Project Name: Sound and Vision

Project by Faculty Innovation Fellows Candidate Daniel Flores Bueno

Why is this project important to you, your department, & your Fellows?

This is an audiobook platform that provides a channel for accessing information from books worked on in class.

Description

This is like a version of Spotify, but of academic books. Texts worked on in a humanities course have been digitized and students are encouraged to actively listen to them, so that they can then develop a video summary.

Stakeholders served (be as specific as possible about your target audience)

Students
Professor
Authors

Key Milestones

December 2021: Digitize all books read for a one humanities course and publish them like a podcast.
March 2022:Build an open repository with learning materials constructed by the students, to help their peers with the discussion around the topics read and listening in podcast.
June 2022:Develop research to measure the impact of the podcast and open repository of student-developed learning materials.
September: Extend the project to the entire humanities area.
December 2022:Develop research to measure the impact of the podcast and open repository of student-developed learning materials to the entire humanities area.
March 2023:Publish the results in a scientific journal

An Innovation Portfolio

Podcast Chanel: https://open.spotify.com/show/5PXghgWHncvFHoHrMYb2Mv?si=-Zp5kSxdQSONEgJ_vmoEaw&dl_branch=1
Repository under construction https://www.reddeinvestigadores.com/
Slides and facilitators guides under construction

Project Name: U-Life: your ever-growing place

Project by Faculty Innovation Fellows Candidate Silvana Balarezo

Why is this project important to you, your department, & your Fellows?

University is rapidly moving from face-to-face to virtual, we started the process a few years ago but the pandemic has accelerated the need of such transformation. We know that University Life goes beyond just taking classes. Thus, if we want to transform the university experience, we need a platform that promotes university services such as social interaction, diversity, multiculturalism, co-creation and innovation. With collaborative and socializing spaces.

Description

As of August 2022, the UPC has a space to promote the UPC community, now students have a place to meet, socialize and create extra-academic communities, interest groups and clubs to strengthen University Life. Since the beginning of the emergency due to the pandemic in March 2020, many freshman students had not had any contact with the university, the services and did not have any new friends. All they knew about were the Virtual Classroom, class sessions and course activities. Therefore, there was a need for an open space and free time outside of class, which would allow them to establish links and share other activities that contribute to their training in an integral way.

The Virtual Campus platform is a simulated replica of the face-to-face campuses, courtyards, corridors, library, sports areas, study cubicles and group work, which makes them live an experience much closer to that of a face-to-face campus. There are also services such as: student care, tutorials, psycho-pedagogical counseling, vocational guidance, and even a prayer or meditation center.

In the Virtual Campus, there are also spaces for specific groups of students and teachers such as communities of gamers, Blackboard experts’ groups, mentors (students that helps other students), musicians, mathematicians, historians, teachers' room, etc., This is, virtual communities of collaboration and interaction, where students and teachers learn, exchange and share knowledge in a transparent way and that also invite the entire university community to join and share as well. In these spaces you can view the different events that run simultaneously, talks, fashion design events, audiovisuals, exhibitions, among others. In other words, all UPC events are integrated and vibrate under its identity.

A first example of the use of the Virtual Campus at its basic level would be the freshman reception event and the subsequent end-of-cycle parties. Hackathons are also created with students and teachers for the development of various projects and ideas. This virtual world is accessed from the Virtual Classroom platform (Blackboard Learn).

Stakeholders served

Freshman and general students
Professors, Teachers, tutors, AAD
Staff and academic leaders

Key Milestones

December 2021: MVP: Launch of the virtual campus with the end-of-cycle party and about 3 basic services (eg. student mentoring, teaching community, navigability, and socialization), on the Monterrico Campus.
March 2022: Launch of the 4 campuses and the "Freshmen” reception event
June 2022: Launch of new features such as: gamer communities, communication students, Musicians, etc. Digital FabLabs with VR / AR / MR, Start Up UPC online, among others
September 2022: Hackathon with students and teachers from different universities to add new functionalities and college week celebration
December 2022: End of years party 2022 with live concerts and other social activities.
March 2023: Welcome to the beginning of the cycle promoting the registration of all new 2022 students (new enrollments and students in general), launching new services.

An Innovation Portfolio

Strategic project plan.
Document of the project design process (empathy, definition, ideation, prototyping and testing).
Project construction document, schedule of activities, methodology (agile), selection of tools.
Implementation, follow-up and monitoring strategies.
Satisfaction and result surveys.