Faculty Development Grantees 2010-11

Project Summaries 2010-2011

Carol Handwerker, Professor in Materials Engineering and Environmental and Ecological Engineering
Professor Handwerker, in collaboration with Professors Riall Nolan and H. Kory Cooper (Anthropology), Prof. Fu Zhao (Mechanical Engineering/EEE), and Prof. Jeffrey Youngblood (Materials Engineering/EEE), are leading a group of eight undergraduates in a semester-long research-based course on examining societal, technical, and economic issues in dealing with global electronic waste (eWaste). Lindsey Payne, ESE/CIE-SL, Anne Dare, ABE/GEP, and Ruihong Zhang (MSE) are collaborating with the faculty in promoting service-learning concepts, global design collaboration, and laboratory module development. During the course the students will be working with the Indian Institute of Technology – Ropar, a new undergraduate IIT in Northern India, and the Electronic TakeBack Coalition, a partnership of non-governmental organizations that promotes green design and responsible recycling in the electronics industry. Over the course of the semester students will be paired with IIT-R students to develop an understanding of how eWaste is handled differently in India, the US, and one other country of the student pair's choosing. The student pairs will develop these as case studies for distribution on Purdue's globalHub website. The Purdue students will also form three subteams to focus on anthropological aspects of electronics manufacturing and use, life cycle analysis of bio-based polymers for use in electronics, and availability and environmental impact of materials critical for electronics. The student sub-teams will create review presentations in these areas that relate their findings to specific electronic products for distribution through globalHub. The students will produce videos demonstrating the disassembly a range of eWaste products and including information from their subgroup research, with the specific target audiences identified through discussions with the Electronic TakeBack Coalition, and post those videos on Youtube, globalHub, and if possible, the Electronics TakeBack Coalition website.

Daphene Koch, Assistant Professor in Building Construction Management
Dr. Koch, in partnership with Cinco Ciebas and Pangola Community and the Iroquois community in Costa Rica, is leading a group of 15 Purdue University undergraduates and graduate students on a three-week Service-Learning course in Costa Rica. The students are from the College of Technology and Agriculture. Before departure, the students and faculty are meeting for a 1 credit pre-course service-learning class to practice the techniques that will be used during the Maymester Costa Rica educational experience. Students will measure and layout trees in the Tippecanoe Battleground park to add to a trail guide. They will also learn about the materials which will be used in Costa Rica and pre-plan the design and schedule for the projects. While in Costa Rica, the students will measure and layout trees in a primary forest, while the agriculture students identify the trees. In the Iroquois community, the students will build a recycling center, perform maintenance on a health clinic, and build periurban gardens with recycled materials. The impact from both courses will be the learning through integrating disciplines and applying course knowledge to helping others. Upon completion of the courses, the students will have produced maps and structures while assisting Costa Rica communities.

Elena Benedicto, Associate Professor in Linguistics
Professor Benedicto's course will create interdisciplinary teams of ten-fifteen students whose combined skills will provide a service to address self-identified needs of five community partners in Rosita, Nicaragua. Rosita is a relatively new mining town in the interior of the Caribbean Coast where two cultures co-exist: the Mestizo Spanish-speaking population and the indigenous Mayangna-speaking population. Students will learn the two languages as a tool for communication and as a sign of respect and acknowledgement for both cultures, one hour each day for each language. The rest of the working day, they will work in collaboration with community partners on their specific project—ten community projects have been identified. During the first week, they will meet with the community partner and learn about the project, and the following four weeks will be devoted to addressing project objectives. As member of interdisciplinary teams, students will learn to combine different academic perspectives (e.g., engineering, social sciences, anthropology, linguistics, etc.). Projects range from the design of buildings/sites to the assessment of specific populations (e.g., people with disabilities) to the training of local human resources (e.g., science teachers, computer training, etc.). Reflection sessions on various topics, including service engagement, the multicultural nature of the site, and the social impact of Nicaraguan history, will be included, as well as a final report.

German Posada, Associate Professor in Child Development and Family Studies
In the course, Child Development in Context: Latin-American Children and Families, a Costa Rican Experience course, 15-20 students will attend four 2.5-hour class sessions on child development at Purdue University and then travel to San Jose and Earth University at Limón, Costa Rica. There, they will visit two government institutions setting policies for disadvantaged children and their families, a hospital for children, an institution for blind and deaf children, a nursery school, and two elementary schools. Both at the nursery and elementary schools they will be helping teachers caring for infants and teaching English; each student will bring educational materials to each school visited. Students will spend two days at the home of a Costa Rican family in a rural setting and will help the family with their micro-business. Also, they will visit Earth University and interact with college students from Africa, Latin-America, and Europe. Students will keep a daily journal where they will register information gathered about a topic in child development. They will write a 5-page typed report on a specific aspect of child development in the context that the students will choose. It is expected that the activities programmed will allow students to link and compare contents covered in class sessions and discussions with their experiences at a variety of settings in a different cultural context.

