Saturday, February 9, 2013

Classes

During the semester I am here, I am taking three classes. Two are during the first part of the semester and one is during the second part.

My first class, Organizational Theory, meets on Tuesday mornings. We're discussing different paradigms for studying organizations. It should be an interesting class, particularly because we're reading a lot of authors that we cite or reference in Organizational Communication, but we don't actually read or engage with. It also seems like the class will be an interesting mix of sociology and philosophy.

My second class is really interesting and very different from anything I've done before. It has a rather long name: Applied Creativity Through Design Thinking. CBS owns a house which they've turned into a 'studio' and the class meets there. There is a kitchen with coffee and tea and the house is divided into different group workstations. My class is taught by two men, one who has a background in neurobiology. In class this week, we were divided into teams of three or four. We will be working in these teams for the rest of the class to solve a real problem for a company. Our homework for the next class is to do something social with our team and come up with a team name, logo, and slogan. We will spend the next two weeks of class talking about the basis for creativity in the brain. After that, we will be learning about the creative process through doing. A Danish company is going to come give a presentation on a problem that needs to be solved and we will generate solutions in our teams, simultaneously learning and using theories about design and creativity. At the end of the course, we will actually go to the company and present our solutions. I'm looking forward to this class. I think the content will be interesting, but I'm also looking forward to getting pedagogical ideas.

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