Summer 2018 Courses

Digital Modeling and Fabrication

Learn to design and create with modern maker technologies. Topics include: Modeling with Fusion 360; Tool pathing with Fusion 360; 3d Printing & CNC Routing – basics of the most popular additive and subtractive manufacturing techniques; Vector files & laser cutting – Using vector based (illustrator) files for laser etching and cutting; Project day @ TEC – Apply what you’ve learned and make something start to finish.

EdTech

The best education technology is built though collaborations of engineers, educators, and learners. This short course will explore what it takes to make such collaborations successful, and how Duke graduate students can get involved in this emerging ‘alt ac’ career space. Guest speakers will introduce the ed tech sector and hands-on activities will introduce the ed tech creative process.

Check out these two blog posts from the 2018 Ed Tech class, written by the instructors and students.

Introduction to Mobile App Development

Mobile devices go everywhere, making them useful tools for gathering data or building interactive ways to explore the results of your research. Topics include: Intro to Xcode IDE / App Store development environment; Intro to storyboards, UX design concepts; Intro to Swift language; App frameworks, templates & reference code; Project day – build, run & deploy to Colab App Store.

Research Computing

Computer resources to help you turn your data into useful science and scholarship. Topics include: Intro to RC & VM — How research computing is different from other computing; Linux 101; A little more on VMs – spark & containers. Improving computing speed and research reproducibility; Parallel computing – (Apache Spark, Big data); Machine Learning – Getting computers to recognize patterns that aren’t immediately apparent.

Web Development Basics

Learn the skills necessary to build, launch, and maintain a basic website. Emphasize your research and lab with modern, interactive content. Topics include: Intro HTML/CSS –foundation of modern web development skills; intro GIT – version control; programming fundamentals; Javascript; Project day – apply what you’ve learned and build a site.

Design Thinking

This learn-by-doing, highly interactive course will take you through a practical, easy to use methodology to stop talking about design-thinking and innovation and start building something new. You will roll-up your sleeves and learn how to use innovation frameworks, agile methodology, and rapid prototyping to solve a complex problem, while building the skills to be a successful innovator.

Launching and Scaling a Business

This course covers a range of topics—including business model for entrepreneurs, lean startup methodology, customer analytics, go-to-market strategies, and the fundamentals of entrepreneurial finance—that are critical in launching and scaling a venture. The goal is to help you better understand how entrepreneurial skills may inform your work as a graduate student as well as your future opportunities in the entrepreneurial space.

Technology Commercialization

The course is organized around the basic elements of taking technology from conception to development and commercialization, including identifying great ideas, designing products, scaling a venture, marketing, and understanding legal frameworks.

Effective Presentations

This is a hands-on workshop for anyone who wants to become a more confident public speaker. In this class, you will learn how to organize information and hone your message to inform and inspire an audience. Over the week we will explore different presentation programs, resources for images, and best practices for slide design, and participants will plan, prepare, and deliver a presentation. No previous public speaking or design experience is necessary.

Check out this reflection from a PhD student in Cell Biology who took the course.

Science Communication

This course seeks to help scientists improve their ability to be effective communicators about science to a non-scientific audience. We will consider communications in written, oral, visual and social media channels. Topics covered include development of speaking, writing, and storytelling practices for diverse audiences; answering difficult, controversial, and critical questions; and tweeting, blogging, and presenting research to funders and policy makers.

Laying the Groundwork for Powerful Academic Storytelling

A great video, audio, or other media piece is like an iceberg –what you experience sits on a base that you cannot see and that is rarely taught. This offering covers two foundational elements to a powerful media project – successful field research and skillful academic storytelling.

Managing Teams

This course translates the science of management into practical insights and actionable strategies for guiding and supporting teams. You’ll discover techniques and skills to improve team decision making, manage conflict, and establish a culture that fosters innovation and mutual respect.

Negotiation

Negotiation is an art and a science. In this course, you’ll learn a number of techniques to influence negotiations. You’ll also gain practice using strategies that capitalize on each party’s strengths while leveraging different perspectives around the table.

Project Management

Explore the principles, methods, practices and skills required for successful project management. Topics include: Core concepts of project management; Defining expectations and project deliverables; Managing the project life cycle; Developing the foundation of the project plan; Communicating with the project team and Stakeholders.

Science Policy

Our goal is to help students understand both the process of policy making as well as the skills needed to communicate scientific knowledge to inform that process. Topic include: communicating science in an approachable and understandable manner; how to write policy briefs and memorandums, editorials, and commentaries; and understanding mechanisms of science policy governance, including regulations, statutes, executive actions and judicial decisions, how they interact, the roles of the federal and state governments in science policy and how to read and analyze such policies.

Check out this reflection from a PhD student in Cell Biology who took the course.

Teaching through Archives

Faculty from across the humanistic and interpretive social science disciplines will demonstrate how they have incorporated archival materials into undergraduate teaching, providing students with the chance to hone research and critical thinking skills through close engagement with rich primary sources.  Seminar participants will discuss the challenges and opportunities presented by these new pedagogical approaches, including best practices in using new technologies to present archivally-based research.