Established in 2019 through the generosity of Fairfield Stagmates Scott and Susan Fredrickson ’82, the state-of-the-art Fredrickson Family Innovation Lab (FFIL) provides College of Arts and Sciences students and faculty with a physical and digital gathering space for interdisciplinary research, instruction, and cross-pollination.

This semester, the co-directors of the FFIL — Mehmet Cansoy, PhD, assistant professor of sociology & anthropology and Jo Yarrington, professor of visual and performing arts — have put forth a robust schedule of free workshops open to Fairfield students, and webinar lectures that are open to students, the Fairfield community, and the general public.

The cadre of events began on September 22 with a lecture from interdisciplinary artist Heidi Neilson, whose work explores connections “between people on the ground and off-planet conditions and infrastructure.” Other events that focus on data-building skills, policy-making discussions, and more continue through October and November.

For students, the FFIL delivers a “kinetic zone” of instruction, experimentation, and accomplishment. For faculty, it facilitates problem-solving partnerships and innovative pedagogical and research collaboration. For members of the community, it demonstrates the value of a Jesuit education in the digital age.

“We hope to cultivate a space for creative work and innovative thinking,” said Dr. Cansoy. “Bridging the divides across different disciplines and bringing faculty and students together to work on exciting and new ideas.”

Towards this end, this year the FFIL will be running multiple workshops and webinars both virtually and physically in the lab, building out their Innovation Grants program and encouraging students and faculty to collaborate and bring new ideas to the Fairfield community. 

“FFIL supports a range of projects that involve faculty and student collaboration, primarily through its Innovation Grants program,” explained Dr. Cansoy, who is also currently at work on his own research project conducted by a four-person interdisciplinary team of social scientists and engineers. “So far, some of the most exciting projects that have been funded include a 3D printing project for visual arts students studying sculpture, digital skills development for health studies students, and digital analysis of birdsongs.”

The FFIL also helps prepare Fairfield students to excel in the workforce by offering a large number of skills-based workshops.

“We offer programming that focuses on digital scholarship, data collection, data analysis, and creative projects like image processing,” Dr. Cansoy said. “We are planning to expand our programming in the spring, with new offerings on digital literacy and coding.”

Upcoming Events and Workshops: 

Advanced registration is required.

Thurs. October 7
Workshop – 5 p.m.

Parade of Tools: Nicole Marino

In this workshop, Nicole Marino from the DiMenna-Nyselius Library will showcase tools built for data, text, and network analysis, digital exhibition, digital publishing, mapping, timeline creation and web annotation. These tools will promote digital scholarship across different disciplines.
Registration and more details through Life@Fairfield

Thurs. October 14
Workshop – 5 p.m.

Adobe Creative Suite: Cheryl Yun

In this workshop, Cheryl Yun Edwards will introduce the Adobe Creative Suite, presenting a photo-based overview of applications in Adobe CS.
Registration and more details through Life@Fairfield

Tues. October 19
Webinar – 7 p.m.

Diversity and Higher Education: W. Carson Byrd

THROUGH A DIFFERENT LENS: INNOVATION LAB LECTURE SERIES
Carson Byrd will discuss key points raised in his new book, Behind the Diversity Numbers, which examines how the organizational processes and policies can shape racial inequality on our campuses particularly around how data is collected, analyzed, and interpreted that can impact supporting racially minoritized and marginalized faculty, staff, and students.
Learn more and register at quickcenter.com

Thurs. October 28
Workshop – 5 p.m.

R&R Studio: Mehmet Cansoy, PhD

In this workshop Dr.Cansoy will introduce the coding language R and the software R Studio and their uses in data analysis. The workshop is intended for people with all levels of data analysis experience and knowledge of working with other types of software. Faculty and students interested in adopting the open source and free R and R Studio in their teaching and research are highly encouraged to attend.
Registration and more details through Life@Fairfield

Wed. November 10
Webinar – 7 p.m.

The Real Fake: Claudia Hart

THROUGH A DIFFERENT LENS: INNOVATION LAB LECTURE SERIES
Claudia Hart's talk will take place inside a world she builds on the Mozilla Hubs, an open-source social VR platform.  Students will be invited to join her, all embodied by digital avatars, to participate in a short seminar in which Hart presents her work in relation to contemporary media practice from mixed realities to the NFT distributed on the Ether blockchain.
Learn more and register at quickcenter.com