Ball State University’s Offices of the Provost, Vice Provost of Academic Affairs, and Immersive Learning are pleased to announce the 2021 Immersive Learning Faculty Awards.

The purpose of these awards is to recognize demonstrated excellence in creating, mentoring, and implementing these courses. This event celebrates not just our award winners but also every individual who is involved in community-engaged, high-impact activities. We appreciate all that you do to promote immersive learning on our campus and in the community.

This year's immersive learning awards celebrate some of Ball State's most impactful projects taking place from January 2019 to July 30, 2020, and the four awardees will receive a $1,000 financial stipend. We extend a special thank you to the past award recipients who served on our review committee: Annette Rose from Educational Studies, David Largent from Computer Science, and Carolyn Dowling from Geological Sciences.

To see the official, recorded announcement, click on the exhibit video.

To read more about the faculty winners and their projects, click on the pages listed in the right side bar.

Stance: An International Undergraduate Journal

Stance: An International Undergraduate Philosophy Journal aims to enrich student learning by providing an opportunity for undergraduate students to have their original, scholarly work reviewed by and published in a peer-reviewed academic journal. Stance is produced and edited entirely by undergraduate students, for undergraduate students. 

For more information about Stance, go to: https://www.stancephilosophy.com/ 

Health Science 302 and 494 are courses that include senior majors completing their final semester of coursework before beginning their internships. The courses seek to highlight the skills necessary to delivery health education programs in a variety of settings, where micro-level (interpersonal interactions) and macro-level (organizational and mass-media) applications are emphasized. Many of the course objectives are achieved in the context of a semester-long group project, where each student is asked to identify a health problem and an appropriate audience, for which they develop a social marketing-driven health campaign. For the past ten years of implementation of the courses, the students have been asked to choose problems that fit within Healthy Campus 2020 objectives, focusing their efforts on problems relevant to college students on Ball State’s campus specifically. However, in reviewing the primary objectives of the course, an understanding of how to tailor strategies and messages to specific diverse populations as well as the importance of advocacy for protection and promotion of the public’s health at all levels of society are often difficult to complete within the boundaries of a college student audience for messages.

To respond to this challenge, across the fall semester, the students (36 in total) were asked to take part in an immersive learning experience where the primary audience were community members from the Cardinal Wellness program, and the health problems were selected based upon what was most relevant to the community. As part of their work, the students were embedded in a full community-based participatory research project directed by the interests of community members. We spent the early part of the semester discussing theoretical and practical foundations of community-based participatory research in public health settings in online live lectures. Due to the online delivery of instruction in the course and the absence of in-person “live” classes at Cardinal Wellness, the students weren’t able to complete observation hours on-site at the program. However, in lieu of this contact, the students were asked to listen to the taped recordings from two previous focus groups with Cardinal Wellness members. We then worked together in live lecture to devise a shortened list of health topics that seemed meaningful and matched to the interests of Cardinal Wellness members. From that list, each student selected a specific topic, discussed as relevant by community members, for their larger course project.

After students ranked their own interests, we created groups (unifying students around shared topics) that worked together to create their community-based social marketing plan. The eight topics included removing the stigma of menopause, incorporating at-home exercises in front of the television, clean eating on a budget, using grocery lists to guide healthy food purchase, food safety and cross-contamination, cervical cancer awareness, colon cancer screening and awareness, and safe sex practices for middle- and older-aged adults.  The plans were required to integrate community viewpoints as much as possible, including the use of focus group recordings and observations from the program’s social media site. The students also recruited for and conducted eight virtual focus groups with community members in early November. Cardinal Wellness participants were recruited using the program’s Facebook page and were compensated $10 for their participation, with eight different Cardinal Wellness members participating across groups. The groups were entirely orchestrated by students, including all communication with community members, moderation of the focus group, and coordination of compensation.

At the completion of the course, each student group was asked to orally present their written integrative summary. The summary featured a complete social marketing plan based on their insights from the focus groups, including an environmental analysis, problem analysis, target audience analysis, logic model featuring program goals and objectives, message design and positioning/branding justification, partnership analysis, and three required media deliverables. These included the storyboard for one video public service announcement, five social media posts, and one print material (a billboard, flyer, brochure, etc.).

The programs created as part of the class projects were implemented across the spring semester at Cardinal Wellness. Students in HSC 302 (Program Planning II – 24 students total) were asked to implement the social marketing programs designed by the 494 students, as part of the next integration of the Immersive Learning grant. In that, the social media content was published on the program’s Facebook page and print materials were distributed on site at Cardinal Wellness by students in the course during brief educational sessions.

Spring 2021 HSC 302 Students:

Hollyn Anderson, Brooke Cummins, Sarah Craft, Kaylen Underhill, Catie Ridley, Kayce Ingram, Emily Jones, Emily Gerbhardt, Jessica Guzman, Jessica Gilmore, Mackenzie Mundy, Nia Kimbrough, Camesia Davidson, Trinity Lee, Sydney Cardenas, Nikki Jennings, Sydney Sisson, Kaitlynn McIntyre, Morgan Friend, Olivia Supancik, Esther Grussing, Briana McCoy, Aerial Simmons

Philosophy Outreach Project

The Philosophy Outreach Project gets high school students across Indiana thinking.

POP creates alternative spaces for learning in classrooms, clubs, online, and conference settings. By curating philosophical content and fostering philosophical discussion, POP provides high school students with tools and a platform to engage with each other and the world.

POP is run by three teams of Ball State students with a variety of different interests and backgrounds. POP's team includes students studying philosophy, psychology, English, communications, criminal justice, and more. 

This diversity of interests and knowledge allows for an impressive level of collaboration, which is ultimately what makes POP successful in promoting and facilitating pre-college philosophy.

For more information about POP, check out our website.

The City of Muncie has diverse communities with friendly people, interesting past, and outstanding cultural amenities that make it a desired place to live, do business, and to visit. Until Spring 2019, a lot of the neighborhoods in Muncie were lacking proper visual identification. A strong visual identity was needed to elevate the image of the neighborhood as well as provide a sense of pride within the residents.

In partnership with Building Better Neighborhoods and Muncie Action Plan, we worked with a core group of committee members from various Muncie Neighborhoods to develop their visual identity. Check out the other neighborhood identities at the Studio 165+ website: www.studio165plus.com/bbn