Seniors will present on topics ranging from Algebra in Motion to the use of classical music in television advertisements during the fourth annual Theories in Action conference April 26-28.
Ninety-six seniors will participate, up from 21 participants last year and nearly twice as many as in 2010, when the conference was first created, said Peggy Chang, director of the Curricular Resource Center, which co-sponsors the conference with the Office of the Dean of the College.
Last year, about 600 audience members, including friends and advisers of the participants, as well as Providence community members, attended the conference, Chang said.
“This is an opportunity for students across departments, across disciplines, even students who are campus leaders in extracurricular service projects, to think about what has been meaningful for them during their time at Brown and to talk about the social and public significance of what they’ve done,” Chang said.
The 2007 Task Force on Undergraduate Education suggested the University should “encourage more students to think about doing capstones … and to improve advising about life after Brown,” Chang said. In light of the Task Force’s recommendations, the Theories in Action conference was created as a way to bring members of the senior class together and “(celebrate) the research, leadership activities, artistic productions and other capstone projects” that they’ve done, according to the conference website.
During the application process, participants choose to present their projects with posters or as a part of a panel with other groups. This year’s conference showcases 19 panels in Petteruti Lounge and the Salomon Center and 16 posters in the Leung Gallery.
While many seniors prepare to present their theses to members of their department, Theories in Action is about “broadening” the audience, Chang said.
“They’re really excited to talk to people outside of the handful of advisers they’ve been working with for a year and a half,” said Darcy Pinkerton ’14, co-coordinator of Theories in Action.
Madeline Sall ’13 focused on classical music in television advertising for her thesis and will be presenting on a panel entitled “Transformers: Aesthetic Narratives in Disguise.” She knew of people who participated in Theories in Action before and thought the conference “sounded really cool.”
“It’s easy to end up in one place and not really understand or know what is going on in other departments and what other people are working on,” she said. “This conference puts all of these people together and forces a larger conversation.”
While her thesis was “meant for faculty of the music department,” she said she wants her presentation to be “less technically derived, more about semiotics and the cultural context.”
Each panel project consists of three or four presenters or groups.
“As much as possible, we try to pair people together who might not ordinarily go together in a conference that is discipline-based but who have common themes,” Pinkerton said. “They’re excited to figure out how their work relates to other people’s work.”
“I’m going to be in a panel, and we decided to call it ‘Enhancing the Brown Experience through Mindfulness and Self-Reflection,’” said Riyad Seervai ’13, who applied to the conference to present on his involvement with the Yoga and Mindfulness Club. Seniors from the Matched Advising Program for Sophomores and Social Classmates are also part of the panel.
“Our overarching theme would be mindfulness in general and some form of self-reflection, allowing people to think about what they want to get out of the Brown experience,” he said.
More students this year than ever before are presenting on extracurricular activities. Three seniors involved in the New Scientist Program, which focuses on promoting diversity in the sciences, are presenting a poster at the conference.
“(NSP) has kind of defined my experience at Brown,” said Tanayott Thaweethai ’13, a coordinator of NSP. “Theories in Action gives us an opportunity to show what we’ve been working on these past four years.”
Nobody presented on an extracurricular passion in the conference’s first year, though organizers advertised the opportunity to do so, Chang said. “We tried really hard to change that,” she said, adding that this year, “a nice set of folks are representing projects outside of the academic areas.”
Kathy Takayama, director of the Sheridan Center for Teaching and Learning, held two mandatory training sessions — one for panel presenters and one for poster presenters — to offer advice on what to include in the posters and “getting jargon out of their presentations,” Chang said.
“I’ve never made a poster before and I found it very helpful,” Thaweethai said. The center had sample posters hanging on the wall, he said.
“The most traditional ... disciplines that tend to know what it means to do a poster are the STEM areas,” Chang said. “It’s becoming more popular in the social sciences, but it’s not necessarily something that people know how to do to.”
Most participants are involved in disciplines with “more of a social focus,” Chang said. “We get a lot (of participants) from environmental studies, political science, international relations and also a lot from public health,” she said.
Seniors concentrating in applied math and physics are also presenting.
“Tailoring presentations to specific audiences, and in particular to ‘non-experts,’ is a very important skill, and participating in this conference allows seniors to work on these skills, in addition to networking with others,” wrote Bjorn Sandstede, professor of applied mathematics, in an email to The Herald. Sandstede encourages his students to take part in the conference, Chang said.
“It’s inspiring to see what people do here,” Chang said. “It’s a great representation of why you want to come to Brown and what is so special about Brown. It’s about finding something you’re passionate about and getting really deeply involved in it.”
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