IGR staff is continually thinking of new ways to learn and share with colleagues on campus and around the world. This year, IGR decided to leverage online technology by creating a webinar series as a new way to disseminate information and foster discussion. IGR piloted its first webinar in mid-February. The webinar was held by IGR’s Research Director, Dr. Patricia Gurin.
Dr. Gurin’s presentation and discussion, titled “Engaging Diversity: It’s Importance in the 21st Century” yielded over 175 participants among four sessions. The actual number of viewers was likely much higher, as many participants reported watching the webinar as a group with their colleagues.
Deepali Stark, IGR Webinar Coordinator, said about the pilot registrations:
I was pleasantly surprised to see that registration filled up for our first two sessions, within 24 hours. We are glad there seems to be a significant desire amongst our colleagues to learn and share with IGR in this format. We were a bit limited by the webinar software we were using, as it only allowed 25 participants per session. However, we expect that capacity to increase for future webinars.
Comments from participants have been positive and indicate interest in more IGR webinars.
I've been reading about the IGR framework and this webinar supplemented what I've been reading. I plan to further explore the strategy and incorporate it into practice.
I think this information will help us in the on-going and continuous process we have in justifying our dialogue program.
In post-webinar evaluations, participants also submitted their ideas for future webinar topics. IGR would also like to solicit ideas for future topics from people who did not attend, but who are interested in future webinars. Click here to access the feedback form and give your input. We would be grateful to know what topics you would find useful and interesting.
If you would like to subscribe to our webinar mailing list (generally about 2-6 emails per year), please fill out the registration form at the bottom of this page.
IGR would like to give thanks to Todd Austin from the College of LSA Instructional Support Services team for providing access, training and guidance for the webinar software. Thanks, Todd, for going above and beyond to make our pilot a success!