These Innovation Fellows were selected in April 2023, will participate in the Innovation Institute in May 2023, and will complete their fellowship projects in the 2023 – 2024 Academic Year. Scroll down to see the abstracts for their projects. Particular areas of focus for this iteration of Innovation Fellows are within the following areas connected to academic excellence and distinction:
- Experiential and/or Austin-based pedagogy: Incorporate new approaches, activities, and/or Austin-based content that can provide students with a richer academic experience.
- Inclusive and Antiracist Teaching: Incorporate equitable, inclusive, and anti-racist practices, such as including Open Educational Resources (OER); adopting Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles; or working toward inclusive and anti-racist content and assessment practices.
- Technology-Enhanced Pedagogy: Integrate any one of a range of technology-enhanced approaches to teaching and learning, such as having students engage with technology for knowledge production, creativity, or digital research methods; developing students’ digital and information literacy and skills; shifting content and activities online to promote active learning in and out of the classroom; creating or adapting courses to be offered online; or including innovative technologies.
Innovation Fellows
Amir Amini Sedeh, Management, Munday School of Business, Strategic management: BUSI 4349: Strategic management
Emily Bernate, Languages, Literatures & Cultures, Arts and Humanities, Social Movements and Reggaetón: SPAN 3399 : Social Movements and Reggaetón
Kelley Coblentz Bautch, Religious and Theological Studies, Arts and Humanities, Living a Meaningful Life: RELS 1305: Living a Meaningful Life
Meredith Edwards, Biological Sciences, Natural Sciences, Advanced Topics in Biology: Environmental Microbiology and Globalization: BIOL 3345: Advanced Topics in Biology: Environmental Microbiology and Globalization
Steven Fletcher, ENSP, Behavioral and Social Sciences, Environmental Science Topics – Build and Explore Series: Boatbuilding and Wetland Ecology. : ENSP 2349: Environmental Science Topics – Build and Explore Series: Boatbuilding and Wetland Ecology.
Nathan Garcia, Theological and Religious Studies, Arts and Humanities, Anime & Spirituality: Topics in Global Studies: RELS 2319: Anime & Spirituality: Topics in Global Studies
Michelle Green, Biological Sciences, Natural Sciences, Urban Ecology: BIOL 3345: Urban Ecology
Jeremy Johnson, Visual Studies, Arts and Humanities, Senior Game Studio 2: VGAM 4347: Senior Game Studio 2
Dustin Joubert, Kinesiology/Biology, Natural Sciences, Human Anatomy and Physiology I: BIOL 2401: Human Anatomy and Physiology I
Lauren Mitchell, Chemistry, Natural Sciences, Organic Chemistry I: CHEM 2323: Organic Chemistry I
Rodrigo Nunes, Global Studies, Behavioral and Social Sciences, Introduction to Comparative Politics: POLS 2341: Introduction to Comparative Politics
Kris Sloan, department of human development and leadership, Behavioral and Social Sciences, Introduction to Leadership and Social Justice: LDSJ 1301 : Introduction to Leadership and Social Justice
Jeanne Stern, Visual Studies: Animation, Arts and Humanities, Animation Production: ANIM 4338: Animation Production
Fellows and Project Abstracts
Amir Amini Sedeh, Management, Munday School of Business, Strategic management: BUSI 4349: Strategic management
As the field of strategic management is constantly evolving, it is crucial for St. Edward’s to stay at the forefront of industry trends, and incorporating Bloomberg technology can help achieve this goal. Bloomberg, a global leader in financial news and data, offers a powerful suite of technology tools that can enhance the learning experience for students in a strategic management course. By offering students hands-on experience in financial analysis and data-driven decision-making, this proposal supports the university’s strategic goal of academic excellence and distinction that prepares students for success in their future careers.
Emily Bernate, Languages, Literatures & Cultures, Arts and Humanities, Social Movements and Reggaetón: SPAN 3399 : Social Movements and Reggaetón
The proposed course titled Social Movements and Reggaetón will create an interdisciplinary learning experience for intermediate and advanced Spanish students. Student protests on the lack of diversity in the university’s course offerings has inspired me to develop a course that features Afro-Latinos through an anti-racist lens. We will learn about the evolution of reggaetón from Jamaicans building the Panama Canal in the early 1900s up to the present day in which transnational collaborations feature artists from multiple nationalities. Each unit will feature history, fluency practice, social critiques, dialect variation, and grammar practice through music that represents each phase of development of reggaetón. The course will encourage students to examine both U.S. and Latin American ideologies that value Black artistic production while simultaneously rejecting Black identities.
