Participants in a theatre arts program for vulnerable youth have created their own music, text, choreography, and scene work for a free public performance at 7 p.m. Thursday, August 11, in the Hatch Studio Theatre, Jackman Dramatic Art Centre.

Coinciding with the rise of the Pokémon Go frenzy, Changing the Odds: Community Transformation through the Arts has arrived at the School of Dramatic Art at the perfect time.

The program is helping participants, teens aged 12 to 18, find balance in the way they communicate with themselves and others. It encourages the growth of advocates and leaders in the community by addressing issues that affect everyone.

This year, the company is using drama to investigate the question “How do we find balance in an ever-changing technological world?” Members have worked with UWindsor students under the direction of creative coordinator, drama professor Meaghen Quinn, and guest artists in a variety of disciplines.

Busloads of children from summer camps in social housing neighbourhoods came to campus last week for hands-on experiences in science.

The Faculty of Science and Let’s Talk Science at UWindsor teamed up with the Windsor Essex Community Housing Corporation and the Community University Partnership for the program, which brought youth from seven different summer recreation sites for half-day field trips.

“We’re trying to generate a positive association with science,” said Erika Haskings (BSc chemistry 2015), one of the Let’s Talk Science volunteers who helped to organize the event.

She led a classroom full of younger campers through a series of activities about dinosaurs and paleontology, including:

• creating paper puppets to distinguish between herbivores and carnivores,
• constructing models of a triceratops skeleton from cotton swabs,
• using toothpicks to “dig” chocolate chips out of cookies, and
• moulding their own fossils in clay and plaster.

Participant Jasmine El-Haj found herself short of time in making her dinosaur skeleton, so she drew one with crayons.

“This is great!” she enthused as she completed her project. “I’m learning a lot about dinosaurs.”

Older children enjoyed activities centred around forensics.

Young entrepreneurs eager to start new businesses in Windsor will showcase their ideas on campus Wednesday. Participants in EPIC Founders, a program of the Entrepreneurship Practice and Innovation Centre, will compete for a cash prize during its second annual Pitch Day.

Eleven UWindsor students and recent grads have spent the summer working with mentors to ready their product or service for market. They will explain their business models to a panel of judges, who will select a winner to receive the $3,500 RBC Top Founder Award.

The public is invited to watch the presentations and tour a showcase of the various projects, August 10 from 2:30 to 6 p.m. in EPIC Innovation, on the second floor of the Joyce Entrepreneurship Centre at 2455 Wyandotte Street West.

To indicate intent to attend, fill out the online registration form.

The campus campaign for United Way is seeking new members for its organizing committee, which directs the charity’s fundraising efforts among UWindsor faculty, staff and students.

Volunteers, under the leadership of co-chairs Datta Pillay and Sheri Lowrie, coordinate events and communications to inform potential donors about the United Way’s work in Windsor-Essex.

“We are a small but mighty group,” Lowrie says, pointing to a record of 10 straight years topping $100,000 in support. “A new committee member or two would be a great help.”

The committee could benefit having a member help with kick-off and appreciation events, says Lowrie, as well as a member to assist with the operation of the campus-wide canvass.

“The time commitment is primarily in the fall, meeting about twice a month during the semester,” she says.

The committee will meet at the end of this month to finalize planning the 2016 campaign. To inquire about joining, contact Lowrie at sherio@uwindsor.ca or 519-253-3000, ext. 6730.

Funding for online programs, courses, and open content development is now available through a call for proposals issued by eCampus Ontario.

The announcement is part of a $21 million funding initiative over the next two years aimed at supporting the development of fully online programs and open content, including a minimum of $1 million for French-language projects. Limited funding is also available for a small number of individual courses that have a history of high repeat rates, low retention, and which typically act as a bottleneck to completion of programs.

Universities can apply for funding to develop new programs, or to convert existing programs intended to be offered completely online. Up to $100,000 is available per project to support the design phase of new programs, with an additional $50,000 per course available for course development.

“There is a strong focus on collaboration within and across institutions in the current round of funding,” says Nick Baker, director of the Office of Open Learning, who is coordinating the University of Windsor’s submissions. “This could mean development of new pathways and programs between colleges and universities, shared programs across universities in Ontario, or innovative interdisciplinary programs that span a number of departments and faculties within an institution.”

eCampus Ontario will consider applications across the full range of possible credentials, from certificate to full degree, and from undergraduate to graduate.

An additional focus of this round is the Open Content Initiative; up to $100,000 is available per project to develop high quality open text books, a complete set of open course modules, or to adapt existing open access content for use in courses.

Another new feature of the current round of funding is the option to apply for multi-year projects, which is important to facilitate development of full programs, and to navigate all the approvals needed, especially with multiple institutions involved.

“Windsor has done extraordinarily well in previous rounds, with 18 successful projects funded over the last two years, putting us second in the province,” Baker says.

These projects were developed with faculty from across the University and the team of online learning and multimedia specialists in the Office of Open Learning.

Baker says the access to significant external funds has helped to raise the profile and quality of online learning at UWindsor, with the recent projects developing highly interactive, engaging courses.

“Our capacity to help faculty design and deliver innovative, high quality online courses has grown rapidly,” he says. “We are constantly exploring new technologies and tools to make learning more engaging and effective, while keeping the focus on quality of the learning.”

The Office of Open Learning supports faculty who are interested in, or who successfully gain funding, from start to finish of these projects, including developing the proposal. Projects are developed through a highly collaborative process where faculty can explore all the possibilities for creating effective learning environments.

All proposals require the approval of the provost at each partner institution. At the University of Windsor, submissions will be coordinated through the Office of Open Learning and the Office of the Provost. Expressions of interest should be discussed with the Office of Open Learning, with full proposals due by Friday, September 16.

Interested faculty, department heads, program chairs, and deans should contact the Office of Open Learning as soon as possible with their ideas for programs, courses or open content to support or expand their programs. For more information please, contact Baker in the Office of Open Learning at 519-253-3000, ext. 4925, or by e-mail, nbaker@uwindsor.ca.