scholarly journals PERFORMING SCIENCE: SCIENCE COMMUNICATION AS PERFORMATIVE EVENT

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Chong ◽  
Lydia Wilkinson
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Performance Studies ◽  
Science Communication ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Popular Media ◽  
Communicative Acts ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
The University

A course at the University of Toronto encourages engineering students to analyze how science isconveyed in the popular media through a variety of contexts. An analysis of the language and rhetoric of these communicative acts provides on entry point into how science is framed, while the discipline of performance studies, which identifies and analyzes the mechanisms with which we present our messages and ourselves, provides another useful tool through which to understand the motivations and associated strategies behind scientific communication. This teaching practice paper presents three case studies of scientific press conferences used in the course: NASA’s 2010 astrobiology event, the Higgs Boson announcement in 2012, and Virgin Galactic’s 2014 SpaceShipTwo crash. These three case studies illustrate how the act of communicating science within public spaces should be navigated with an awareness of the intended message and the way that this message is conveyed and perceived. Each case study includes a summary of observations on the event (generated and shared through class discussions), and prompts that will enable theeffective instruction of these and other case studies.

Notes from the field: Three Wikimedian-in-Residence case studies

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin O'Neil ◽  
Sarah Severson
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Hiring Decisions ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
Concordia University ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The University ◽  
The Impact

When the University of Alberta Library hired its first Wikimedian-in-Residence (WIR) in 2019, the team had difficulty finding detailed information about how to plan for a WIR and set up the role for success. This chapter details two Wikipedia residencies that served as a guide for the Alberta team in building their WIR project. Case studies of the University of Toronto and Concordia University in Montréal are presented alongside a case study of the University of Alberta. Each study includes details about how the role was approved and funded, how hiring decisions were made, how the WIR focused their efforts, and the impact at their institution. Together, these three examples demonstrate the variety of options for funding and hiring a WIR role and for the focus of the WIR’s work in their term. The chapter poses concrete questions for librarians considering implementing a WIR role at their institution and offers recommendations from each WIR experience as guidance in answering those questions.

scholarly journals Getting hired in industry – life science graduate students use case studies to get noticed by employers

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian Yung ◽  
Christina Wehrle ◽  
Cricia Rinchon ◽  
David Sealey
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Career Paths ◽  
Life Science ◽  
Graduate Degree ◽  
Study Program ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
Interesting Approach ◽  
Approach Working ◽  
The University

Many career paths are possible after completing a life science graduate degree. How trainees pursuing careers in industry can compete effectively in the job market is of critical interest. While some trainees boost their marketability through internships, co-operative education programs, and/or consulting projects, these opportunities may be limited in number or availability, or challenging to arrange around research commitments. To explore career paths and build a portfolio of experience while in school, some trainees are taking an interesting approach: working in teams, with mentorship from industry professionals, they lead projects that simulate the kind of work they would be doing in their field of interest. After ~130 trainees have participated in the annual Industry Team Case Study program at the University of Toronto over four years, we interviewed four alumni to find out how their case studies helped them get noticed by employers and get hired.

Disruptive innovation and operationalization in local and sustainable food systems: Examining the University of Toronto-Local Food Plus partnership

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 120-139
Author(s):  
Lori Stahlbrand
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Food System ◽  
Local Food ◽  
Disruptive Innovation ◽  
Government Support ◽  
Sustainable Food ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
The University

This paper traces the partnership between the University of Toronto and the non-profit Local Food Plus (LFP) to bring local sustainable food to its St. George campus. At its launch, the partnership represented the largest purchase of local sustainable food at a Canadian university, as well as LFP’s first foray into supporting institutional procurement of local sustainable food. LFP was founded in 2005 with a vision to foster sustainable local food economies. To this end, LFP developed a certification system and a marketing program that matched certified farmers and processors to buyers. LFP emphasized large-scale purchases by public institutions. Using information from in-depth semi-structured key informant interviews, this paper argues that the LFP project was a disruptive innovation that posed a challenge to many dimensions of the established food system. The LFP case study reveals structural obstacles to operationalizing a local and sustainable food system. These include a lack of mid-sized infrastructure serving local farmers, the domination of a rebate system of purchasing controlled by an oligopolistic foodservice sector, and embedded government support of export agriculture. This case study is an example of praxis, as the author was the founder of LFP, as well as an academic researcher and analyst.

scholarly journals A Simple but Efficient Concept of Blended Teaching of Mathematics for Engineering Students during the COVID-19 Pandemic

