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Interdisciplinarity and International Education: Creating Opportunities for Collaboration in Design Research and Practice

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Intersections Across Disciplines

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Abstract

Globalization has led to an increasing interest in international collaborations in higher education to help students develop a stronger awareness of how their professions are practiced overseas. These study-abroad experiences fit well with the goals of interdisciplinarity, since they both share the same agenda of encouraging students to gain a more expansive and inclusive perspective on their disciplines. This paper discusses the creation and implementation of an educational opportunity for undergraduate and graduate students in design fields that was intended to simultaneously encourage interdisciplinary and international awareness. The participating students, from a major US university, studied design and operation factors related to construction projects in Jordan, with an emphasis on sustainable design and the ecological impacts throughout the buildings’ life cycles. This endeavor helped the students to become more aware of practical and cultural design issues in the international context, while interacting with a diverse interdisciplinary team to learn about varied aspects of the construction process. While visiting their study sites in Jordan, the students were also able to participate in immersive cultural and ecological activities to deepen their appreciation of local contextual factors in design.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Built Environment, Indiana State University, 200 North Seventh Street, Terre Haute, 47809, IN, USA

    Genell Wells Ebbini

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  1. Genell Wells Ebbini
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Correspondence to Genell Wells Ebbini .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. College of Design, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN, USA

    Brad Hokanson

  2. Learning Design and Technology, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA

    Marisa Exter

  3. Graduate Programs Office, Kent State University, Kent, OH, USA

    Amy Grincewicz

  4. University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

    Matthew Schmidt

  5. Instruction Curriculum Leadership, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, USA

    Andrew A. Tawfik

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Ebbini, G.W. (2021). Interdisciplinarity and International Education: Creating Opportunities for Collaboration in Design Research and Practice. In: Hokanson, B., Exter, M., Grincewicz, A., Schmidt, M., Tawfik, A.A. (eds) Intersections Across Disciplines. Educational Communications and Technology: Issues and Innovations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53875-0_19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53875-0_19

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-53874-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-53875-0

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