UNBOUND goes Global.
On May 17, a group of Unbound members, York Engaged Scholars, and their advisors took to Newark International Airport to embark on their journey to Crete, Greece. In Crete, Unbound performed Design Thinking workshops with Hellenic Mediterranean University (HMU) engineering students and professors. These workshops were a part of the York Engaged Scholars international experience where scholars are not only participating in workshops, but also immersing themselves in local cultures and fulfilling personal learning outcomes.
Unbound facilitated two separate workshops under the York Engaged Scholars advisors to ideate possible solutions to build and encourage a collaborative partnership between the two schools. Unbound first worked with HMU students to complete a Design Thinking exercise. On the first day, the scholars guided the HMU students through the Design Thinking process using the New City Method. This step proved to be highly beneficial since the students of HMU became familiar with the Design Thinking process for the second workshop. The second day of the workshop is where the scholars and HMU students worked together in larger groups to ideate and prototype solutions to answer the question: “How might we work together (YCP + HMU) to increase collaboration between institutions?” The students created and presented fantastic prototypes that answered the question, however, the students gained much more than a Design Thinking experience. YCP and HMU students formed and developed relationships which proved to be beneficial for the workshop but perhaps even more fundamental was the students' ability to increase their intercultural competencies and cultural inventory.
The scholars will be partnering with HMU faculty and staff for another two-day workshop using the same process. They will work together using Design Thinking to prototype possible solutions to create a collaborative partnership between the institutions. After finishing the first workshop the students are excited to create new relationships and ideas with the HMU faculty and staff. Unbound would like to thank the following organizations and people for making this opportunity possible: Hellenic Mediterranean University, York College of Pennsylvania, Karin Swartz, Dave Fyfe, Megan Given, Costas
