Author: christinabondi (page 2)

By Joey Youssef (Team Lead) & the Multi-Faith Centre Research Team

Do you value faith, spirituality, and making meaning in your everyday life?

The Innovation Hub is recruiting volunteers to aid in a project aimed at exploring these topics, and how students can be better supported in their religious, spiritual, or self-reflective practices. The Multi-Faith Centre (MFC) and the Innovation Hub at U of T will be working together this 2018-2019 academic year to explore how students currently make use of the MFC’s existing facilities and services, and how the MFC can cater to the needs of U of T’s diverse student body — including those who do not necessarily prescribe to a particular religious group or faith.

By Shirin Gerami, Design Research Team Lead (Family Care Office)

The Family Care research project is born out of a partnership between the Innovation Hub and the Family Care Office at the University of Toronto. The overall aim of this project is to answer the question “what are the experiences of students with family responsibilities, and particularly student parents, at the University of Toronto?”

By Joey Youssef (Team Lead) & the Multi-Faith Centre Research Team

In this blog post series, we introduce you to each of the Innovation Hub’s research teams this year, as well as provide some project details. To learn more about the research questions, see here. Below, you will find a brief statement from the Multi-Faith Centre’s research team, regarding why they decided to join the I-Hub and this particular project.

By Nick Feinig, Senior Research Assistant (for the ACE-Transforming the Instructional Landscape project)

What do instructors and students have to say about instructional space at UofT? Quite a lot, it seems! Beginning in the fall of 2017, the Innovation Hub undertook an initial ethnographic study combining long form empathy interviews, participant observation in classrooms around campus, and data lifted from a social media campaign as part of ACE’s Transforming the Instructional Landscape (TIL) project. Instructor feedback was also solicited through a dedicated portion of the TIL website.  Analysing this data, our research team determined that both students and instructors recognize the importance of thoughtfully managed space to the learning process, while the former in particular have powerful memories associated with certain campus spaces.

By Suzie Kim, Communications Team

Shape your future classroom! As part of Academic and Campus Event’s Transforming the Instructional Landscape project, the Innovation Hub is bringing the design process into the U of T community.  Join us in the Bahen Atrium and Med-Sci Lobby so we can ask you: what makes a classroom great? 

By Julia Smeed, Innovation Projects Officer

A world-class institution deserves world-class spaces for learning and instruction. That’s why we think that Academic and Campus Events (ACE) landmark renovation project – Transforming the Instructional Landscape (TIL) – will be such an exciting and impactful project at U of T. The instructional space on campus plays an essential role in fulfilling the university’s mandate to provide an unparalleled learning experience and impacts every student here. As the steward of these important facilities, ACE is committed to developing accessible, innovative, and purpose-built classrooms that address the needs of instructors and students. We can’t help but be inspired by their ambitious new vision for U of T.

By Shirin Gerami, Design Research Team Lead (Family Care Office)

Are you a student with family responsibilities?

In partnership with the University of Toronto’s Family Care Office, the Innovation Hub would love to hear about your experience as a U of T student and parent or caregiver. We are interested in the opportunities, challenges, and needs that parents and caregivers have as they navigate their multiple roles and responsibilities while studying.

By Suzie Kim, Communications Team

On October 11th, 2018, the Innovation Hub partnered with the SLP network to host a research event entitled SLP Presents: The Future of SLP.  SLP is a network of staff who  work directly with students across at the University of Toronto’s three campuses.  The partnership between SLP and the Innovation Hub commenced last year to explore two questions: What should the future of the SLP Network look like? and how should this community of practice be redesigned to better serve the needs and wants of all its members?  After conducting a number of empathy interviews with staff in a variety of positions and career stages, insights were generated.  These insights reveled that supporting staff to develop institutional knowledge, mentorship and networking, senior management involvement and career development support are areas where there are opportunities for SLP to provide support.  This event sought to gather additional data to inform next steps of the process.

By Rachel Davis, Design Research Team Lead (Trademark Licensing) 

Do you feel a sense of pride as a student here at the University of Toronto? Why or why not? What do you value as student here? What has been most challenging? Student researchers at the Innovation Hub are working with University of Toronto Trademark Licensing Office to connect with you about your thoughts, feelings, and experiences at UofT.

By Paul Giurgeu and Chanz Valmonte, Communications Team

Chanz’s Perspective

Entering into my first year of university, I knew I wanted to make the most of my experience. I was determined to figure out a way to balance my studies with extracurricular activities (as well as sleep, and social life, and sanity). At least, I would try my best! That’s when I found out about the Innovation Hub, a student-led initiative launched to improve student experience through research. The I-Hub would allow me to get involved on campus, cater to my personal interests, and positively impact a diverse group of people—no matter the size! For these reasons, I jumped right in! I completed the application (there’s CCR-credit, so win-win!). Now I’m here, writing a piece about my experience at September’s weekend-long training.