Jacksonville University’s 2014 Faculty and Student Symposium March 26-28 features results from more than 100 projects, with topics ranging from shape-shifting smartphones, veterans’ college transition issues and using yoga in kindergarten classrooms to the best college coaches of all time, how social media use affects SAT scores and reviving oyster harvesting in Jacksonville.
The free symposium, which runs from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day in the JU Davis College of Business Conference Rooms B and C, spotlights JU students and faculty who engage in cutting-edge research in intriguing topics across a range of disciplines.
Students and the community can stop by the college of business during the event and learn about JU’s research, teaching, service, study abroad and internships, said co-organizer Brian Lane.
“The JU Symposium is a venue for faculty and students to share their work with the rigor and expectations of a professional conference in JU’s friendly campus environment,” Lane said. “We receive abstracts of all topics, allowing students to learn about work in fields very different from their own.”
For example, he said, research in history is very different from research in mathematics, and a business major’s internship is very different from a sociology major’s service learning project, so the JU Symposium is an
opportunity for students to learn what their classmates are working on.
“Many of these presentations will later be delivered at national conferences (such as the National Conference on Undergraduate Research) or lead to papers submitted for publication, so the feedback that presenters receive at the symposium is vital to the further development of their work,” Lane said.
Another feature of the symposium is that professors and students present side-by-side, sometimes even co-presenting, Lane noted.
“As students near the end of their projects, the symposium marks a rite of passage to becoming a professional in their fields.”
This year’s symposium planning committee included John Buck, Laura Chambers, Teri Chenot, Janet Haavisto, Jesse Hingson, Lane, Ed McCourt and Chris Robertson.
The symposium is funded by ECHO, JU’s experiential learning program.