When I began my studies in Rhetoric and Composition in the English department, I had no idea that I would become interested in technology. Three years later, I have been awarded a Student Innovation Fellowship, or SIF, through the Information Systems and Technology (IS&T) department of Georgia State University. I’m excited and a little nervous to be joining a team of student innovators who all possess different skills, backgrounds, and ways of implementing knowledges.
Over the course of the next year, and beyond, I will be running this blog to let those interested in on what is happening for me as I make my journey through my Humanities degree as a SIFellow. I bring a little bit of knowledge about a lot of software to the table, and I bring a lot of knowledge about creative deployment of technology in a classroom setting. My hope is that I will experience a unique sort of bartering over the next year as I get to know my colleagues and trade my know-how with theirs.
And since all blogs need a theme – I’ve given mine an inquiry theme. In April, 2014, I wrote an article for an open-access pedagogical journal called Hybrid Pedagogy called “Taking the ‘No’ Out of Innovation.” As I formed the article, I found that no one out there in tech-talk land really has a strong idea of how to concretely define ‘innovation.’ As I find myself an “Innovation Fellow,” I feel it should be my pursuit as a Digital Humanist of sorts to attempt to nail down what this word means. What does it mean for me, personally? What might it mean for my colleagues here in the SIF Program? And what does it mean for the University system at large?
So join me in my journey to attempt to answer this question, and form new ones. I expect to have a bunch of successes, and a lot of fun failures. Please don’t hesitate to comment, or email me with any questions, problems or concerns you may have as you read.
– Valerie Robin