Saturday, April 28, 2012
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Spotlight on ICSC Graduate: Marta Davidovich Ockuly
Marta moved from Sarasota, Florida to Buffalo, New York in May of 2010 to become a residential student in the I.C.S.C. program. In one whirlwind year, she completed her studies with distinction. Awarded her Master’s of Science degree in May, 2011, she was also one of three graduating students chosen to receive the coveted Mary Murdock Creative Spirit Award. Her master’s project: “Keys to Unlocking Creative Potential: The Expressive Path to Personal Growth” launched her popular creativity blog, and also led to a Social Media Consulting position offer from Saybrook University distinguished professors Dr. Ruth Richards and Dr. Steve Pritzker.
Prior to leaving Buffalo, Marta was accepted as a PhD student at Saybrook. She began her PhD studies as a distance student in August, and by September, under Dr. Ruth Richard’s generous mentorship, she was published as a co-author in the peer reviewed journal: NeuroQuantology. The is titled: “Creativity Revalued: How Professors, Students, and an Innovative University are Turning the Tide.” In 2013, Marta will begin training with Dr. Natalie Rogers to earn her Certification as a Person-Centered Expressive Arts Therapist as part of her doctoral program.
Upon her return to Florida, Marta accepted an Adjunct Professor position with Eckerd College. She is teaching a course she developed called: “Creative Process: Awakening Creative Potential for Personal and Professional Growth” to adult undergraduate students. Marta will present at the National Association of Gifted Children’s conference ‘Creativity Night’, Friday, November 4th in New Orleans, Louisiana, the same week she launches her first original research project in partnership with Dr. Ruth Richards. It is a quantitative study measuring contemporary views, perceptions and definitions of creativity and using social media to attract participants from varied backgrounds. She hopes to present the findings at APA’s Annual Conference in August of 2012. In addition to her work as a PhD student, professor, and social media consultant, Marta is a busy creativity catalyst, joy coach, and Chief Inspiration Officer of www.JoyofQuotes.com. Her fast growing site is attracting more than 100,000 visits per month and features the largest collection of creativity quotes on-line.
On the personal side, Marta’s daughter Sarah is an award-winning metals artist who recently graduated Summa Cum Laud with a Bachelor of Arts Degree from Bowling Green University in Ohio. Her son David is a certified art teacher completing his Master’s Degree in Art Education at Ohio State University. Marta enjoys her life in sunny Sarasota with her companion Alejandro (a 4-month old Maltese puppy)!
Links:
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Spotlight on ICSC Graduate: Patrick Colemont
When Patrick Colemont from Belgium started the graduate program in 1986, he was the first European student at ICSC. He received the Creative Studies Alumni Foundation Award in 1987 and completed his Masters degree in 1990. His Master’s project consisted of the planning and organizing of the Second European Conference on Creativity and Innovation in The Netherlands. Patrick continued to be a pioneer and professional in the field of creativity and innovation and he was nominated “universal ambassador” by the European Association for Creativity and Innovation in 2001.
In the first decade of the new millennium Patrick developed a new career as creative consultant in communication and campaigns in politics. In 2008, he became part-time parliamentary collaborator of two Belgian senators. Later on, Patrick has continued his passion for creative thinking in a variety of domains, including mental health and peace making initiatives. He currently is active as ‘co-creative-partner’ and is in the process of writing a publication on “The Code, a conceptual design for co-creativity”.
Patrick will be participating and presenting at the 11the European Conference on Creativity and Innovation in Faro, Portugal from 14-16 September, 2011. He recently has entered a contest to contribute a seven minute speech at the Creativity World Forum 2011 in his hometown of Hasselt. You can see his pitch talk on the internet: www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QgXNpUmU2U
Patrick is a proud father of Antoine (14) and Amarine (10) who live with their mother Anne-Sophie in Paris. With his partner Krisje, he enjoys playing golf and spending quality time with the children when they stay in Hasselt. Patrick can be contacted at: patrick.colemont@telenet.be
Links:
www.co-creative-partner.be
www.eaci.net/eccixii
www.flandersdc.be/en/events/cwf11
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Spotlight on ICSC Graduates: Hector and Suzanna Ramos
Hector and Suzanna come from diverse backgrounds (Spain and Singapore) but they share one passion – the study of creativity.
They both completed their MS in Creative Studies in 2005, while garnering several awards during the course of their study. Suzanna received the President’s Medal for “Outstanding Graduate Student” and “Outstanding Master’s Thesis Award” while Hector received the “ICSC Alumni Foundation Achievement Award”. Prior to their studies in Buffalo, Suzanna and Hector had accomplished careers in their respective fields. Suzanna had a career in education and served as a teacher, head of department, assistant principal and professional development officer facilitating teachers in action research in the classroom. Hector has a background in publishing and was also a trainer and facilitator in South East Asia and the Middle East.
