Week 16 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

Here's your last blog prompt!  Please submit by Sunday, December 4 at 5:00pm.

What are you going to do with what you have learned this semester in ENGR 103? (i.e. take a foreign language, plan to study abroad, engage in “global” activities on campus, modify your degree or career goals, hang out with the cool friends you made in class) 

What else do you want to know or learn about?

What else would you have liked for ENGR 103 and/or the learning community to provide you?

Week 15 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

A short and easy blog assignment for a break week!

Identify and reflect on cross-cultural situations you have observed or encountered this semester.

All posts, comments, and responses will be graded at 5:00pm on Sunday, November 27.  

Week 14 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

Next week's guest is Dr. Klein Ileleji.  Dr. Ileleji earned a B.S. in Agricultural Engineering from the University of Ilorin, Nigeria; an M.P.S. in Applied Economics and Business Management at the Institute of Economic Studies at Nitra, Slovakia; and a Ph.D. in Agricultural Engineering at the Slovak Agricultural University in Nitra, Slovakia.  His presentation will be about "Engineering the right solutions for rural communities in Africa."  There is no reading assigned for this week, but the following questions may encourage you to do a little research...


Come to class prepared to discuss the following:
Why have massive investments in foreign aid from the West not had the expected impact in Africa?
Why might engineering solutions that work in the West, not work in Africa?
Africa has so much wealth (mineral ores, petroleum, arable land).  Why is it not utilized?
What is the danger in generalizing an entire continent, like Africa?  Why do you think it happens so often?

Week 13 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

Next week will be a bit of a change of pace.  We will take the class period and talk about the variety of international experiences that are available for you to pursue during your time at Purdue and how to get involved in them.  As your blog assignment leading up to this discussion, I want you to think about the presentations we have had so far this semester.  Every one of them has in some way attempted to motivate you to get excited about international experiences.  What messages have stuck with you?  If you could go and study or work anywhere, where would you want to go?  What would you want to do there?  How long would you want to stay?  How does that fit with your personal and professional goals?  What steps are you going to take to help achieve these dreams?

Week 12 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

Our guest in Week 12 will be Profess Jean Paul Allain.  Dr. Allain is a Professor of Nuclear Engineering, with an appointment also in the School of Materials Engineering.  His research interests can be found here.

Dr. Allain has provided some readings and ideas for you to consider before his visit on Monday.  The three documents referenced below are available under Week 12 Course Content on Blackboard.

There are two readings for the class associated with the subject matter of a new course he will be teaching in Spring 2012 entitled: "Energy Policy and Nanotechnology in Emergent Economies," which will look at aspects of engineering design and policy in rural and developing regions of Latin America. An information sheet about this course is available on Blackboard.

The first reading is the IEA report section on Brazil (pages 19-35 of the PDF).  You need not carefully read all these pages.  Just get an idea of what the report is talking about. The second reading is a quote from Physicist David Bohm.

Reflect upon Bohm's quote against the approach of policy in bringing technology to remote areas of Latin America, which tend to be rather poor communities. Two basic questions for discussion:

1. How can limited resources influence energy policy and implementation of technology in countries in Latin America with large populations under poverty?

2. What are some of the challenges you perceive of implementing technology in rural Latin America?

Given the late post of this assignment, posts (including all comments and responses) will be graded at 9:00pm on Monday, October 4, 2011.  However, you should familiarize yourself with the material in advance of class so you can contribute to the discussion.

Week 11 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

Next week our guest will be Dr. Riall Nolan from the Department of Anthropology.  Dr. Nolan worked overseas for nearly twenty years in the field of international development, and has experience as a development project designer, manager, and evaluator. He has lived and worked in Senegal, Tunisia, Papua New Guinea, and Sri Lanka. His experience with development includes grass-roots community projects with the Peace Corps, project design and management with USAID, and policy analysis with the World Bank. He has also participated in numerous consulting assignments for both bilateral agencies and NGOs.

Prior to coming to Purdue, Dr. Nolan directed international programs at the University of Cincinnati. He has also held administrative and teaching positions at Golden Gate University, the University of Pittsburgh, the School for International Training, Georgia State University, and the University of Papua New Guinea.

Your reading assignment (available on Blackboard under Week 11 Course Content) is an excerpt from Dr. Nolan's book "Development Anthropology."  You need only read the Mini-Cases 1, 2, and 3, not the text in between.  These mini case studies are intended to provide examples of how situations can be interpreted differently depending on your frame of reference.  

Dr. Nolan has experience working with multi-disciplinary teams of professionals (including engineers) in international development projects.  After reading the case studies, think about the intercultural competencies one might need to effectively work not only in international projects, but in multi-disciplinary teams. Also, think of a few questions you would like to ask Dr. Nolan about his diverse and many life experiences, and how training in anthropology is relevant to engineering.

Week 10 Blog Assignment for ENGR 103

Next week's guest is Dr. Ayşe Çiftçi. Ayşe was born and raised in Turkey where she attended Middle East Technical University and received her undergraduate and Masters degrees. Ayşe moved to the United States for her doctoral program at the University of Memphis, Tennessee in 2002.  After graduating in 2006, she moved to Purdue University as an Assistant Professor in the Counseling Psychology program. Ayşe's research interests lie in multicultural issues, cross cultural psychology, immigration, international students, and psychology well being. 


In preparation for her visit, she has asked you read Chapter 3 from Diversity Consciousness.  This reading is available under the Week 10 Course Content on Blackboard.  It is a longer reading assignment, but there are a lot of figures and it should be rather easy and interesting for you to read.  Dr. Çiftçi does not have any specific thought questions for you, but asks that you read this carefully and thoughtfully.  


In order to develop a blog post, I suggest you read the chapter and write about something that you found most interesting.  For example, I find the section about map projections to be quite interesting from a technical standpoint of how maps are developed, and from a cultural standpoint of who is generating the maps.  Perhaps from here I could expand upon what kinds of implications and perceptions this could develop in people who view these kinds of skewed maps, or other examples of how ethnocentrism influences how we portray information in popular media.