Your Name and Title:
Michael Aldarondo-Jeffries, Director, McNair Scholars and Research and Mentoring Program
School or Organization Name:
University of Central Florida
Co-Presenter Name(s):
Dr. Violeta Vidaček-Hains, University of Zagreb, Faculty of Organization and Informatics
Dr. Melody Bowden, University of Central Florida
Area of the World from Which You Will Present:
Orlando, Florida, USA and Varazdin, Croatia
Language in Which You Will Present:
English
Target Audience(s):
Program Staff and Faculty interested in creating international collaborative opportunities for their students.
Short Session Description (one line):
This case study of student exchange program and collaborative faculty development projects between the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Florida and the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Organization and Informatics in Varazdin, Croatia examines developing transcultural IF competencies.
Full Session Description (as long as you would like):
The McNair Scholars Program is a federal TRIO program funded by the U.S. Department of Education. It is designed to prepare undergraduate students for doctoral studies through involvement in research and other scholarly activities. McNair participants have demonstrated strong academic potential and are either first-generation college students with financial need, or members of a group that is traditionally underrepresented in graduate education. The program works closely with participants through their undergraduate requirements, encourages their entrance into graduate programs, and tracks their progress to successful completion of advanced degrees.
If being information fluent is critical to all university students’ academic achievements and professional success, this is all the more true for McNair Scholars, whose end-goal is to become part of academia and therefore instructors and role models in information literacy in their own right. However, achieving information fluency is easier for students who are privileged with money and other advantages; McNair scholars are, by definition, disadvantaged. For them, overcoming the digital divide is far more difficult.
In its mission to fully prepare undergraduate students for doctoral students and eventual entrance to the professoriate, the McNair Scholars Program has included information fluency as a key component of the program. Among the many ways in which information fluency has been infused into the program is a summer study abroad collaborative with the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Informatics (FOI).
Our presentation will feature contributions from the Director of UCF’s McNair program, University of Zagreb, FOI faculty member students from both institutions, and the Director of UCF’s Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning, which has hosted two virtual exchange sessions between FOI and UCF faculty members about educational use of social networking tools and other new media. The presentation will begin with a description of the FOI and UCF/McNair collaboration, including reflections from students and faculty on ways in which this international exchange he promoted both their global awareness and their information fluency and will end with a brief discussion of ways in which the faculty exchange has been valuable on both campuses and promises to be increasingly useful in the future.
Websites / URLs Associated with Your Session:
University of Central Florida McNair Scholars Program: http://mcnair.ucf.edu/news/details.php
University of Zagreb, Faculty of Organization and Informatics: http://www.foi.unizg.hr
University of Central Florida Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning: http://www.fctl.ucf.edu
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