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Brittni Wisner

By Ellie Webb-Bowen, CLA Student Writer - March 26, 2025

As an alumna of the School of Writing, Literature, and Film (SWLF), English composition instructor and now interim head academic advisor, Brittni Wisner, M.A. ‘24, is a familiar face to many who frequently visit Moreland Hall. 

Wisner grew up in Palmer, Alaska, and attended the University of Alaska Southeast in Juneau, where she received her degree in English literature. Wisner started out majoring in early childhood education, but switched to English after discovering an unrecognized passion in literature.

“I took my first English class and realized that the courses were a great outlet for thinking and seeing things from new perspectives,” said Wisner.  

Everything changed again when Wisner took a class on gothic literature while studying abroad in Germany. Instantly she became intrigued by what people are scared of and why. Wisner dedicated her academic time to studying “monster theory.”

“My undergraduate thesis explored the concept of monstrosity, from the gothic to the biopolitical,” explained Wisner. “Monsters in literature provide a key insight to culture and serve as barometers of society’s anxieties.”

After graduating from the University of Alaska Southeast, Wisner volunteered and travelled internationally, but returned to Juneau, working as an admissions counselor at the university. Going for a master’s in English was something Wisner always had in the back of her mind, and after five years in Juneau, she was accepted into SWLF’s M.A. program and moved to Corvallis.

In addition to teaching writing courses as a master’s student, Wisner continued her research into monstrosity. Her thesis, “Society Must Be De-Fenned: Early Modern Surveillance of Wetlands and Wombs,” earned her the prestigious WAGS/ProQuest Distinguished Master’s Thesis Award. In her thesis, Wisner analyzes early modern understandings of wetland environments and their connection to early modern understandings of the biological processes of menstruation, gestation, and childbirth. Ultimately, Wisner reveals how these understandings of ecology and maternity inform each other in early modern wetland draining and state building. 

Teaching was also one of Wisner’s  favorite experiences as a graduate student. In combination with her unique research, Wisner earned the Lisa Ede Award for Excellence in Composition Instruction and was selected as an alternate for the esteemed Fulbright English Teaching Assistant award to teach in Norway.  After graduating in spring 2024, Wisner  became an academic advisor for SWLF, helping students navigate their own English and creative writing journeys. 

"Helping students connect with and believe in their own ideas, as well as showing them how to communicate those ideas, is the most fulfilling part of teaching,” said Wisner. “I think a lot of students have trouble believing in themselves and the caliber of their thoughts. Assisting them in connecting with themselves is the most fulfilling aspect of both teaching and advising."

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Andrew Justice

By Colin Bowyer, Communications Manager - March 19, 2025

Andrew Justice, ‘99, started playing violin at the age of six. Inspired by his stepfather’s classical music records, Justice learned to play violin through the Suzuki method, developing an ear for music from the surrounding environment. He took private lessons with Michael Grossman, a violinist who lived in Corvallis, and went on to play violin for Highland View Middle School (now Linus Pauling), Crescent Valley High School, and the Corvallis Youth Symphony, conducted by pianist and educator Charles Creighton. 

“Despite its size, Corvallis has an incredible music community,” said Justice. “I have memories of Measure 5 passing, which destroyed music education in Oregon, yet my parents and mentors kept supporting and pushing me to continue on. Looking back, it was these people who kept the musical arts alive in this small town.”

After studying with violinists throughout his teenage years, many of whom had ties to OSU, Justice chose to stay in Corvallis and enroll as a music performance major at the College of Liberal Arts. While at OSU, Justice studied with Marlan Carlson, professor of music, for four years, which Justice described as some of the best musical experiences of his entire life.

“The music program and playing under Marlan’s purview was incredibly formative,” said Justice. “I was able to observe him as a conductor and musician. His teachings were foundational to my growth as a musician and he was overall a fantastic person with stories upon stories to tell.”

Justice also fondly remembered first- and second-year Music Theory (MUS 114) with composer and conductor Ron Jeffers, who passed away in 2017, as well as Music History (MUS 122) with David Eisman.

