The International Curricular Initiatives Committee awarded four grants for faculty members to begin conducting research over the summer of 2019.
Sydne Record, Assistant Professor of Biology
Demographic Trade-Offs in Parasitic Plants: Cheating Towards Success?
Sydne Record, along with a team of international colleagues and a Bryn Mawr undergraduate, will explore the significance of parasitic plants and their “cheating” strategy in a comparative cross-continental study using two species of mistletoe: European and North American Oak. The project aims to set up two field studies: one in New Jersey and one in Oxford, where they will collect data on establishment, survival, growth, and reproduction of both species. This data will be used to build models to estimate the relative importance of various demographic processes to the species.
Rosi Song, Professor of Spanish
How to Start a Dialogue: Racial and Cultural Diversity in Modern Spain
In this project, Rosi Song will examine how different immigrant organizations based in Madrid are charting the territory of creating spaces to culturally participate in Spanish society. The research involves a trip with an undergraduate student to Madrid to meet with activists, artists, and organizers of the associations who work with immigrants from Africa, Asia, and Latin Africa. The final goal of the project is to bring experiences and examples from these immigrant organizations into the classroom, specifically as part of a course in the Spanish Department at Bryn Mawr College.
Min Kyung Lee, Assistant Professor of Growth and Structure of Cities
Milan and the Modern City: Bridging Design and History
Min Kyung Lee seeks to use the city of Milan as a means to bridge curricula in studio design and architectural history at Bryn Mawr, and to further international pathways with urban planners, architectural and art historians, architects, and curators in Milan. The goal is to create an integrated curricula and sequence of assignments that are in conversation with both design practice and historical research, and to use Milan as a site to develop a synthetic model of teaching the urban form. It will put Bryn Mawr College’s unique curriculum in the Growth and Structure of Cities Department into conversation with institutions in Milan that will culminate in a workshop on pedagogical strategies for teaching the histories of the built environment.
Heejung Park, Assistant Professor of Psychology
Multicultural Families in South Korea: Daily Experiences and Resilience
Heejung Park will collaborate with colleagues from two universities in South Korea to conduct a study to understand daily experiences and resilience in multicultural families in South Korea. These families are made up of a native Korean parent, a foreign-born immigrant parent, and their children. The goals of the project are to identify key issues faced by multicultural families and to design and initiate a methodologically robust research approach to investigate daily experiences and resilience of multicultural families. It will foster global learning through collaboration with international scholars and will bring to light increasing diversity in migration trends and its implications for human development.
This annual grant opportunity of up to $5,000 from the International Curricular Initiatives Committee is available to Bryn Mawr College faculty and staff. The grant may be used for projects, collaborations, conversations, assemblies, and hosting visitors/collaborators/co-teachers; for student engagement in travel, research collaboration, and/or research assistance; and for projects concerned with local or domestic issues that have an international or global connection. Projects that include students as collaborators and participants are strongly encouraged.