Priorities:University of Cincinnati Student Priorities
Contents
Overview
The University of Cincinnati (UC or Cincinnati) is a public research university in Cincinnati, Ohio. Founded in 1819 as Cincinnati College, it is the oldest institution of higher education in Cincinnati and has an annual enrollment of over 44,000 students, making it the second-largest university in Ohio. It is part of the University System of Ohio. The university has four major campuses with Cincinnati's main campus and medical campus in Clifton Heights and branch campuses in Blue Ash and Clermont.
2023 Cohort
Focus #1
College Mixer Day
While there are many students focused on working in a specific field, some students hope to work in an industry that is inherently multidiscipline. This project aims to offer opportunities at the specific boundary between two fields. One College invites another to their space for a lunch event with presentations, networking, and a chance to meet with industry professionals. These events are themed to be inherently multi-disciplinary: think "The Business of Music" or "The Art of Code."
Key Tactics:
- Connect students of different majors with each other to foster a more layered academic identity
- Break the physical boundary of colleges by inviting students into a college they may never visit
- Give opportunities to students interested in work at the intersection of two fields
- Offer a chance for students to explore multidisciplinary uses for their major
Focus #2
Blind Dating a Major
This event allows students to explore majors, minors, and certificates offered at UC. This event will be held every semester and is open to all students interested in exploring major paths. It will be held in the TUC Great Hall. Students will come in and receive a packet where they have a grading scale that they will use to rate the different majors. Representatives from the respected college/major will tell them about the program without "telling them" what the program is - no dead giveaways either! After dating around for a while, students can drop off their grading scale and about a week later they will get their "matches" back. This will help them accurately determine a program that fits their interests and goals.
Key Tactics:
- Putting the students needs and wants out of college first to ensure they are picking a major route that is suitable to them
- Open the event up to minors and certificates to allow students who know what they want to do broaden their horizon
- Keep all representatives 'blind' so there is no stereotypes or ego in play when it comes to choosing a major
- Reaching out to the students shortly after the event to put them in contact with the correct people/colleges
Focus #3
The coLab
The coLab is a major neutral space on campus used to host multidisciplinary events. The space may be used by students, students ambassadors for the space, as well as the staff who sponsor/operate the coLab. While Digital Futures offers students the opportunity to work in specific labs, the coLab is a general purpose space. It is a sample of 1819 and digital futures.
Key Tactics:
- An on-campus space devoted specifically to hosting multi-disciplinary work
- Open for any students to come and work on MD projects together
- Host frequent, casual events to generate student participation
- Contains windows, whiteboard walls, open space, smaller conference room, music, coffee, couches, tables+chairs, beanbags
2022 Cohort
Focus #1
UCreate
This project would expose students to what it's like to work on diverse teams for projects around the area. Service hours are something many students require for scholarships but some people struggle to find an opportunity to serve. Students want to work with other people majors from their campus and participate in projects that are applicable to what they want to study. With UCreate, students can work on these projects and have a chance to work with students from other majors; also giving them a chance to see what is possible with their degree.
Key Tactics:
- Students complete a professional personality assessment
- Working outside majors on projects that weren't thought to be possible
- Chance to do roles on a team that they may have never done before
- Increases the community involvement for the Cincinnati area
Focus #2
The Future of Capstone
The purpose of the Future of Capstone is for students to expand on the trends and observations they have taken away from their industry experience acquired during their professional coop program. Students from the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning, College of Engineering and Applied Science, and Lindner College of Business can participate in this capstone course. From their observations they noticed on coop, they will continue researching future trends in their industry and decide on the topics they would like to apply the knowledge through a future forward perspective to bring into the University of Cincinnati community. Students that have convening topics will be placed in a group to work on developing the project for the rest of the semester and will have a showcase of their own.
Key Tactics:
- Applying the insights on the future in the student's industry into a project
- Multidisciplinary collaboration through a team project
- Bridging the gap between coop industry experience and education
- Researching and synthesizing insights on the future of jobs
- Students and faculty discover the areas for opportunity to prepare students for post graduation
Focus #3
Digital Futures and the Future of Work
The Future of work research would allow students explore what the future of their industry will look like within a certain time frame, giving students the understanding of how their industry or career path will change as they are almost ready to enter the workforce. Students would be working with the Digital Futures building, a UC innovation lab that is focused on creating, researching, and designing the future of our world. With labs that focused on the future of health, education, crypto economics, the future of transportation, and more, students will conduct intensive research with said labs on their own industry and hopefully be able to influence education and the specific industry with their findings.
Key Tactics:
- Providing students with in-depth research opportunities that are relevant to their own interests.
- Creating partnerships between students and the Digital Futures / CID
- Giving typically non co-op students the chance to explore and prepare their own path before leaving the cushion of the university
- Allowing students to find a more entrepreneurial future and aiding them to start their own businesses or organizations
Focus #4
Student-led Insight on Future of Work
The idea of student-led insights comes from reflections that students complete after returning from co-op. The University of Cincinnati has a top co-op program with students that travel across the nation and the globe. Students are emersed in different types of work and regions which allow them to see trends as they are happening. Currently, students are not afforded the opportunity of bringing this knowledge to campus and are integrated back into academic semester. Being able to tap into the students insights to be able to generate reports that we could bring to university partners to be informed could be a powerful relationship to foster.
Key Tactics:
- Student co-op reflection alternative of an interview
- Value proposition to students is to provide them a platform for better reflection to inform their passions
- Synthesizing all the information provided by students to create projection on the future of work
- Being able to provide this information to university partners
- Informing faculty on changes in the workforce and creating changes to curriculum to adjust to industry changes
2021 Cohort
Focus #1
Innovation Passport
This innovation passport would encourage students to explore a program that is outside of their own major. We think that this would be incredibly beneficial as students don't have the time to explore their interests outside of their own majors. We know that students want to learn about all these different opportunities and resources on campus so having an incentivized roadmap to help them get there would be the extra push that is needed. This would also be incredibly beneficial to show a diverse and well-rounded portfolio when students are out looking for outside jobs.
- Find Overlap with existing UC Resources / programs
- Strongly encourage interdisciplinary work around passions outside of major
- Incentives through BoK equivalent work
- Incentives through Cincinnatus hour earnings
- Integrate system with an existing platform and design interface
Focus #2
Innovation Teams
- Create a matching system to link student with complementary traits
- Find ways to integrate with existing groups on campus (LCs, Design Chanllenge cohort)
- Operation system - create feedback mechanism to track the progress of groups, reassign people if groups aren't working
- Mix of both group and individual activitues to encourage both and collaboration and individual achievement
Focus #3
Innovation Micro-Credentials
- Find events / classes / programs that can become microcredential activieties.
- Reach out to people on campus who can promote this program
- Find incentives to encourage people to participate (Medals / Cords)
- Decide upon the best subjects to include as mirco-credentials
- Test run micro-credential program with interested students
Focus #4
Student Project Forum
- A place to assemble a team for interdiciplinary work -- find the skills and talents
- Encourage a community of projects and learning
- Design an interface forum
- A place to share successes and ask for advice
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