Feeling he needed more experience in music performance, Justice decided to continue his studies at the University of Oregon, this time as a viola player. At UO, he also received training in historical performance practice that allowed him to learn more about music-making within sociocultural contexts and its impact on composition. Driven by curiosity from a music research methods course and music history, he found a passion for musicology and library science.

After working at Cornell University in central New York and the University of North Texas, Justice is now Head of the Music Library at the University of Southern California, where he maintains a collection of print and digital books, notated music, recordings, and archival collections to support the information needs of students and faculty at the Thornton School of Music, ensuring they have efficient access to materials for study, performance, and research.

“My music skills, both artistic and scholarly, were developed in Benton [Community] Hall,” said Justice. “I cannot speak more highly of my time there or the people who supported me.”

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Ann Marie Bottita camera operating at the Happiness Festival at OSU in 2021

By Jessica Florescu, CLA Student Writer - March 19, 2025

From learning the ins-and-outs of a video camera as a child to finishing a video production internship with KPTV FOX 12, Ann Marie Bottita, ‘24, is following her creative passions. She was introduced to visual media at a young age by her parents, which initially sparked her love for creating video content. 

“My dad used to take home videos of my brother and I doing random things as kids, and those are memories I might not have remembered without those videos,” said Bottita. “It’s really cool to think of these captured moments as a timestamp for someone.” 

Bottita grew up as YouTube was becoming increasingly popular, which she loved from the moment she logged on. During her middle and high school years, she was always shooting footage with friends on her hand-me-down camcorder from her Dad.  Although she had a strong interest in video production, Bottita wasn’t sure how she could  pursue video production as a career, until she came across the digital communication arts (DCA) major at OSU’s College of Liberal Arts. 

“My dad and I were looking over the course catalog while attending a campus tour,” explained Bottita. “He was the one who suggested giving it a try based on my hobbies and interest in video production. I’ve  always valued the continuous support and encouragement that my family has given me, regardless if my interests aren’t academically typical.” 

Bottita was able to focus on her interests in the field of visual media, while also exploring a wide variety of digital media-related topics, like graphic design, photography, and creative writing. Bottita’s ambitious passion to become involved in production started at OSU as soon as she walked on campus her sophomore year (after spending her first year entirely online, due to the COVID-19 Pandemic). 

“I moved into my dorm room in Tebeau Hall, then almost immediately walked over to the Orange Media Network, looking for an opportunity to get involved and gain experience.” 

Bottita’s first role at the Orange Media Network (OMN) was camera operator, but took on other roles and responsibilities as video editor, producer, and director, working live events, late night shows, and recorded broadcasts. Bottita was also a constant presence during KBVR-TV’s long running music program Locals Live. One of her favorite parts of working at OMN was the ways that she could express creativity through non-scripted footage and video promotions, but it wasn’t always easy at the beginning. 

“When I first started my position, my heart would race just by walking through the building doors because I didn’t know what to expect. Everything seemed new everyday and I had to branch out to grow my skill level, which took me way beyond my comfort zone. I kept returning to OMN not only because of the challenge, but also the overwhelmingly welcoming and supportive environment.”

Bottita became the first to lead Creative Video Team, an internal OMN team focusing on documentaries and featured video stories of OSU students. Productions led by Bottita took viewers behind the scenes of OMN productions, including Locals Live, DAMChic, The Daily Barometer, and more. Throughout her time at OMN as part of the Creative Video team and as a KBVR student-employee, Bottita won several awards for her video editing and photography from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. Bottita also twice attended the National Association of Broadcasters conference in Las Vegas, one of a handful of students representing the School of Communication. During her final year at the College of Liberal Arts, the School of Communication awarded Bottita with an Outstanding Senior award.