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 56
Author(s):  
Saray Busto ◽  
Michael Dumbser ◽  
Elena Gaburro
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Video Quality ◽  
Lecture Hall ◽  
Ex Post ◽  
Teaching Of Mathematics ◽  
Online Streaming ◽  
The University ◽  
Blended Teaching

In this article we present a case study concerning a simple but efficient technical and logistic concept for the realization of blended teaching of mathematics and its applications in theoretical mechanics that was conceived, tested and implemented at the Department of Civil, Environmental and Mechanical Engineering (DICAM) of the University of Trento, Italy, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The concept foresees traditional blackboard lectures with a reduced number of students physically present in the lecture hall, while the same lectures are simultaneously made available to the remaining students, who cannot be present, via high-quality low-bandwidth online streaming. The case study presented in this paper was implemented in a single University Department and was carried out with a total of n=1011 students and n=68 professors participating in the study. Based on our first key assumption that traditional blackboard lectures, including the gestures and the facial expressions of the professor, are even nowadays still a very efficient and highly appreciated means of teaching mathematics at the university, this paper deliberately does not want to propose a novel pedagogical concept of how to teach mathematics at the undergraduate level, but rather presents a technical concept of how to preserve the quality of traditional blackboard lectures even during the COVID-19 pandemic and how to make them available to the students at home via online streaming with adequate audio and video quality even at low internet bandwidth. The second key assumption of this paper is that the teaching of mathematics is a dynamic creative process that requires the physical presence of students in the lecture hall as audience so that the professor can instantaneously fine-tune the evolution of the lecture according to his/her perception of the level of attention and the facial expressions of the students. The third key assumption of this paper is that students need to have the possibility to interact with each other personally, especially in the first years at the university. We report on the necessary hardware, software and logistics, as well as on the perception of the proposed blended lectures by undergraduate students from civil and environmental engineering at the University of Trento, Italy, compared to traditional lectures and also compared to the pure online lectures that were needed as emergency measure at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. The evaluation of the concept was carried out with the aid of quantitative internet bandwidth measurements, direct comparison of transmitted video signals and a careful analysis of ex ante and ex post online questionnaires sent to students and professors.

Environmental Reviews and Case Studies: Beyond the Information Campaign: Community-Based Energy Behavioral Change at the University of Toronto

2013 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 147-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matto Mildenberger ◽  
Leah Stokes ◽  
Beth Savan ◽  
Brian Kolenda ◽  
Dan Dolderman
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Behavioral Change ◽  
Information Campaign ◽  
Community Based ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
The University

Documenting the Delusion: A Case Study

2015 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-291
Author(s):  
Donald Wiebe ◽  
Luther H. Martin
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Naturalistic Study ◽  
Religious Thought ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
The University

This paper documents the lack of interest in creating an environment to promote a naturalistic study of religious thought and behavior at the Department for the Study of Religion (dsr) of the University of Toronto. Thedsr, it seems to me, simply exemplifies the point about the self-deception and delusion that characterizes many departments for the study of religion about their academic or scientific credibility that I make in the essay.

scholarly journals Reading McLuhan Reading Ulysses

2019 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Galey
Keyword(s):  
James Joyce ◽  
Media Theory ◽  
Marshall Mcluhan ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
Close Analysis ◽  
Etude De Cas ◽  
Étude De Cas ◽  
The University

Background  Marshall McLuhan was not only a prolific reader but also an expert annotator of his own books. Taking as a case study McLuhan’s copies of James Joyce’s Ulyssesin the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library at the University of Toronto, this article asks what we can learn about McLuhan’s reading from close analysis of his own books.Analysis  The article begins with a discussion of McLuhan’s media theory as “applied Joyce,” with particular reference to Ulysses, and then turns to an overview of the annotation techniques and strategies visible in McLuhan’s copies of the novel.Conclusion and implications  The conclusion considers McLuhan’s own books as hybrid artifacts that challenge us to rethink rigid distinctions between print and manuscript cultures.Contexte  Marshall McLuhan, en plus d’être un lecteur assidu, était un annotateur expert de ses propres livres. Par exemple, McLuhan a annoté des exemplaires d’Ulyssede James Joyce qui se trouvent maintenant dans la Bibliothèque de livres rares Thomas Fisher à l’Université de Toronto. Au moyen d’une étude de cas de ces exemplaires, l’article actuel examine ce qu’on peut apprendre à partir d’une analyse attentive du processus de lecture de McLuhan.Analyse  L’article commence par envisager la théorie des médias de McLuhan comme étant du « Joyce appliqué », mettant un accent particulier sur l’influence d’Ulyssesur le penseur. L’article continue par un examen des techniques et stratégies d’annotation utilisées par McLuhan dans ses exemplaires de ce roman.Conclusions et implications  La conclusion considère les livres de McLuhan comme des artéfacts hybrides nous invitant à mettre en question les distinctions rigides entre culture de l’imprimé et culture du manuscrit.