Kelley Coblentz Bautch, Religious and Theological Studies, Arts and Humanities, Living a Meaningful Life: RELS 1305: Living a Meaningful Life
This Innovation Institute project concerns designing the SLOs and curriculum for a new course offered in the revised Religious and Theological Studies curriculum: RELS 1305 Living a Meaningful Life. The course, to be taken by Religious and Theological Studies and Catholic Studies majors and minors, offers students a semester-long opportunity to clarify their stories and questions, to explore their values, and to consider both a sense of calling and the journey ahead. Important to the project is thinking about how to ensure that the course is informed by experiential pedagogy and is inclusive.
Meredith Edwards, Biological Sciences, Natural Sciences, Advanced Topics in Biology: Environmental Microbiology and Globalization: BIOL 3345: Advanced Topics in Biology: Environmental Microbiology and Globalization
BIOL 3345 Advanced Topics in Biology: Environmental Microbiology and Globalization will be developed for a Study Abroad program in Thailand (Su2024). This course will be designed with transformative experiential learning at its core. This course will enhance students’ study abroad experience in alignment with the University’s mission to provide experiential learning opportunities and to develop culturally aware global citizens. Students will conduct research that encompasses both field and laboratory work. Lectures will support their research, providing background on microbiology and an introduction to the scientific method. In addition, social justice will be interwoven into the course through discussion and research on anthropomorphic effects on environmental microbiomes. The course will emphasize the connection between science and social justice and our responsibility as individuals to identify and act on these issues. The fellowship will provide the necessary tools, techniques and experiences to help construct a course that synthesizes science and social justice.
Steven Fletcher, ENSP, Behavioral and Social Sciences, Environmental Science Topics – Build and Explore Series: Boatbuilding and Wetland Ecology. : ENSP 2349: Environmental Science Topics – Build and Explore Series: Boatbuilding and Wetland Ecology.
The technological revolution that began in earnest in the last decades of the 20th century has a generation of college-aged students who lack experience working with their hands. This gap in knowledge around practical craft can limit other important skill development around problem-solving, persistence, self-efficacy, and collaboration – all essential skills in today’s job market. To help remedy this gap and study the value of craft, I am creating an elective topics course for the Environmental Science and Policy department that intersects with my own personal and professional interests around the value of craft as a tool to stimulate learning. Students will work in teams to construct simple boats that will then be used to study topics in local wetland ecology. The course will theoretically framed from Craft Theory and Constructionism – both developed to help understand the function of making as an essential element of being. The process of learning how to safely use tools, measure, cut, fit, and glue together wood, sand, paint, and finish surfaces, and then investigate and learn about the organisms and cycles of local ecosystems that include water fits well with Project Based Learning as a contemporary pedagogy. The concept of guiding students to become proficient in a concrete craft that produces functional and elegant tools for use in the study of the natural world is transformative and could be broadly applied for future courses across disciplines.
Nathan Garcia, Theological and Religious Studies, Arts and Humanities, Anime & Spirituality: Topics in Global Studies: RELS 2319: Anime & Spirituality: Topics in Global Studies
Anime and Spirituality is an innovative RELS course designed to navigate theological issues through the Japanese artistic medium known as anime. By emphasizing spirituality, this course implicates the student’s own questions, curiosities, and experiences with the divine. Using a globally popular medium, we draw on immersive story-telling and Eastern themes to examine perennial issues of existential concern. Anime films and televised episodes will be studied to broaden the student’s spiritual perspective and awareness.
Michelle Green, Biological Sciences, Natural Sciences, Urban Ecology: BIOL 3345: Urban Ecology
I will be developing a new course – Urban Ecology – to help support our nascent Environmental Biology and Climate Change program. Through the Innovation Fellowship, I hope to develop learning objectives for the course, explore the possibility of adding an Experiential Learning for Social Justice mission marker, and discover new ways of assessing student learning. I also hope to develop relationships with colleagues across campus so that I can include perspectives from other disciplines into my course.