“I want to give the biggest thank you ever to Steven Sandberg, advisor to OMN,” said Bottita. “He supported me and my good friend Kate Zaine, who is currently leading Creative Video, to make the team into what it is today. I was so lucky to have Marigold "Gigi" Baldonado and K Crandal as such wonderful team members during the year that I led the Creative Video Team. Their enthusiasm and passion continues to impress me and inspire me every day. The Creative Video team today has leveled up their production so much and I am utterly over the moon and so proud of what they have created.”

For her senior thesis project, Bottita worked with Herd U Needed a Home (HUNAH), local dog rescue organization, to create a docuseries. HUNAH specializes in finding homes for herding dogs through a foster-based system, and Bottita spent over a year documenting their stories and releasing it on a YouTube channel called A Little Look. 

“This was such a passion project for me,” said Bottita. “I need to thank my Honors College mentor, Alina Padilla-Miller, who helped shape the docuseries into something much bigger than I could have ever imagined. She truly helped me believe in myself and my capabilities as a storyteller.”

Bottita advises current college students to take advantage of opportunities at OSU. She views college as an amazing time to step outside of your comfort zone, and mentioned that her biggest advice for college students is to give yourself time and space to learn about who you are. 

Bottita added, “OSU is filled with so many ways to spread your wings and learn about the things you are passionate about, and hopefully you can learn more about yourself along the way.” 

After graduating, Bottita interned with KPTV FOX 12 Oregon, which helped grow and expand her skill set even more. In comparison to her role at OMN, the KPTV internship was focused more on news production; however, she also worked with creative services and promotions departments. The most valuable lesson she learned through this opportunity was how to be flexible and adapt to a new environment, with many days where she needed to learn something completely new to her normal style of work assignments. 

“I tend to like more creative work, because of the style and timeline for everyday workflow,” Bottita expressed. “News production is very quick and new pieces have to be completed everyday. I like to craft my work over longer periods of time. Taking the time to develop my creative vision for a project is something that I really enjoy.” 

Bottita just started a new role for NexiGo, an electronics company that specializes in projectors, as a full-time video production specialist. As a change of routine, Bottita  will sometimes make an appearance on camera instead of behind the scenes, but the production process is her overall favorite part. One key piece of advice that she shared from her major and life in general is the importance of connections with your audience. 

Bottita reflected, “For digital communications from a marketing perspective, connecting people to the story behind a product is so important. It isn’t just about promotions, it is about telling a story that people can relate to. Throughout any career field, authenticity is a significant value to prioritize and value within each job you may have in the future.” 

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Kelsy Kretschmer

By Colin Bowyer, Communications Manager - March 12, 2025

Activism has been dramatically impacted by the development of information and communication technologies (ICTs). Digital options exist for everything activist groups do, including recruiting new members, meeting and collaborating with each other, planning events, and documenting group decisions. ICTs also introduce new risks and challenges, including surveillance from opponents and state actors, as well as adapting to the technological capacity of members. While technology choices are fundamental to growing and sustaining activist groups, little is known about how and why activists come to use particular ICTs. 

In new research still under review, Associate Professor of Sociology Kelsy Kretschmer, '03, explores how activist organizational structures and processes influence the ICT choices of group members. Partnering with engineering Professor Glencorra Borradaile and Ph.D. student Alexandria LeClerc, and supported by the National Science Foundation, Kretschmer and her co-authors analyzed 40 interviews with 33 distinct left-leaning activist groups in the U.S., ranging in size and purpose.

“This eight-year collaboration between myself, Glencora, and Alex dives into, for the first time, how activists today are making technology decisions under the threat of surveillance,” said Kretschmer. “Broadly speaking, we’re trying to answer which activists are thinking about privacy and security and who is not.”

Technology changes have dramatically reshaped the ways social movements operate, with more and more platforms becoming available for activists to find each other, organize, meet, communicate, and plan courses of action. The technologies available range from familiar and common (e.g., Google and Facebook) to often daunting and complex (e.g., email encryption). As activists weigh their options, group members must find a balance between user-friendly functionality, and their perception of surveillance risk. 

