Delivering Innovation / Learning
Being persistent in the pursuit of innovation is the cornerstone of Convocations. We’re constantly looking for the next great artist and performance to present to the Purdue community. However, Convocations wouldn’t be able to succeed without the future-focused and expert campus partners that help us deliver these new and innovative performances to our students.
To celebrate their contributions, we want to take the time to highlight our partners and share what they mean to Convocations.
The Department of English
Convocations is proud to partner with departments that deliver innovative resources not only to our students, but throughout local and global communities. Offering five undergraduate degrees and four doctoral disciplines, the Department of English instructs thousands of Purdue students each year and offers training for around one hundred graduate students at a time. They proudly publish the internationally acclaimed literary journal, Sycamore Review, as well as Modern Fiction Studies, an elite, peer-reviewed scholarly journal. The Department also oversees the OWL: Online Writing Lab, an ever-adapting collection of references accessed around the world.
The Department offers training in “adaptive thinking, empathy, and creativity,” preparing our students to be effective global citizens — and making the Department a valuable partner for Convocations. Offering courses in professional writing, creative writing, literary analysis and first-year composition, the immense and diverse teaching staff are consistently teaching content that aligns with Convocation’s production. Innovative instructors have made creative and clever connections between coursework and shows such as Huang Yi & KUKA, a performance blurring the line between art and technology. Enriching the Greater Lafayette community through the shared experience of fiction, the Department’s Big Read program chose to feature Emily Wilson’s “The Odyssey“; we were honored to supplement this choice by scheduling Aquila Theatre’s production of “The Odyssey“ to joining in on this link between our work, campus, and community. A valued partner and cultural collaborator, the Department of English makes our work possible.
“I think it’s important to try to find ways for students to take their thinking and writing about a text outside of the classroom. So seeing a staged version of something we read gives them a chance to see the text from a new angle, and offers different perspectives than what usually arise in a classroom discussion.”
– Mike Johnston, Associate Professor of English
Purdue Honors College
The Honors College provides an interdisciplinary community in which Purdue students can hone their individual skills and thrive as scholars and global leaders — missions we value in our campus partners. The College’s staff and faculty work collaboratively to make sure students have the most meaningful undergraduate experience possible. Students are challenged by a curriculum that “compares, contrasts, and integrates multiple perspectives from a wide range of disciplines,” providing the curriculum-catalyzing work that Convocations values most. Thanks to the Honors College’s direct support of “The Odyssey” and “1984″ presented by Aquila Theatre, Convocations is able to provide meaningful and challenging content to our community.
“The Honors College is always eager to partner with Convocations. As Purdue’s first residential college, we seek to connect the classroom to the campus in myriad ways. No matter what major our students are pursuing or what their goals are for after graduation, we know that a lively engagement with the arts enhances both their education at Purdue and their lives going forward.”
– Kristina Bross, Associate Dean For Research & Creative Endeavors