Open OHIO intends to provide a place for face-to-face communication among people who don’t normally converse with one another.
The project is supported by the Academic Innovation Accelerator, or AIA. AIA provides resources, services, advice and funding for experimental projects. Those projects aim to enhance the quality of the Ohio University experience.
Open OHIO, founded by Sarah Davis, aspires to connect lines of communication not only between students and faculty, but other community members as well.
“I think we’re starting to see a separation between the academic community and the general public,” Davis, an associate professor of ecology and civil discourse, said.
Part of that separation between the community and the public comes from technology. Davis said that communication through social media has made it harder to have meaningful dialogue at OU.
The project will have three phases. First, a meeting space where face-to-face dialogue will take place. Once topics of interest are discussed, experts and artists will empirically review the topic and present information for further conversation. The art and data will tour the community, creating further discussion on the topic.
“We don’t want to prescribe the topics that will be discussed during these meeting times because the purpose is to invite people and make sure everyone has a voice in this discussion,” Davis said.
The project intends to provide a safe space for people to talk about subjects of interest. Topics that were discussed in the group pilot meeting this past April included communication challenges, trust and perception of scientists, feminism, racism, power dynamics, health, social media and religion.
Davis hopes that over time, Open OHIO will not just take place on campus, but other areas in the community as well.
Busy schedules could make it harder to discuss the important subjects Open OHIO aims to address.
“Time is an issue for all of us, one of the barriers of civil discourse and effective communication is time,” Davis said. “We are all running from place to place and have a bunch of deadlines we try to meet, and we really don’t have as much time to spend on dialogue not focused on our obligations.”
Generational gaps between students and the community are also a challenge, but provide the opportunity for all people to learn from one another, Davis said.
“I think that relationship between our university and community is fundamental to our life and our society. We’ve seen a move toward isolation as an academic community. What we do here in higher education should benefit to broader society. Pushing the boundaries of knowledge would be helpful,” Davis said.
Open OHIO meetings will begin on Sept. 11 from 2:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.
