• Center for Digital Learning & Research
• About

About

As an R&D team, the CDLR is committed to staying abreast of emergent developments in digital scholarship and scholarly communication, and sharing this information with the Occidental Community. This sharing takes place in the context of a formal speaker series, casual High-Tech Happy Hours, Faculty Learning Communities (co-sponsored with the Center for Teaching Excellence), annual Mellon Digital Scholarship Institutes, and everyday collegial conversation. Each of the scholars on the team also maintains an active research profile, bringing disciplinary expertise to our shared engagements with digital scholarship. In addition to these campus-centered activities, a key aspect of the CDLR's work is the building and brokering of connections among faculty and students with partners beyond Occidental College boundaries in order to extend experimentation, innovation, and scholarly creation.

The CDLR's Mellon Postdoctoral fellows lead and partner with faculty on research projects that incorporate advanced technologies, especially on projects that require technological engagements beyond those services regularly supported by Occidental's Information Technology and Instruction + Research groups. The CDLR currently focuses on projects and practices that experiment with forms of public scholarship, model more open forms of scholarly communication, or take advantage of new learning spaces.

Occidental's CDLR also pointedly engages with undergraduates. In addition to teaching courses that experiment with technologically-engaged pedagogies, the CDLR team supports faculty in the exploration of new course designs and assignments, regularly advises students working on advanced research projects, consults with new student organizations interested in digital technologies, and collaborates with a team of digital scholarship student assistants.

As the Center has grown to accomodate a cohort of postdoctoral fellows, it has moved to an environment more conducive to its work. The CDLR will now be located on the ground floor of the Academic Commons, in close proximity to the Center for Academic Excellence and the oMac lab. The CDLR remains a place that invites impromptu faculty consultations, regular faculty office hours, and a reliable cup of coffee, and will more dynamically host the CDLR team and an experienced set of student workers in an inspiring, generative space.