Jean Paul Allain, Assistant Professor in Nuclear Engineering
Professor Allain's goal is to integrate a module titled: "Energy, Materials and Nanotechnology in Emerging Economies" within the context of a new graduate course in the School of Nuclear Engineering titled: "Advanced Nanostructured Materials." The module will be a collaborative design project with students at Colombian institutions held during the Spring semester. The course will be limited to 20 students both at the graduate level and advanced undergraduate level. The course will use the nanoHUB infrastructure as a means to conduct engineering design between Purdue and Colombia. The Purdue students will be split into five teams and each group of four students will be complemented with a team of Colombian students. The projects will encompass two objectives: 1) develop learning modules for training of Colombian and rural Indiana primary and secondary school teachers and 2) develop technical design of nanotechnology-energy related materials to be implemented in Colombia. The concept of EPICS will be used as a framework for engineering design and service-learning pedagogy. Outreach in Colombia will be coordinated with Colombian institutions and preparation via nanoHUB. Students will also participate in discussion sessions, including: socio-economic challenges facing research in biotech, nanotech, and cyber-infrastructures in Latin America, and the integration of education and engineering design into service-learning modules that can impact Latin American rural and less-developed regions. The groups will then be asked to write up their discussion and findings in a collaborative project report that describe methods on how to connect both in research areas within the theme of the workshop and also ideas on experiential and service-learning modules that could be executed at an institution in Colombia or in the U.S. The course will then conclude with inviting rural Indiana school teachers and students for a 1.5 day workshop held in the Discovery Learning Research Center in Discovery Park. In the long-run once funding can be identified for this activity (e.g. EPICS based NSF funding) the 20 student cohort would visit Colombia during the spring break to join the Colombian students in the outreach activities.

Lynetta Freeman, Associate Professor of Small Animal Surgery
Dr. Freeman, in partnership with VIDA (Volunteers for Intercultural and Definitive Adventures), is leading a group of 11 Purdue University School of Veterinary Medicine students on a 10-day Service-learning course in Costa Rica and Panama. In this course, veterinary students will perform spay/ neuters of small animals as well as deworming and vaccinating both small and large animals under the guidance of local veterinarians. It is expected that the course will allow the students to enhance their education and training through practical application, and, at the same time, provide a much needed service to educate owners about the importance of basic needs like access to food, water, and proper shelter and serve as role models in how to treat pets and livestock.

Lori Unruh Snyder, Assistant Professor in Agronomy
Dr. Unruh Snyder, in partnership with Cinco Ciebas and Pangola Community, is leading a group of 15 Purdue University College of Agriculture undergraduates on a three-week Service-Learning course in Costa Rica. Before departure, the students and faculty are meeting for a 1 credit pre-course service-learning class to design a trail guide for the Cinco Ciebas farm and creating a peri-urban recycling agricultural garden for a community of 100. While in Costa Rica, the students will partner with College of Technology Purdue students to help design a recycling center. It is expected that the course will allow the students to enhance their education and training through practical application, integrating disciplines and promoting civil awareness of sustainable agriculture and "green" construction.

Matthew Lynall, Clinical Assistant Professor in Management

Michael Schutz, Professor in Animal Sciences
Prof. Schutz's Dairy Farm Evaluation course (ANSC 48500) furthers the education of 10 Senior College of Agriculture students by increasing their communication abilities and knowledge of dairy farm operational and business management, and allows students to deliver that knowledge as community outreach. During this course, students will be working with the following community partners: Indiana Professional Dairy Producers and milk marketing cooperatives and feed industry businesses to assess and deliver recommendations for business enhancement to Indiana dairy farms. In the first part of the course, participants will work closely with industry partners to learn about critical operational control points in dairy farm management. In the second part of the course, the students will assess and evaluate dairy farms and provide the owners/operators with recommendations to foster improved operational performance. It is expected that the course will allow the students to enhance their education and training through practical application, while improving the financial performance of the dairy farms which in turn will provide a more sustainable and stable business for the family owners.

Minchi Kim, Assistant Professor in Curriculum and Instruction
Professor Kim will partner with local middle and high schools to design and support a virtual service-learning and teaching environment that will allow online students in EDCI 56400 (Integration & Management of Computers in Education) to engage in service-learning and teaching. EDCI 56400, offered online as part of Learning Design and Technology's online masters program, is designed to help students who use or intend to use computers in educational settings to (1) understand important issues pertinent to integration and management of technology and (2) effectively plan, implement, and evaluate technology-based instruction. Through the virtual service-learning and teaching environment, students will be able to communicate with teachers in the schools to identify classroom-based issues and problems related to the use of technologies and provide solutions and/or assistance in various forms. Students may work with teachers to develop a lesson plan that incorporates emerging technologies (e.g., web-based simulations), help K-12 students to obtain necessary computer skills, and work with media/computer specialists to design and develop technology-enhanced teaching materials. Students may also design a website for classes, locate web-based simulations and games, and develop a teaching material with technologies. Approximately 20 students will engage in this activity to work with selected 2-3 teachers and over 100 students in the local schools.

Monica Miller, Clinical Assistant Professor in Pharmacy Practice
In CLPH 457: Pharmaceutical Care in Developing Countries, Dr. Miller is incorporating service-learning education to further educate students about service-learning projects. This is an elective course offered to Doctor of Pharmacy students in the spring semester of their 3rd professional year who will be participating in the Pharmacy in Kenya Program Clerkship (CLPH 889). On an annual basis, the sequence can accommodate 30 students. The students spend two months in Kenya during their 4th professional year. The 30 students are divided between 5 rotation blocks which means there are typically 6 students in Kenya at one time. In previous years, students have participated in a number of service-learning projects while they were on their clerkship. This year, Dr. Miller plans to augment that experience in several ways. First, the students will be taught about service-learning in the CLPH 457 class. She plans to have assigned readings and discussion about what service-learning is and how they can actively participate in it. Second, she plans to have a service-learning project competition. Each of the current students will have to write up a new service-learning project that can be completed during the 889 Clerkship. Submissions will be judged on creativity, sustainability, and financial constraints. The top 5 projects will be implemented. This will allow each group of students to implement and complete on project during their clerkship experience.