Methods: Topics

The following introductions to research themes were developed to help frame student research. In each case, EUI affiliates have written a brief introduction to the theme, identified key issues or questions, and provided some important references.

	Globalization and the University
		This project examines the influence of globalization on the university and the university's place in a burgeoning world market for higher education. What impact, for example, do the half-million foreign students studying in the United States have on the nation's universities? At the same time, this project considers domestic students' engagement with international education, including foreign language study and study abroad. How will the globalization of the university affect U.S. undergraduates' much-lamented ambivalence about study extending beyond the nation's borders?
	Learning Communities
	Both in and beyond educational institutions, people forge human ties that allow them to learn more effectively and with greater results. Through these collaborations - be they in workplaces, sports clubs, or on the Web - people construct something more powerful and meaningful than they would have alone. Research in this project aims to document and learn from these communities and in so doing to consider how we might better foster collaborative learning.
	Student Writing
	Students write their way through the undergraduate curriculum, in part simply to demonstrate what they know about a subject, but also to rehearse and demonstrate disciplinary modes of knowing and expression. This project examines how students use writing to make sense of the university's research mission as they themselves engage in academic inquiry. It also investigates students' extracurricular writing and attempts to discern how students compose a coherent "writing life" that draws from their identities during their undergraduate years.
	The University and the Community
	EOTU appreciates that the boundaries between the university, the local community, and the wider world are porous. Many campus units and constituencies interact with the community and world in diverse ways, from service programs to research projects. EOTU is interested in documenting this interaction in the interest of thinking about how more truly collaborative university-community projects might be developed.