They are currently doctoral students at Texas A&M University, pursuing a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology focused on Creativity, Cognition, and Giftedness. Suzanna is part of a research team investigating the gap between verbal and nonverbal intelligence of underperforming gifted students in various schools in Texas. She is also exploring creative strategies, like ‘MindSketching’, to address this problem. Her other research interests include implicit theories of creativity and intelligence, and cross-cultural creativity. Hector is currently investigating learning transfer as it relates to creative thinking training. His other areas of interest are creative and innovative climate and exploring elements that foster and hinder undergraduate research at Texas A&M University.
Besides presenting at the Texas Association for the Gifted and Talented conferences, they are also involved in writing chapters for the Encyclopedia of Creativity, Invention, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship. This Encyclopedia is a 4-volume reference currently in development in Springer. It features contributions from economics, management, psychology, anthropology, technology, education, and the arts, to offer a “transdisciplinary” approach to creativity and innovation.
In addition to their academic pursuits, Hector and Suzanna have managed to incorporate the skills they have learnt from the master’s program. They ‘revived’ and headed the Creativity and Innovation Alliance (CIA), an undergraduate student organization at Texas A&M University. Hector is currently the President of the Educational Psychology Student Organization (EPSO) where he has numerous opportunities to apply his creativity skills. He is a graduate assistant at the Honors program and has facilitated staff retreats using CPS. Suzanna is also a graduate assistant where she conducts workshops on supervision and management. She has modified the sessions to incorporate CPS tools and techniques.
As a form of relaxation, Suzanna is passionate about making her own jewelry and is constantly perfecting her craft. Hector and Suzanna are also avid practitioners of the Turkish art of Paper Marbling called ‘Ebru’ and are exploring ways to apply this technique to greeting cards, tee shirts and jewelry.
As a celebration of their 15 years of marriage, they reaffirmed their wedding vows on June 1st 2011.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Spotlight on ICSC Graduate: Kai Wang
Kai Wang is a researcher in creativity and innovation management. He is a 2010 alumnus of the Master's program in Creative Studies. While he has heavy background in biotechnology, his major passion has been creativity since college. Following this passion, he found the program in ICSC by online search. Now he has facilitated many CPS sessions, in Chinese and English, for people from various disciplines. His Master's project was focused on the classification of idea generation techniques. Now he is in the PhD program in technology management in Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. One of his major research interests is about creative processes and techniques. The current research project is about developing ways to organize online crowds to generate creative ideas. Specifically, he is using Amazon Mechanical Turk, an online crowdsourcing marketplace, to solicit creative ideas from the crowd and to study ways to collect, improve, evaluate and select ideas. A second academic interest is about innovation management. He is involved in research about innovation diffusion and implementation, for example, what factors affect the implementation of new technology in an organization.
He is from mainland China and currently resides in New Jersey. Read more on his Linkedin Profile
Monday, April 11, 2011
Give for Greatness
http://www.giveforgreatness.org/organization/folkloric-dance
This video clip highlights work Cathy Skora is doing in the field of art education utilizing the creative process in teaching and learning. The clip shows portions of a rehearsal process for a 4th grad class involved in a school-wide project entitled Welcome to the Village conceived and developed by Cathy Skora.
In this project Cathy uses brainstorming and other action based teaching and learning methods to facilitate students in a script building process with a theme on global conservation. Students also use their creativity as via dance brainstorms in putting together a dance. The program culminates with school wide presentations of the work at venues outside of the school allowing students a varied experience in presenting their work in different environments.
This program was recognized and funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts
from linked: Dance Teacher - Arts Integration Facilitator Develop programming for grades K-6 focusing on cultural dance according to NYS art standards, develop lesson plans that align with core curriculum, using creativity training facilitate students in learning movement and script writing. Certified in Dance Content by NYSED.
<http://www.linkedin.com/profile/edit?trk=h-gnav-name-link-0#name> Workshop Facilitator, Trainer Folkloric Productions Dance Co., Inc. Workshop Leader
My lifelong studies of dance and meditation have led me on an interesting journey. This journey has included developing techniques to assist others in enhancing their lives professionally and personally. Working in a variety of settings from education to special need populations has allowed me to tap into the creative process by identifying and connecting common denominators among different groups, such as movement and emotion , in order to assist others in moving past barriers in order to enhance their lives.
Workshops I have developed focus on techniques for personal development , discovery, and awareness of personal potential. My current studies as a graduate student in the Creative Studies Department at the State University College at Buffalo is a natural progression towards the development of layering and identifying further personal development workshops utilizing movement and meditation to access the creative process,
My career path has been an incredible journey full of renovations, realizations, and reinventions. It is my pleasure to share my insights and assist others in connecting with their potential.