From the collected qualitative data, Kretschmer and her co-authors found that formalized bureaucratic groups, like the American Civil Liberties Union or Planned Parenthood (though they were not included in the study), were less likely to prioritize privacy in choosing which ICTs to use compared with smaller informal groups. While there were some small informal groups that did not prioritize privacy enhancing technologies (PETs), all the groups that insisted on high privacy standards for digital communication were small, local collectives. 

This new paper builds on research by Kretschmer, Borradaile, and LeClerc, published in 2021 in Sociology of Computer Science, which looked at activists’ ability to use encrypted technology, as well as who utilized encrypted communication.

“Digital or not, technologies that require significant knowledge to use will pose a barrier to recruitment,” said Kretschmer. “The most familiar digital platforms, like Facebook, are often those with few, if any, privacy protections for users, meaning that they are not end-to-end encrypted, and the information existing on these platforms is visible to third-parties. Group leaders will need to make technology choices that balance their own view of best practices with members’ willingness and ability to learn new technologies.”

Security culture varies dramatically across groups, with some prioritizing open, inclusive practices over closed, exclusive ones. Some groups may sacrifice privacy in favor of easier, more familiar tools; other groups may change technologies more frequently to ensure more protection for their group. Achieving robust privacy for a group’s digital information requires using specialized, generally not widely adopted, and often fast-changing PETs and practices that can complicate and slow communication and recruitment. 

“Small, informal collectives are often built by highly committed people who know each other well, so they are better positioned to overcome cumbersome technology,” said Kretschmer. “Conversely, larger bureaucratic organizations are structured to participate in mainstream political processes such as electoral politics, fundraising, and collaborative campaigns, like lobbying and marching, to exert influence on policymakers. These organizations choose not to shroud their activities, because it may hinder outreach, awareness, or recruitment.”

“We’re seeing structure and culture intersecting to produce fascinating incentives for groups to consider,” concluded Kretschmer. “The next steps to explore would be to include right-leaning groups, as well as international activist organizations, to see if their choices are similar to what we found.”

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By Colin Bowyer, Communications Manager - March 11, 2025

The production, dissemination, and adoption of information are at the foundation of all political systems. Communication is key to politics and an integral aspect of how political information is shared to and among the electorate, how the media cover politicians, and the way issues in the media affect politics. In recent decades, technological and societal changes have strongly affected the field of political communication, including the rise of internet-based communication, the increase of populist and racial rhetoric by political parties, and the fragmentation of the media landscape. 

In Political Communication (PS 207), offered online via OSU’s Ecampus, Instructor Sean Long examines the role of rhetoric and communications in American politics, including the language used by politicians, the media, and interest groups. 

“Political communication may seem to be dry and far from understanding politics,” said Long. “But with the rise of social media in our racialized rhetorical arena, it’s increasingly relevant exploring the mainstream study of public opinion and connection between communication, psychology, and political behavior.”

Using John Zaller’s The Nature and Origin of Public Opinion, the course’s first half examines the influence of political elites through media and how people acquire political information, as well as how actors outside of government and mainstream media increasingly affect public opinion through “top-down” political communication. Students will apply a series of theoretical models to investigate how politicians and news outlets attempt to influence and shape public opinion.

The second half of class focuses on political rhetoric surrounding race, where students will analyze politicians’ rhetoric that aims to tap into racial attitudes, as well as their intended effects.

“The entire course is focused on application, and this course couldn’t be more applicable to today’s political world,” said Long. “How do we make sense of the rapid changes in media ownership and technology?  And how do we evaluate intent from those speaking to us? Students are consuming political communication all the time, whether they’re aware of it or not. My hope is to help students better understand the world around them and process what they’re absorbing.”

Political Communication (PS 207) is an asynchronous, 4-credit course delivered via OSU Ecampus during spring terms.

