March 15, 2023

Can digital technology create a new ‘golden age’ for education?

Technology has long posed a challenge to businesses and industries, and the digital revolution has only raised the stakes for entities in danger of failing to adapt to the changing landscape. The question of how universities can utilize technology to offer more inclusive educational opportunities was the topic of a recent Merage School event organized by the Center for Digital Transformation. The event host, CDT Director and Merage School Professor Vijay Gurbaxani, spoke to Michael Smith, professor of information systems and marketing and co-director of the Initiative for Digital Entertainment Analytics at Carnegie Mellon’s Heinz College. During their discussion, “The Abundant University: Remaking Higher Education for a Digital World,” Smith delved into how higher education has been able to resist the forces of digital transformation and why current market forces make higher education ripe for disruption.

Roxane Cohen Silver delivers distinguished senior faculty award lecture

Roxane Cohen Silver, a Distinguished Professor of psychological science, medicine and public health, and vice provost for academic planning and institutional research recently won the 2022-2023 Distinguished Senior Faculty Award for Research. She recently had the honor of delivering a special lecture, “Coping with Collective Trauma: From Mass Violence to COVID-19,” at the Newkirk Alumni Center, where her colleagues celebrated her and nine other award recipients. Since joining UCI’s faculty 1989, Silver, an expert on coping with collective traumas, has focused her research on community-wide disasters. She has studied trauma from natural disasters such as wildfires, earthquakes and hurricanes, mass violence events such as terrorist attacks and school shootings, and pandemics, including COVID-19, and for decades. And she has offered her expertise to policymakers on Capitol Hill and in numerous journal articles, media interviews and webinars.

Latest storm brings ‘record rainfall’ to Southern California

California’s 11th atmospheric river storm in a row caused major flooding throughout the state and left more than 300,000 people without power, according to the Los Angeles Times. It also brought several inches of rain to Southern California with record-breaking accumulations at Los Angeles International Airport, downtown L.A., and the Santa Monica and Long Beach airports. Officials say showers will decrease during Wednesday and give way to cloudy skies by Thursday. At least one more storm is expected to hit California before the rainy season ends.

Researcher examines race and social exclusion in online gaming

A new book by Aaron Trammell, an assistant professor of informatics, suggests that even in seemingly non-confrontational online games, white players often subtly discipline players of other races to stay within rules. The result, he argues, is social exclusion. Viewing games this way is a kind of “intellectual reparation,” according to Trammell, who hopes his work will help readers focus on the deeply painful and traumatic aspects of play. Trammell’s ongoing research at UCI examines how games further white privilege and hegemonic masculinity with their among players. He is the editor-in-chief of the journal Analog Game Studies and the multimedia editor of Sounding Out!

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