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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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Atlanta, GA | Posted: January 7, 2016
Tara La Bouff, Communications Manager
404.769.5408
Summary Sentence:
Students from any college can enroll in new interdisciplinary courses about sustainable communities – inspired by “Computing 4 Good” from the College of Computing and at the heart of a 10-year sustainability initiative launching now.
Full Summary:
For the first time this semester, students from any college will be able to enroll in new interdisciplinary courses focused on sustainable communities. The courses were partly inspired by the “Computing 4 Good” curriculum from the College of Computing and are at the heart of the 10-year Serve Learn Sustain initiative launching this month to teach sustainability and community engagement concepts across every major at Georgia Tech.
Ellen Zegura compressed
Beril Toktay
CS4803 AD Spring 2016Launching this month is a new, 10-year initiative to teach sustainability and community engagement concepts across every major at Georgia Tech, and it begins with a course inspired in part by the successful “Computing 4 Good” (C4G) program from the College of Computing.
For the first time this semester, students from any major are able to take an interdisciplinary “special topics course” that will teach how to create communities where people want to live and work, as well as how to coordinate with stakeholders to make sustainable ideas a reality for entire communities with diverse backgrounds and interests. The course has two offerings -- a sophomore- and a senior-level version.
Students from any major may register for either one – CS/Arch/GT 4803 or CS/Arch/GT 2803 – through Jan. 15. The class will be team taught by professors from the College of Architecture, College of Engineering, and the School of Public Policy.
“These are broad intellectually and teach an appreciation for what it means to work in and with a community that is different from your own,” said Ellen Zegura, professor of computer science and an original instructor from C4G who has led community projects from Atlanta to Africa.
Projects by C4G – such as implementing electronic health data systems in Africa or helping an Atlanta entrepreneur make a mobile app for women’s safety – inspired Zegura to do more.
“Much of my computer science research work takes years to develop and impact the real world,” she says. “C4G became such a fantastic avenue to do something more applied, more immediate and more directly impactful on society.”
She is now co-architect of Georgia Tech’s 10-year initiative called “Serve, Learn, Sustain” with Beril Toktay, the Brady Family Chair in Scheller College of Business.
Like C4G, students in the courses can apply disciplinary skills to solve community needs. Unique from C4G, Zegura’s new course will enable students to observe a real community challenge – water remediation at Proctor Creek – map the stakeholders, model and learn successful methods for engaging with such stakeholders to make progress on an issue.
The class is ideal for students with “an interest in the real world, an interest in what makes communities great, understanding why there are inequities, and who want to work towards a positive future,” Zegura says.
Zegura and Toktay expect the “Serve, Learn, Sustain” initiative to grow.
Within five years, they aim to add 16 new electives and refresh 28 courses across Georgia Tech with sustainability content. A freshman camp will be formed, support for relevant student organizations will be provided, and two pathways will be specified — one in Public Service and one in Innovating for Sustainability — consisting of classes and experiences such as service-learning projects or internships with organizations that tackle sustainability challenges. Capstone course offerings also will be expanded to offer projects from the sustainable communities domain.
“Eventually we hope that students will be interested in pathways to other courses, that there will be lots of classes across Georgia Tech like C4G that have community and sustainability components, and that more faculty will add sustainability concepts into their curriculum.”
For more: https://oscar.gatech.edu/