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Alison Johnston

By Colin Bowyer, Communications Manager - March 6, 2025

Over the past three decades, populist parties have become increasingly successful electorally, in some cases even joining as coalition partners in the governments of mainstream parties. On rarer occasions, populist parties have commanded full control over government, granting them authority to dictate national policy.  Why populist governments’ electoral success is due to a variety of reasons, including perceived economic inequality and cultural backlash, yet, when populist parties control governments, they are subject to a constraint they don’t have to worry about while outside of government: the whims of financial markets. 

As governments increasingly rely on borrowed funds, particularly from foreign investors, they succumb to greater pressure to shape their fiscal and monetary policies around the preferences of bond holders. In a new 2025 paper, currently under review, Professor of Political Science Alison Johnston looks at populist governments in Italy (5 Star/Lega) and in Hungary (Fidesz), and why they appease bond holders through flexible macro-economic policies.

“In Europe, populists come in as part of coalitions,” Johnston explained. “It’s correct to assume that populist far-right governments should be more resistant to market pressures; given their tendency to scapegoat elites, including financial elites, as well as their championing of ‘the people’ and prioritizing their voters’ interests over investors. Nevertheless, we find that markets still bring populist governments to heel.” 

Once populists enter power, they often attempt to re-engineer financial markets to reduce the influence of foreign investors and entrap domestic investors (and central banks) into supporting their sovereign financing needs. Bond markets negatively react to far-right populists entering government, some of which cave, yet others remain defiant. 

Using the populist 5 Star/Lega coalition in Italy and Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz’s government in Hungary, Johnston finds that populists do bend to market pressure, but that this market-disciplining effect does not stem primarily from foreign investors. Despite the constant chastising of foreign investors by populist governments in both countries, it was the power of domestic investors that caused these governments to reverse course on their macroeconomic policies.  

“Interestingly,” explained Johnston, “it was domestic interests [bond holders] that mattered, like smaller private banks and households who purchased government bonds. These parties were more vested and vocal about how governments were enacting economic policy, particularly because they couldn’t leave, like other foreign capital.”

In Italy, the 5 Star/Lega coalition government watered down its “People’s Budget” not in response to threats from the European Commission or foreign capital flight, but rather after demand for Italian bonds from domestic investors collapsed in November 2018. In Hungary, domestic bondholders’ reluctance to finance the government in the face of high inflation in 2022 forced the Orbán government to renege on major spending commitments and compromise with the European Union. Because domestic investors served as both governments’ bond “buyers of last resort”, these governments needed to maintain their favor in order to borrow.

“What this shows is that financial markets still remain an important constraint on populist governments,” said Johnston. “Markets do constrain populists’ macroeconomic policies, but we find this constrain comes from domestic investors, an audience their policies are designed to privilege.”

The forthcoming paper builds on Johnston’s 2024 research published in Comparative Political Studies, where Johnston identified more market volatility overall when ruling coalitions included members of far-right parties.

“When analyzing bond spreads from 2000 to 2019 in high income countries, the results showed that right executives enjoy prolongedly lower bond spreads than their left-wing counter-parts, but only when they rule without the far right.”

What does this mean for the United States? “It depends,” said Johnston. “The U.S. enjoys a privileged position as a safe haven for assets, but if bond markets, both domestic and foreign, become spooked by the Trump Administration’s populist macroeconomic policies, will the administration back off?”

As populist movements rise, Johnston’s work is relevant more than ever before. “Markets are really being tested for the first time,” said Johnston.

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Bryan Tilt

By Hayley McKinnon, CLA Student Writer - January 18, 2024

After more than a century, the Klamath River is losing its dams. For some people, it's been a long time coming; for others, it’s troubling.

In the early 2000s, research on the four hydroelectric dams showed that they were disrupting salmon migration, and that they provided relatively little power compared to some of Pacific Power’s other sources, so the decision was made to remove the dams completely instead of doing costly retrofitting. In the world’s biggest dam removal project, the first of the dams, Copco 2, was removed in 2023, with the remaining three, JC Boyle, Copco 1, and Iron Gate, scheduled for removal in 2024.

