Esther Obonyo
Department of Building Construction/ College of Design, Construction & Planning
High Performance Green Building Delivery
In orderfor the U.S. to continue to be regarded as a country at the forefront of innovation across the different sectors of economy, its future professionals must be educated in a global context. Consequently, “internationalization of the curriculum” has become a topical theme in North American Universities and significant investments have been made in educational activities such as student exchanges, study-abroad programs and overseas summer projects. The term “internationalization,” as used in this context, has been defined as the process of integrating an international dimension into the research, teaching, and service function of higher education. However, such activities tend to be expensive and remain beyond the reach of many students.
In cognizance of this limitation, the proposed project will be directed at using the “Internationalization at Home” (IAH) approach to make international educational activities accessible to a larger proportion of the student community. The investigator will develop a learning module on Sustainable Development in Sub-Saharan context featuring case studies of appropriate options for construction technologies and building systems in Tanzania. The new material will be developed in collaboration with Dr Harriet K Eliufoo (Acting Dean, School of Construction Economics, Ardhi University) and Dr Alfred Omenya (Head of Research and Publication, Department of Architecture and Building Science, University of Nairobi). The focus of the new learning module will be to illustrate an exemplary approach to ecological design in the East African context. The proposed work will be used to enrich a graduate level course: BCN 6580 – High-Performance Green Building Delivery with 30 students.