Changes

<span style="color:#000000;">Union College is one of a handful of liberal arts colleges that offer </span> [http://www.abet.org/accreditation/ ABET-acredited] <span style="color:#000000;">engineering programs. What does this mean? For one, we have a culturally, racially, and gender-diverse campus community. Our engineering students are offered exciting academic opportunities outside of the technical engineering curriculum. Academic excellence, a variety of competitive sports teams, and an abundance of campus leadership opportunities attract some of the finest college applicants to spend four years studying on the beautiful campus in upstate New York. Students are the primary focus of our professors, who also successfully maintain cutting-edge research projects, and develop new ideas and technologies in the sciences, as well as the humanities and the arts.</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">One has every reason to believe that a school with as tight interdisciplinary connections as Union College, it would be a national leader for innovation, and a catalyst for the transition of STEM into STEAM (where A stands for arts). Well, we are not quite there yet. In general, students at Union are very content (and we have every reason to be), which makes it difficult to identify exact gaps and spaces for improvement. On a 2,200 student campus with The following will be targeted in the six strategies for innovating Union:</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">A. Encouraging creativity</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">B. Technology-based learning</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">C. The visual vs. the verbal/written</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">D. Innovative study space(s)</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">E. Campus involvement navigation</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">F. Engineering and liberal arts in conversation</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">G. Community division by major, culture, and Greek/non-Greek</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">H. Target career opportunities</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">After discussing some of these with professors and deans, two clear messages have been communicated over and over again:&nbsp;</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">1) Innovation and creativity on campus should '''not''' be tied to academics</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">2) What to do is unclear, but what '''not to do''' is crystal clear.</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">The real question is: How to make busy and overinvolved Union students happy, while also ensuring the happiness of the faculty (which matters in gaining support and funding for just about any initiative), particularly one that involves a long-term change?</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">Looking at the Innovation Engine, encountered in Tina Seelig's TEDx Crash Course on Creativity and UIF Meetup Presentation, there are two apparent tracks Union can take:</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">1) Educate "the Self", i.e. the students.</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">2) Change "the "Environment" on campus.</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">The first would mean incorporating innovative ideas in the classroom environment, and ensuring that innovation, creativity, and entrepreneurship find their way into every class, one way or another. The second would mean providing the perfect setting for students to explore innovation on their own, outside the classroom through organizations, design spaces, and projects (This seems to be the preferred approach of Union faculty). To say that both can be implemented right away would be far too ambitious, but one without the other would not allow Union College to achieve its full potential and become the leader for applying innovation and creativity in upstate New York.</span>

<span style="color:#000000;">Each of the following strategies is designed to significantly expose and educate students in the areas of innovation, creativity, and entrepreneurship. &nbsp;<u>Note</u>&nbsp;that the strategies listed below are in no particular order of completion. </span>