scholarly journals A New Educational Thermodynamic Software to Promote Critical Thinking in Youth Engineering Students

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miguel Romero Di Biasi ◽  
Guillermo Eliecer Valencia ◽  
Luis Guillermo Obregon
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
User Interfaces ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Graphical User Interfaces ◽  
P Value ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Level Of Significance

This article presents the application of a new educational thermodynamic software called MOLECULARDISORDER, based on graphical user interfaces created in Matlab® to promote critical thinking in youth engineering students, by means of the energy and entropy balance application in different systems. Statistics of the results obtained by the youth students are shown to determine the influence of the software in a regular course in thermodynamics to promote critical thinking. Two case studies were done by the students, where parameters such as temperature of the fluid and metal surfaces, pressure of the system, mass of the fluid and solid, volume, and velocity of the fluid are used to obtain output variables such as enthalpy, entropy, changes in entropy, entropy production, and energy transfer in the chosen system. Four cognitive skills were considered to evaluate the cognitive competencies of interpreting, arguing and proposing, and interacting with the different graphical user interfaces; these cognitive skills (CS) were argumentative claim (CS1), modeling (CS2), interpreting data/information (CS3), and organization (CS4). Student´s T-test was used to compare the degree of difficulty of each criterion. The case studies were evaluated first without using the software and then with the use of the software to determine the significant effect of the software quantitatively. A population of 130 youth students was taken to perform the statistical analysis with a level of significance of 5%. With the help of the software, the students obtained an improvement when performing case study 1 since the p-value obtained was 0.03, indicating that there are significant differences between the results before and after taking the software. The overall averages of the grades for case study 1 had an increase after using the software from 3.74 to 4.04. The overall averages for case study 2 were also higher after taking the software from 3.44 to 3.75.

Making Knowledge/Playing Culture

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 83-101
Author(s):  
Antje Budde ◽  
Sebastian Samur
Keyword(s):  
Experiential Learning ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Performance Studies ◽  
Performing Arts ◽  
Undergraduate Research ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
University Of Toronto ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The University

(A project of the Digital Dramaturgy Lab at the Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies, University of Toronto) This article discusses the 2017 festival-based undergraduate course, “Theatre Criticism and Festival Dramaturgy in the Digital Age in the Context of Globalization—A Cultural-Comparative Approach” as a platform for experiential learning. The course, hosted by the University of Toronto’s Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies, and based on principles of our Digital Dramaturgy Lab, invited a small group of undergraduate students to critically investigate two festivals—the Toronto Fringe Festival and the Festival d’Avignon—in order to engage as festival observers in criticism and analysis of both individual performances and festival programming/event dramaturgy. We argue that site-specific modes of experiential learning employed in such a project can contribute in meaningful ways to, and expand, current discourses on festivalising/festivalization and eventification through undergraduate research. We focus on three modes of experiential learning: nomadic learning (learning on the move, digital mobility), embodied knowledge (learning through participation, experience, and feeling), and critical making (learning through a combination of critical thinking and physical making). The article begins with a brief practical and theoretical background to the course. It then examines historical conceptions of experiential learning in the performing arts, including theoriesadvanced by Burnet Hobgood, David Kolb and Ronald Fry, and Nancy Kindelan. The importance of the festival site is then discussed, followed by an examination of how the festivals supported thethree modes of experiential learning. Samples of student works are used to support this analysis.

scholarly journals Decolonising the university curriculum or decolonial-washing? A multiple case study

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lesley le Grange ◽  
Petro du Preez ◽  
Labby Ramrathan ◽  
Sylvan Blignaut
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Higher Education Institutions ◽  
Multiple Case Study ◽  
University Curriculum ◽  
Political Symbolism ◽  
Common Strategy ◽  
Multiple Case ◽  
The University

In this article, we report on four case studies of how higher education institutions have grappled with the demands of decolonisation of their curricula. In some respects, the cases differ in form and content, and the unique responses to decolonisation of each institution are described and analysed. An important similarity among the institutions was the use of extensive public lectures, seminars, and workshops as a common strategy to deal with the calls for the decolonising of curricula. The inquiry is motivated by our concern that some institutions, in an effort to comply, might resort to instrumentalist and quick-fix solutions to decolonise curricula, which result in decolonial-washing rather than substantive change. We discuss the following themes based on the data and literature: decolonial-washing; decolonising of curricula as a national project; political symbolism; and the need for complicated conversations. We also reflect on the methodology used in this study.

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