On September 12, university faculty and staff from the Pacific Northwest and beyond will gather at UW Bothell for a symposium on the use of technology to further students’ global engagement. Hosted by UW Bothell Global Initiatives and the Teaching and Learning Center, the symposium will provide strategies for integrating international collaboration components into university coursework and allow educators to share best practices for creating a physical and virtual learning community.
Registration is open now for the Global Engagement through Technology Symposium, and participants may sign up until September 11. An Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Area and International Studies grant, administered by the UW Jackson School of International Studies, has allowed organizers to offer the event at a reduced rate to participants.
University of Washington alumnus Steven Holl, a native of Bremerton and leader of Steven Holl Architects in New York City, received a 2014 Praemium Imperiale International Arts Award. The Japan Art Association gives the honor each year to recognize lifetime achievements in painting, sculpture, architecture, music and theater or film.
Led by principal investigator Craig Lee, an oceanographer at the University of Washington’s Applied Physics Laboratory, researchers from around the world are conducting the longest and most extensive effort ever to track the melting of arctic sea ice. Members of the international research team hail from the United States, the Republic of Korea, the United Kingdom and France.
For the first time, golf fans will watch a Husky athlete compete at the Open Championship in Holyoke, England. Representing UW at this week’s tournament is Cheng-Tsung Pan, a senior communications major from Taiwan.
Commenting in a recent BBC News article, University of Washington professor Philip Howard explained that military forces like Hamas and the Israeli Defense Force are using social media to influence public opinion about conflicts.
The New Ventures Facility is a business incubator providing startups critical access to University of Washington facilities and researchers. This year, the New Ventures Facility was ranked #1 among university business incubators by the 2014 University Business Incubators Global Index.
Dhruv Bhatli, the global index’s co-founder, said the New Ventures Facility was selected because it provided “exceptional quality to its clients [and] produced growth companies and high economic impact for the region.”
At last month’s TEDxUofW event, UW alumna Julia Robinson spoke candidly about the importance of human resources in solving global health challenges like AIDS. New technologies are getting a lot of buzz, she told the crowd, but supporting health workers is the best way to solve health challenges globally.
“I think technology is amazing, but I also believe… that technology needs people to implement it. We need to put that same level of effort into supporting health workers.”
College of Arts & Sciences Dean’s Medalist Jueqian Fang showed promise in the sciences during high school in China. However, she came to UW ready to explore new pathways. Drawn to the arts, Jueqian went on to double major, earning degrees in photo/media in the School of Art + Art History + Design and cinema studies in the Department of Comparative Literature.
While at UW Jueqian has displayed her artwork at exhibitions on campus as well as in a juried art show in Seattle’s Pioneer Square. She was selected as a Dean’s Medalist on the basis of academic performance and faculty recommendations.
English literature major Shangé Purnell was chosen for the honor of carrying the Arts & Sciences college banner at this weekend’s graduation. Study abroad played an important part her Husky Experience and helped develop her exciting future goals.
GO! and Fritz Scholar Shangé Purnell Photo: University of Washington
Shangé plans to earn a doctorate in English literature and teach at the college level. Through this work, she wants to help increase diversity in published literary works. She says, “the highbrow elite have set what is highbrow literature – Shakespeare and other mostly white European authors. We’re starting to get more diversity, but it’s still very narrow, it’s still a Eurocentric perspective. I realize that being a U.S. citizen I have been conditioned to have a Eurocentric view, but I’d like to give view to the people of color in this world.”
Beyond serving as an officer in the Black Student Union and as a member of the Students for Diversity Coalition, Shangé also sought new perspectives and leadership experience through international learning. Her experiences studying abroad in the United Kingdom and Ghana with UW faculty-led programs were important in developing her goals and provided new insight into diversity issues. Particularly while in Ghana, where she tutored school-aged children, Shangé tried to see world through fresh eyes. “We tried to look at it from not just a Western perspective,” she says.
Scholarships from UW Global Opportunities supported Shangé’s study abroad experiences. She received the GO! Scholarship for her trip to the United Kingdom, and the Fritz Scholarship for the next summer’s program in Ghana.
The government of Togo, a small West African country with a dwindling population of elephants, recently sought assistance from Samuel Wasser, Research Professor and Director of the UW Center for Conservation Biology. The Togolese government sought information about ivory thought to be illegal, and Wasser provided a report demonstrating that the ivory samples provided indeed came from illegal sources.
International experts predict that new forensic technologies like the ones used by Wasser will help illuminate origins and pathways of illegal ivory and eventually end the trade altogether.