OSU professor and cultural anthropologist Bryan Tilt has been part of a multi-phased, qualitative and quantitative study, funded by the Oregon Sea Grant, on the effects of the dam removal on communities who interact with and rely on the Klamath River. It’s a big project with lots of personnel and moving parts, according to Tilt, with researchers looking at the change in infrastructure from multiple angles. “There’s people on our team looking at what's happening ecologically – how the dam removal project is going to affect water quality and what the river channel looks like – while my piece is really about the people, and how individuals and communities are affected,” said Tilt.

The Klamath River flows from the foot of the Cascade Mountains on the California-Oregon border and snakes southwest into California, passing through several hydropower dams before opening into the Pacific Ocean south of Crescent City. At the mouth of the Klamath are the homelands of the Yurok Tribe, and OSU has partnered with Tribe researchers and ecologists to learn about the perspectives of indigenous people and think about the project from a Traditional Ecological Knowledge standpoint. Tribes including the Klamath Tribes, the Karuk Tribe, the Hoopa Valley Tribe, and the Yurok Tribe have advocated for the removal of the dams for years, as salmon and other threatened fish species are both a critical food source and an important cultural resource. “The goal is to collect all this social science information to think about management options that might be win-win,” said Tilt. “Are there places where the interests of these different parties overlap, and can we make some decisions that benefit everybody?” Surveyed stakeholder groups in the river basin include farmers and ranchers who use Klamath River water for irrigation, people working in conservation, restoring salmon habitat or improving water quality, people who use the river for recreation such as river rafting and paddling, and fishing communities.

Currently, Tilt’s team is conducting interviews with plans to do larger scale surveys in the next year or two, continuously analyzing social responses on a rolling basis. Several students in the master’s or Ph.D. programs at OSU have found opportunities to get involved with hands-on training in all aspects of the project, either conducting interviews and surveys, or in the field collecting water quality data. “There’s a lot of overlap. Because we’re an interdisciplinary group of researchers, the students also have an interdisciplinary cohort that they are working with,” said Tilt. “One of my anthropology master’s students spent a couple of days over the summer doing water quality sampling because they needed an extra person, and I think that was a really interesting experience for her.” The ecological science teams are doing specific pre- and post-removal water quality and habitat studies. With 400 miles of habitat blocked off by the dams, degraded water quality, and toxic algae growth, the river has seen the near-collapse of multiple salmon populations. In fact, there hasn’t been a thriving fishery along the Klamath for several decades due to the unhealthy conditions of the river.

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Todd Kesterson | Credit: Blake Brown

By Molly Rosbach, Writer - University Relations & Marketing - May 9, 2024

Oregon State University researchers are helping preserve the legacy of Silver Falls State Park by using three-dimensional scanning to produce digital replicas of the park’s historical structures.

The work is especially timely given the increasing frequency of wildfires in Oregon and throughout the West, with fires destroying similar historical structures at Jawbone Flats in the Opal Creek Wilderness and at Breitenbush Hot Springs in Oregon in 2020.

“Having a digital record of these buildings is essential, as that may be the only record we have,” said Todd Kesterson, senior instructor in OSU’s New Media Communications program and project director for the 3D scanning work. “If something is damaged or lost, that record can be used for repair or restoration.”

He pointed to the example of Notre Dame in Paris, which suffered significant loss in a fire in 2019. An art historian had conducted 3D scanning of the building in 2015, providing a perfect blueprint for the iconic cathedral to be rebuilt to an accuracy of within 5 millimeters.

For the Silver Falls project, Kesterson teamed up with Michael Olsen and Ezra Che in OSU’s College of Engineering. The project was paid for with a $14,163 grant from the Oregon Heritage State Historic Preservation Office.

The work involves two types of technology: photogrammetry and laser scanning. Photogrammetry uses a camera to take successive images of a structure, and then uses structure-from-motion software to stitch those photos together to build a three-dimensional digital replica. Laser scanning uses lidar (light detection and ranging) technology to record millions of points per second, measuring and mapping the exact shape and location of a structure at a high resolution.

