UHCL hosted the 23rd Annual Student Conference for Research and Creative Arts (SCRCA) April 17-20 with more than 300 students from UHCL and one student from San Jacinto College South Campus showcasing their original research and creative arts projects.
The SCRCA is designed as a way to allow students to present their original work in a professional manner and gain feedback by professionals in their field.
“Our [SCRCA] mission is to enhance classroom experience by facilitating interaction within and across disciplines,” said Michael Hunt, director of the SCRCA.
Events held at this year’s conference included: an Amazon symposium; a video symposia featuring incarcerated students from the Ramsey Prison Campus; a mock trial; poster and oral presentations; a poetry reading and coffee house; and the animation and film festival.
Former First-Year Seminar students held the roundtable “Communing Across Difference: Student Roundtable on Community, Identity, and Belonging,” where they discussed intersections between the struggles of characters in the Common Reader Program book “The Book of Unknown Americans” and their own experiences. Panelists focused on how the different perspectives of the characters in the book and in their classrooms helped push them to reexamine their own strongly held beliefs.
The panel was facilitated by Anne Gessler, lecturer in the First-Year Seminar Program and Humanities Program, who stated the importance of the issues discussed in “The Book of Unknown Americans.”
“It has really generated nuanced conversations about immigration, class, poverty, and disability,” Gessler said. “These experiences speak to a large percentage of our demographic at UHCL.”
Panelist Annette Collins, president of the Black Students Association, also said during the roundtable how discussing issues with people who hold different perspectives can bring people together.
“Having conversation builds community,” Collins said.
For nearly the past decade, the SCRCA has featured a video symposia that highlights an invisible part of the UHCL population – incarcerated students working toward their bachelor’s or master’s degree from prison.
Sponsored by Shreerekha Subramanian, associate professor for the College of Human Science and Humanities, inmates at the W. F. Ramsey unit were able to present about topics such as love, prison literature, race, class and gender in a roundtable format via video and in turn be a part of the community in which they are earning their degrees.
“There are so many stereotypes about incarcerated men and women,” Subramanian said. “It’s important for people who are incarcerated to speak from themselves. These students are a part of our community but never get to speak so the video presentation is a formal way for them to become a part of the UHCL community.”
Also published on Medium.