A Meta-Analysis of Alternative Water Sources

Roughly one half of the Earth’s population suffers from shortage or lack of clean water. While many innovations and products have been created to address this Global Water Crisis, no comparisons have been done as to which innovations and products are the best overall choice for philanthropic investment. The crisis can be broken down into three specific crises including the transportation crisis, the access crisis, and the sanitation crisis. The study examined fifteen innovations and products, targeted to address the three crises to determine which innovation in each group is the overall smart investment. Pulse tool was used to create reports of data comparing the innovations and products to one another. Findings concluded that the Hippo Roller is the smart investment for transportation of water, the Treadle Pump is the smart investment for gaining access to water, and the Filtron and the Mobile MaxPure are the equally smart investments for sanitizing water. Therefore, for future development of social innovation comparison, it is recommended that an investor look at the overall benefits of an innovation before donating money to that cause

Assessing collaborative and experiential learning

Collaborative and experiential learning has many proven merits. Team projects with real clients motivate students to put in the time for successfully completing demanding projects. However, assessing student performance where individual student contributions are separated from the collective contribution of the team as a whole is not a straightforward, simple task. Assessment data from multiple sources, including students as assessors of their own work and peers\u27 work, is critical to measuring certain student learning outcomes, such as responsible team work and timely communication. In this paper we present our experience with assessing collaborative and experiential learning in five Computer Information Systems courses. The courses were scheduled over three semesters and enrolled 57 students. Student performance and student feedback data were used to evaluate and refine our assessment methodology. We argue that assessment data analysis improved our understanding of (1) the assessment measures that support more closely targeted learning outcomes and (2) how those measures should be implemented

A collaborative and experiential learning model powered by real-world projects

Information Technology (IT) curricula\u27s strong application component and its focus on user centeredness and team work require that students experience directly real-world projects for real users of IT solutions. Although the merit of this IT educational tenet is universally recognized, delivering collaborative and experiential learning has its challenges. Reaching out to identify projects formulated by actual organizations adds significantly to course preparation. There is a certain level of risk involved with delivering a useful solution while, at the same time, enough room should be allowed for students to experiment with, be wrong about, review, and learn. Challenges pertaining to the real-world aspect of problem-based learning are compounded by managing student teams and assessing their work such that both individual and collective contributions are taken into account. Finally, the quality of the project releases is not the only measure of student learning. Students should be given meaningful opportunities to practice, improve, and demonstrate their communication and interpersonal skills. In this paper we present our experience with two courses in which teams of students worked on real-world projects involving three external partners. We describe how each of the challenges listed above has impacted the course requirements, class instruction, team dynamics, assessment, and learning in these courses. Course assessment and survey data from students are linked to learning outcomes and point to areas where the collaborative and experiential learning model needs improvement

Latin American perspectives to internationalize undergraduate information technology education

The computing education community expects modern curricular guidelines for information technology (IT) undergraduate degree programs by 2017. The authors of this work focus on eliciting and analyzing Latin American academic and industry perspectives on IT undergraduate education. The objective is to ensure that the IT curricular framework in the IT2017 report articulates the relationship between academic preparation and the work environment of IT graduates in light of current technological and educational trends in Latin America and elsewhere. Activities focus on soliciting and analyzing survey data collected from institutions and consortia in IT education and IT professional and educational societies in Latin America; these activities also include garnering the expertise of the authors. Findings show that IT degree programs are making progress in bridging the academic-industry gap, but more work remains

Concept paper on a curriculum initiative for energy, climate change, and sustainability at Boston University

