Fall 2010 Cycle
Eight projects have been awarded FaCE Grants totaling nearly $60,000 in the Fall 2010 funding cycle.
Applications for the Psychology of Forgiveness
Collaborative Scholarship Model for Liberal Arts Colleges
- Asani Seawell, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Grinnell College
- Loren Toussaint, Associate Professor of Psychology, Luther College
- Grant amount: Up to $4,000; additional funding may be available later for conference presentations and publication costs.
The focus of this project is a collaborative research model that merges the research interests, expertise, and resources of faculty and undergraduates at Luther and Grinnell Colleges. It is through this collaborative model that Professors Seawell and Toussaint intend not only to pursue their research interests in forgiveness and health, but also to demonstrate the ways in which research at small liberal arts colleges can be successfully accomplished. The model incentivizes research, provides a steady source of accountability, fully involves students in all stages of the process, and will result in broad dissemination of both the our collaborative research model and our research results.
Forgiveness has long been a topic of study and discourse in religion and philosophy, but only recently has the scientific study of forgiveness become of interest to psychological scientists. Professors Seawell and Toussaint will be conducting two research studies related to forgiveness and health that will employ a collaborative model. The first study will examine the effects of writing about forgiveness on the physical and psychological health of undergraduate students. The second study will focus on the impact of meditation on forgiveness and health. The most important outcome of this project will be the development of a collaborative research model that will be useful for ACM faculty and students.
Approaches to Research and Learning about the Environment
Collaborative International Event
- Mike Taber, Associate Professor of Education, Colorado College
- Nick Gomersall, Associate Professor of Economics, Luther College
- Fabio Roland, Associate Professor of Environmental Studies, Federal University of Juiz de Fora
- Grant amount: Up to $15,000
The primary objective of this collaborative event is to conduct a three-day workshop on "Approaches to Research and Learning about the Environment" in Juiz de Fora, Brazil. Participants will involve approximately 14 Environmental Studies faculty from the ACM, the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF), and the University of Brasilia (UnB). The main goals of the workshop are:
High Stakes Performance By Liberal Arts College Students: Understanding and Coping with Anxiety
Collaborative Event
- Eric Wiertelak, DeWitt Wallace Professor of Psychology, Macalester College
- Laura Nichols, Visiting Assistant Professor of Music, Macalester College
- Grant amount: Up to $14,908
Students at liberal arts colleges engage in "high stakes" performance across a wide range of disciplines. As they present their research findings, undergo interviews for national scholarships, address community audiences, compete on the athletic field, perform in the concert hall, or audition for theatrical or dance productions, these students put themselves on the line. In fact, most liberal arts colleges explicitly aim to cultivate the talent, mental capacities and gumption needed to excel in such settings. Facing judgment, disagreement and possible disappointment are integral to the leadership and civic engagement we expect of our students.
Although high stakes performance is pivotal, most liberal arts educators possess only odd lots of knowledge and advice about doing it well. What works for one individual fails another, and what works on one occasion, is ineffective in the next. While anxiety is a universal phenomenon, its operation in individuals is hard to predict. Accordingly, the measures to control or relieve anxiety are poorly understood. So it is that liberal arts educators are much better at designing and critiquing high stakes performances than they are at helping students to improve or excel at them. At "High Stakes Performance and Anxiety," ACM educators will learn about performance anxiety among high potential college students.
How Useful Is Digital Field Technology in a Standard 3-Hour Lab Course?
Presentation Grant
Portable, location aware computing has the potential to revolutionize the way field-based science courses are conceived and delivered. Thirteen faculty and IT staff from liberal arts colleges met in June, 2009, to discuss the opportunities and concerns associated with these technologies. The group discovered that although digital field technology is used successfully at several geology field camps across the United States, the use of similar technology in a standard 3-hour lab in a semester-long course presents challenges. Instructors must balance the content and technique goals of the course and the labs with the time spent on learning new hardware and software.
Jeff Clark, one of the conference organizers (Sue Swanson, Associate Professor of Geology at Beloit College and co-organizer of the project, cannot attend this presentation), will offer a workshop at the 2011 American Association of Geographers meeting in Seattle, WA, on April 12-16, 2011. This is the pre-eminent and largest meeting of geographers in the country. The annual meeting attracts upwards of 7,000 researchers, educators, and practitioners from around the world. Clark and Swanson believe that lively discussion of what the group learned will be the most valuable way to disseminate information and that by sharing best practices with other educators they can continue to build on the collaborative nature of the work and inform the work of others well outside of the ACM. See the Outdoor Classroom project website for a report on the earlier FaCE project.
Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Liberal Arts Curriculum
Collaborative Event
- Ádám Galambos, Assistant Professor of Economics, Lawrence University
- David Gerard, Associate Professor of Economics, Lawrence University
- Jerry Gustafson, Coleman Foundation Professor in Entrepreneurship, Beloit College
- Daniel Johnson, Schlessman Professor of Economics, Colorado College
- Grant amount: Up to $15,000
It is widely recognized in economics as well as in the broader United States culture and polity that Innovation and Entrepreneurship are the engines of the spectacular economic development and prosperity that the most developed countries have enjoyed in the past half century. Yet most undergraduate economics courses today fail even to mention these subjects, or do so only in a cursory way. This conference will help economists — and other colleagues in related fields — at ACM colleges to address this very serious issue. About 20 to 30 faculty members from economics and related departments at ACM colleges will hold a two-day conference to explore how the subjects of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (I&E) can be integrated into the undergraduate economics curriculum. The conference will have four sessions: two will be devoted to understanding the history and current state of research on I&E, and two will be devoted to the topic of teaching the economics of I&E and to changes in the way we teach economics that will encourage students to be more innovative.
A Multi-Year Collaborative New Media Ethnography of Individuals Transitioning to and from Ultra Orthodox Jewish Identities
- Devorah Heitner, Assistant Professor of Communication, Lake Forest College
- Katya Gibel Mevorach, Professor of Anthropology, Grinnell College (consulting colleague)
- Grant amount: Up to $4,120
This project builds on Professor Heitner's interest in media and identity in a realm that, more than a decade into pervasive Internet usage, we are still calling "new media." Specifically, the collaborative team will use media ethnography and textual analysis to consider how individuals transition their identities to and from ultra-orthodox (haredi) identities. They will be investigating the new media productions and consumptions of individuals who are moving into ultra-orthodox Jewish identities and individuals transitioning out of ultra-orthodoxy. The project will attempt to understand how these individuals use blogs, social networking, and video sharing sites for communication, recruitment, autobiography, journalism, and pedagogy.
This project suggests new possibilities for student-faculty collaboration by considering students as collaborators and not assistants, by including students in the research design as well as application, and by considering them as experts in interdisciplinary collaboration.
Presentation Grant
- Carol Zerbe Enns, Professor of Psychology, Cornell College
- Erin Davis, Associate Professor of Sociology, Cornell College
- Joan E. Ericson, Professor of German, Russian, and East Asian Languages, Colorado College
- Grant amount: Up to $1,560
- Project website
How do you create a study abroad course that fits a unique college curriculum and programmatic needs — and as inexpensively as possible? These questions formed the basis for a recent project by three faculty members from Colorado College and Cornell College. With the benefit of a FaCE Grant, Professors Carol Enns, Erin Davis, and Joan Ericson developed and executed a short-term international travel and study experience in Japan for their students. See the project website for more information about their project.
Their panel presentation at the April 2011 AsianNETWORK conference in Oakbrook, IL, will present a framework for collaborative short-term international study at their institutions and beyond. Topics addressed in the panel will include:
- Initial planning and FaCE proposal;
- Cornell College highlights;
- Colorado College highlights;
- Intersection of the two courses in Tokyo;
- What worked;
- Problems to work on for a future course; and
- Tips for other institutions interested in collaborative international study.
Zen Stories for Today
Collaborative Model of Research Mentorship
- Gereon Kopf, Associate Professor of Religion, Luther College
- Benjamin Moore, Assistant Professor of Art, Luther College
- Asuka Sango, Assistant Professor of Religion, Carleton College
- Grant amount: Up to $6,000
The goals of this research and collaboration project are:
- To produce interactive applications, which contain animated versions of encounter dialogues between masters and disciples that make up the basic scriptures and lore of Zen Buddhism;
- To develop a resource section that provides the historical, scriptural, ritual, and philosophical background of these stories;
- To make accessible audio recordings that feature interviews with Zen Buddhist practitioners and scholars on the role and use of encounter dialogues in contemporary society; and
- To supplement the animations with an interactive segment, by means of which the user can engage with these stories via web applications and interactive streaming media.
The project will enact a collaborative model of mentorship; students will be colleagues rather than assistants and thus empowered to become researchers, creative artists, and proficient users of current technology. The project will combine cutting-edge research and up-to-date digital and interactive technology to facilitate learning across the liberal arts and, while exploring religious texts, intersecting faith and learning. In short, this project will enable the student participants to make the transition into their professional and academic fields and, due to its cross-disciplinary nature, will affect multiple aspects of their education and their life.