Convergence Design Lab joins the School of Media Arts at Columbia College Chicago

CHICAGO (Sept. 9, 2016)—Convergence Design Lab, an innovation incubator in design and learning experiences previously located within the Center for Community Arts Partnerships, has joined the School of Media Arts at Columbia College Chicago. The move to the School of Media Arts reflects a new milestone in Columbia’s efforts to further integrate academic life, research and scholarship with intentional community outreach.

“Convergence’s commitment to investigating and building leading-edge digital media strategies across a number of industrial and municipal sectors provides a fertile training ground for our students, fertile research territory for our faculty, and is intimately linked to the curricular work already being undertaken within the School of Media Arts,” said Eric Freedman, Ph.D., Dean of the School of Media Arts at Columbia. “By partnering with Convergence, Columbia continues to be a powerful agent of change in the regional ecosystem with a resourceful combination of disciplines and robust portfolio of community initiatives.”

The addition of Convergence to the School of Media Arts will further the impact of educating and training Columbia students in the important work of intentional community outreach and industrial and cultural change. The dedicated focus of Convergence, as an inter-media strategist, consultant and change agent is intimately linked to the teaching, research and creative practice at Columbia. It will also provide more opportunities for the college to lead in area-wide conversations about emerging digital economies and information literacies while continuing to foster a strategic vision for Chicago’s connected city.

Together, Convergence and Columbia’s School of Media Arts are exploring how digital technologies are transforming society and culture, producing new forms of interaction, and modeling new information ecosystems, and using that knowledge to empower and transform communities across the greater Chicago area.

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Columbia College Chicago is a private, nonprofit college offering a distinctive curriculum that blends creative and media arts, liberal arts and business for more than 8,000 students in more than 100 undergraduate and graduate degree programs. Dedicated to academic excellence and long-term career success, Columbia College Chicago creates a dynamic, challenging and collaborative space for students who experience the world through a creative lens. For more information, visit www.colum.edu.

Convergence Design Lab is an innovation incubator committed to the future design of learning experiences, with a focus on participatory civics and holistic problem solving, and a commitment to strengthening the competencies needed to thrive in a convergent digital media environment. Convergence works as a strategic partner with civic agencies, educational organizations and foundations to innovate and test new ways to build civic capacity in our communities. For more information, visit www.convergencedesignlab.org.

Media Contact: Cara Birch, 312-369-8695, cbirch@colum.edu

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