By Daniel Robles (2016 i3 Alum, 2018 Communications Assistant)
Day 16
The final week of i3 has finally arrived and our scholars are still putting in 100% as if it were Week 1 again. As is typical of the final week, our students from both introductory and concluding cohorts finalize and present their research proposals and full, completed research projects (respectively). To kick off these presentations, 2017 Team Bryan Dosono presented their yearlong research on how student athletes leverage information communication technologies (ICTs) to prepare for careers beyond athletics after graduation.
Day 17
With all remaining groups scheduled to present on Wednesday and Thursday, i3 Scholars devoted the next day to final edits and preparation. Students only had a half-day of workshops, allowing them to use the afternoon and evening to rehearse. To ease the stress and offer a much-needed break, we took our Scholars out for a kayaking adventure that went just swimmingly (although no swimming was needed for these pros).
Day 18
Wednesday soon arrived and our 2018 Scholars were ready for their presentations. With 27 students who self-selected into 6 research teams, we had to privilege of listening to 6 research proposals throughout the day that ranged from “microtransactions” in gaming to online discrimination and identity formation to ethics in virtual reality. The proposals were exciting and could prove to address major gaps in existing information science research. From here, these Scholars will tackle their projects in distributed teams throughout the course of the next year, until they return to i3 for their Concluding Institute in 2019. Each of our 2018 research teams are pictured below:
Day 19
Our second to last day of the program brought us our final set of student presentations and they did not disappoint. The remaining groups from the 2017 Cohort presented their completed projects that they worked on for a full year. Similar to our 2018 teams, these presentations covered a vast array of topics within information science and were both exciting and insightful. These research projects will go on to be submitted for publication at the next iConference as a poster or full paper submission.
Day 20
Our final day of i3 featured our inaugural BUILD Summit at the University of Pittsburgh School of Computing and Information. We brought together representatives from higher education, philanthropic organizations, government, and industry to hold workshops, discussion panels and networking opportunities with a focus on building inclusion, leadership, and diversity.
Along with our many guests in attendance, we had the pleasure of welcoming back many of our i3 Alumni.