The team selected three of the most well-known structures at the park: the South Falls Lodge, the South Falls Nature Store and the Stone Kitchen Shelter. They were built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps as part of the New Deal, and most park visitors walk past them en route to the falls. 

Olsen, Che and a group of graduate students set up laser scanners on tripods at various sites around and inside each building, capturing three-dimensional panoramas from different angles as the scanner rotated 360 degrees. They also sent a large drone 300 feet into the sky to take aerial photos.

Olsen said the bulk of his work focuses on monitoring infrastructure and natural environments for stability and erosion, but he has also done a lot of historical preservation work, even scanning the Renaissance-era Palazzo Medici in Italy to map the building’s deterioration.

The researchers spent a day last month at Silver Falls gathering 3D scans. They will spend the next year processing the data and stitching the scans together to build digital models. Once complete, the photogrammetry models will be uploaded to a public database.

The precise digital models built from the laser scanning data will be given to the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department for them to keep and use for future restoration or rebuilding, whether due to a fire or other natural disaster, or the typical wear-and-tear that historical buildings experience.

Park ranger Matt Palmquist was among those evacuated from Silver Falls during the 2020 Beachie Creek Fire, and said park management was told there was only enough time and manpower to protect one structure. They chose the South Falls Lodge, putting sprinklers on the roof and moving all the historically significant objects outside the park. But it was “heart-wrenching” to think of the building going up in smoke, he said.

“We get over a million visitors here at Silver Falls, and probably 90 to 95% of them walk right through this district and right past these buildings,” Palmquist said. “It’s a really excellent spot to showcase the history here and the work of the Civilian Conservation Corps here at Silver Falls.”

Kesterson hopes that the Silver Falls work will highlight the importance of increasing 3D scanning of historical structures in Oregon and throughout the U.S., even though structures like the South Falls Lodge don’t receive national or international attention.

“I do hope this kind of project leads to greater awareness and has people really understand that this is an important part of our history, and we need to protect it on a digital level, as well,” he said.

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By Colin Bowyer, Communications Manager - March 5, 2025

Starting in spring term 2025, the School of Public Policy will be offering a new baccalaureate core course online via Ecampus, titled Science and Technology in a Social Context (SOC 456). Last offered in 2018, the updated curriculum will introduce students to sociological dimensions to technology.

“Science and technology play a tremendous role in shaping modern society,” said Professor of Sociology and Public Policy Dr. Hilary Boudet, co-instructor of the course. “Technology, particularly A.I., is developing rapidly in front of our eyes and is now touching people on a personal, everyday basis. This was the perfect time to re-develop the course and have a social science component to explore technology’s connections through society”

The 4-credit course features research and interviews with scholars from multiple disciplines at OSU on topics covering new media, artificial intelligence, philosophy, race, gender, energy production, and environmental policy. The goal is for students to build an interdisciplinary understanding of technology’s societal implications, apply new concepts to emerging issues, and analyze the impact of techno-science on society. 

“Though the course is housed in the School of Public Policy, we welcome student perspectives and contributions from a variety of academic backgrounds,” said Waseq Billah, Ph.D. student and co-instructor with Boudet. “Students will learn the social implications of innovations and we hope each student will bring something to the table in terms of their own personal experiences or technical knowledge about science and technology.”

A special contributor to the course is Dr. Ruha Benjamin, the Alexander Stewart 1886 Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. Benjamin, who specializes in the interdisciplinary study of science, medicine, and technology, will cover the diversity, equity, and inclusion-perspective of the course and how our inherent biases influence technological development.

“We’re very fortunate to have had Dr. Benjamin sit down with us for an interview for the class,” said Boudet. “She brings such a unique perspective as a scholar exploring the relationship between innovation and social inequity, which will complement the other topics perfectly.”

Science and Technology in a Social Context (SOC 456) will begin to be offered via Ecampus during spring term, starting in 2025.