[Summary] Boston University has made important contributions to the interconnected challenges of energy, climate change, and sustainability (ECS) through its research, teaching, and campus operations. This work reveals new opportunities to expand the scope of teaching and research and place the University at the forefront of ECS in higher education. This paper describes the framework for a University-wide curriculum initiative that moves us in that direction and that complements the University’s strategic plan. The central curricular objectives are to provide every undergraduate the opportunity be touched in some way in their educational program by exposure to some aspect of the ECS challenge, and to increase opportunities for every graduate student to achieve a focused competence in ECS. The initiative has six cornerstone initiatives. The first is the Campus as a Living Lab (CALL) program in which students, faculty and staff work together and use our urban campus and its community to study and implement ECS solutions. The second is a university-wide minor degree that helps students develop an integrated perspective of the economic, environmental, and social dimensions of sustainability. The third is one or more graduate certificate programs open to all graduate students. The fourth is an annual summer faculty workshop that develops new ECS curriculum and CALL opportunities. The fifth is web-based resource that underpins the construction of a vibrant knowledge network for the BU community and beyond. Finally, an enhanced sustainability alumni network will augment professional opportunities and generate other benefits. The learning outcomes of this initiative will be realized through the collaborative work of faculty, students, and staff from all 17 colleges and schools. The initiative will leverage existing BU student resources such as the Thurman Center, Build Lab, and Innovate@BU. Benefits of this initiative, beyond the curriculum, include acceleration towards the goals of our Climate Action Plan; improving the “sustainability brand” of BU; enhancing the ability to attract students and new faculty; strengthening our alumni and campus communities; deepening our ties with the city of Boston; and the potential to spin off new social and technological innovations.Published versio

The Ethical Challenges of Community-Based CS Training at Portland State

This literature review investigates Service Learning, the Capstone program at Portland State University, and the CS version of that Capstone program in particular in order to evaluate the ethical issues surrounding them. To achieve this, this paper is split into a few sections. There is an explanation of Service Learning, and a brief overview of its history. Following that is a summary of the history of the Capstone Program at Portland State including a description of the CS Capstone program at Portland State. After that the paper investigates some of the legal challenges surrounding the use of free labor. Next, the paper will take a look at the open source movement, the status of Open Source software as a public good, and the degree to which it mitigates the ethical challenges involving free labor. The paper comes to the conclusion that there’s a need for advocates and practitioners of Service Learning and similar types of experimental learning to reflect on the ethics of these types of pedagogies, specifically on the obligations of the university and the other organizations involved towards the students. The paper also makes some suggestions as to how the CS Capstone at Portland State can be improved

Academic Service-Learning In An Accounting Information Systems Capstone Course

This paper presents the use of nonprofit organizations in an Accounting Information System (AIS) capstone course to promote Academic Service Learning (ASL).  ASL integrates community service with course requirements, objectives, and outcomes.  Use of a carefully planned field project is an ideal approach to realize these dual objectives of providing meaningful community service with academic learning.  Conclusions drawn from the use of ASL in the capstone course over the last two years are presented

Advancing Environmental Equity: Environmental Justice Organizational Directory and Toolkit, 2022

Too often grassroots groups and environmental justice (EJ) organizations are not linked to each other (Bullard, 2000), exist in silos, and are isolated from the resources and/or organizations in which they can collaborate and benefit from. This thesis, in the form of a directory, is designed as a planning, organizing, networking, and community empowerment tool to bring organizations and underrepresented stakeholders to the table in planning summits, conferences, and workshops. The goal of this thesis is three-fold: 1) to offer a conventional analysis on reoccurring and longstanding, environmental justice themes and inequalities burdening low-income and/or people of color in the United States; 2) to compile and document a directory of grassroots environmental justice and civil rights organizations that currently operate and serve in Alaska, EPA Region 4 (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and 6 Tribes), and EPA Region 6 (Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Texas, and 65 Tribal Nations); and 3) to track and examine enabling policies, resources, and tools that serve to create a more equitable environmental justice landscape in the United States

Project Renew Worcester

n The client for this capstone project is RENEW Worcester which is a fledgling solar power project whose main goals are to bring renewable energy in the form of solar power into local, primarily low-income communities and are committed to the mission of making the transition off of fossil fuels to clean, renewable power. Based in Worcester, Massachusetts, they are a local chapter of Co-op Power which is a consumer-owned sustainable energy cooperative (co-op) made up of numerous different local chapters all over the New England area as well as the state of New York. The problem that we will attempt to address is to determine what kind of organization RENEW should become: non-profit or for-profit, while taking into consideration that our recommendation should be in line with what would best be suited for their goals and mission. The purpose of this project is to provide research into the solar power industry – with special focus on the solar industry in Massachusetts – as well as provide detailed information on the different types of non-profit and for-profit organizations