five local families contributed what they could to purchase a pool pass; the remainder of the cost was supported by the fund. The local chapter of the American Red Cross offered free swimming lessons to all members of these families.
Since this initial success, students in the spring 2011 course completed another fundraiser. Nearly $4000 was raised, supporting 16 families in the summer of 2011. This year, working cooperatively with Panhellenic, the spring 2012 class will plan yet another event, moving the fund to a more sustainable level of support.
Accounting majors at Bucknell will often add half-credit courses each semester, when available, in order to graduate with sufficient course credits to meet professional certification requirements. Many courses concerning innovation attract students with a prior interest in innovation; however, accounting students’ unique course demands provide an opportunity to create a course concerning innovation (for one-half credit) targeted at a group that is less likely to have considered taking one.
The standardized formats of financial statements constrain their interpretation, regardless of their specific contents. This topic is rarely addressed in the academic literature. An interesting course might begin with speculation on how this occurs, that is, how human cognitive processes are unintentionally exploited to narrow the range of possible interpretations of the data. The course would then proceed to imagine how the same data might be presented in ways that target the other human senses – sculpture, music, and dance among them – thereby tapping into other parts of the brain and perceiving different patterns.
John Hunter and Joseph Tranquillo will be co-teaching a course cross-listed across arts and sciences and the college of engineering called “Brain, Mind, and Culture” (HUMN 301/BMEG 461). The course’s goal is to juxtapose and analyze neuroscientific and culturally based approaches to problems of selfhood, free will, memory, and knowledge to see what each could learn from the other. As well, it will model the lack of established pathways for this endeavor by requiring students to collectively (1) decide what course materials we will study; (2) in what order we examine them; and (3) how the format in which a body of knowledge is presented influences the conclusions that we draw about it.
Sue Ellen Henry and Joe Meiser conducted this project in the spring of 2011, bringing together a multiculturalism in education course and drawing course. Education students wrote narratives throughout the semester to investigate and seek a better understanding of their own identities and social conditioning. Through an exchange of anonymous narratives and unidentified photographs, the drawing students attempted to match up the authors of the narratives to the corresponding photographs. The two classes were brought together for a final meeting at the end of the semester, and as was expected, very few of the drawing students accurately chose their narrative’s author. In fact, some of the students even mistook female authors for male, and vice versa. The discussion that followed at this final meeting illuminated the unreliability of preconceptions and reminded all of the participants of the importance of meeting each new person as an individual.
This collaboration was organized again in 2012, click here for more information about this second iteration of the project.
Five faculty members are working together to pursue funding for a robotic system capable of precisely milling three-dimensional forms at a large-scale. In recent years, designers, engineers, and artists have begun to use robotic milling systems in their workflow in a variety of industries. Acquiring this system for our university would enhance faculty research, present unique pedagogical opportunities for our students, and serve as a catalyst for interdisciplinary collaboration.
To offer just a few examples, students and faculty would use this system to:
- Create streamlined vehicle bodies that would enable engineering students to test aerodynamics
- Produce complex sculptural forms that would be inconceivable with traditional art-making techniques
- Fabricate product prototypes that would be used by marketing students to better understand consumer preferences
- Build lightweight stage props and scenery elements for theater productions
This robotic milling system would also serve as a catalyst for interdisciplinary and cross-college collaboration. Students and faculty from Engineering, Art & Art History, Theatre & Dance, and The School of Management would converge to utilize the milling system for vastly different purposes, which would create a dynamic environment of intellectual exchange. For example, an engineering student could: learn about aesthetics by working with artists, consider the market viability of their own project in a new light after interacting with a student studying product design, or directly observe how the principles they’re learning about in their engineering courses are being practically applied in theater stage design. We believe that this milling system would bring together educational silos and act as an extraordinary platform for interdisciplinary education.
The group pursuing funding for this equipment consists of: Nathan Siegel from the Mechanical Engineering Department, Seth Orsborn from the School of Management, Heath Hansum from Theatre & Dance, Steven Shooter from the Mechanical Engineering Department, and Joe Meiser from Art & Art History.