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A reflection on interdisciplinary work

  • Writer: CGEST Staff
    CGEST Staff
  • May 18, 2022
  • 3 min read

By Rachel Ware


At the end of my first year as a graduate student, I am reflecting on the role of interdisciplinary work and learning in my growth. Both here at CGEST as a graduate research assistant and through a course I took focusing on interdisciplinary collaboration, I have been able to expand my field of view beyond my major in computer science and learn valuable skills that I wouldn’t have otherwise.


Recently, what stood out to me most about interdisciplinary work is communication. Even though I have not been the most narrowly focused in my academic career, I still have learned certain ways of communicating and problem-solving that are not universal. In my interdisciplinary class, we were focused on the topic of inequities in education and building a project around that. The students were from different majors, with backgrounds in teaching, justice, design, and more. While we agreed on the overarching idea of the need to address these inequities with culturally responsive approaches, it was the most intense communication I have experienced in a class. Some of that I would attribute to the number of people, 8 students and 3 professors, but also the differences in backgrounds, which meant we frequently had different interpretations of how to achieve a goal. I think the challenge involved in truly conveying my ideas in the detail needed was extremely valuable. Communication is always important, but I recognize now that when trying to coordinate a project with larger and interdisciplinary groups it is its own task.


Another part of interdisciplinary work that stood out to me is how much variety helped me keep engaged and find meaning. As much as the analytical part of me enjoys writing code, I also enjoy creating art and working on education. In an interdisciplinary environment, there are times when I have been the computer science person and so those related tasks are my responsibility, but I have also had chances to do things that I was interested in because it wasn’t anyone in the group’s expertise. At CGEST I have had many opportunities to do various tasks, even creating some graphics, as well as using my computer science knowledge to support various projects. In the class I took, we ended up hosting a STEM day at a local school for which I helped create an educational game about choosing jobs for a mission to Mars. I was able to use knowledge about engineering and science careers, think about the language being accessible to all the students, and create images that would invite them into these fields. My classmates did amazing jobs on the activities we had and coordinating different parts of the planning and event. Working together, the event was so much more than any of us could have done alone and the day went well. Having a chance to work from start to end on this project has helped me contextualize the hard work put into CGEST programs better.


I think having interdisciplinary experiences in different ways has shown me how the skills I learn are transferable, and how each group of people can have a different dynamic. The smaller skills and the bigger knowledge and work all are meaningful to me as someone trying to find their way. I always appreciate hearing many different perspectives and getting advice from the people who have gone on various interesting paths to end up at CGEST. I would encourage anyone to find interdisciplinary spaces and opportunities that allow them to grow in new directions. It is meaningful to have different perspectives working on complex issues and can be personally beneficial as well. I look forward to more of these experiences in the future.

 
 
 

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