Jeremy Johnson, Visual Studies, Arts and Humanities, Senior Game Studio 2: VGAM 4347: Senior Game Studio 2
Senior Game Studio II is the final semester of the culminating experience for video game development students. In an effort to expand the impact of this program and , we propose a revision to Senior Game Studio that would shift the focus from straight-forward game development to the creation of Open Education Resources (OER).
By using the game development skills learned in the major, seniors will be able to create interactive educational materials that can be used freely by students and educators anywhere. These OERs will provide access to educational resources that are dynamic and interactive in order to provide another avenue for a student to engage with a concept.
Seniors will use their creativity and technical skills not just to make games, but to make a meaningful impact on education.
Dustin Joubert, Kinesiology/Biology, Natural Sciences, Human Anatomy and Physiology I: BIOL 2401: Human Anatomy and Physiology I
This course redesign focuses on “flipping” the traditional lecture model in BIOL 2401 (Human Anatomy & Physiology I). In the flipped model, students complete content, heavy lecture material on their own time prior to coming to class. This allows for experiential learning activities in class through the use of case studies, critical thinking exercises, and discussion. These experiences are transformative as they allow students to see how course content is relevant and can be used to explain real world scenarios.
Lauren Mitchell, Chemistry, Natural Sciences, Organic Chemistry I: CHEM 2323: Organic Chemistry I
Organic chemistry is required of many non-major students who often view it as just a requirement, not as a course that will instill relevant knowledge. The world though is filled with the relevance and impact of organic chemistry. To increase interest and engagement with the subject each student in the class will present a real-world application and impact of a particular topic to their peers. A few applications will be provided, the student will then relate the application to the topic, as well as explaining the social justice relevance. By increasing the number of non-exam assignments, it creates a more diverse portfolio of work on which to evaluate student performance. The previous non-required textbook for the course is becoming an open access resource in fall 2023. With this, pre-reading assignments could be developed both to prime students for learning and to open class time to allow for student presentations
Rodrigo Nunes, Global Studies, Behavioral and Social Sciences, Introduction to Comparative Politics: POLS 2341: Introduction to Comparative Politics
Introduction to Comparative Politics is a foundational course for political science and global studies, and a contributor to our general education curriculum (global perspective). My project seeks to transform one of the sections of this course into an asynchronous online class that is as rigorous, engaging and transformative as the in-person experience. As we diversify our teaching modalities to keep up with changing student preferences, demands and realities (such as working full time while taking college courses), I feel it is important that flexible, asynchronous courses lose few, if any, of the qualities of our face-to-face offerings. In particular, I want to design an asynchronous course that is rigorous and interesting, but that also creates a learning community. In other words, an asynchronous course that encourages collaboration and imbues a sense among students that they, together, are in charge of their learning.
Kris Sloan, department of human development and leadership, Behavioral and Social Sciences, Introduction to Leadership and Social Justice: LDSJ 1301 : Introduction to Leadership and Social Justice
My project involves developing the introductory course for a new major (Leadership and Social Justice) LDSJ 1301 (Introduction to Leadership and Social Justice). While my initial focus at the institute will be becoming more familiar with the latest in technology-enhanced pedagogy I will also seek to develop pedagogical strategies for an online, a-synch course that are not only inclusive, but antiracist. The ultimate goal is to create an online course that can offer students the knowledge and skills necessary to become successful change makers, activists, and community organizers. This course explores how grassroots movements can transform communities, cultural norms, and global systems. Students will engage in experiential learning to strengthen their skills in choosing effective tactics, facilitating groups, active listening,
public speaking, and catering to specific audiences.
Jeanne Stern, Visual Studies: Animation, Arts and Humanities, Animation Production: ANIM 4338: Animation Production
This fellowship will focus on Technology-Enhanced Pedagogy for the course “Animation Production.” I will be researching how best to use and teach Toon Boom Harmony. Toon Boom Harmony is a leading industry 2D animation software program. According to their website, it’s considered to be “the worldwide standard for 2D animation productions.”
To best support the needs of this course, I will focus on cel animation techniques, drawing tools, and project organization. I will also create supplemental materials to teach students about the conceptual framework of the software, its place in the history of animation, and its use by animation production companies. Additionally, I will research available tutorials and determine the best way to teach its use. I will also learn about potential bugs or issues that might need to be addressed, as well as options for students to access the software. In the process of my research I will create sample artwork and animation tests.