Student Spotlights
February 2019 Student Spotlight
Grand Valley State University (GVSU) student, Christina DeKoekkoek, presented her research on Applied Learning Through the Management of Online Educational Resources at a conference in Boston, Massachusetts with faculty mentor Star Swift (Management).
Christina is a senior studying accounting at GVSU who fell in love with numbers after taking a few accounting classes. She met Professor Swift in a business law class, where she was recommended to join an organization called, Teaching Through Technology (t3). T3 is a collaborative group full of alumni, students, and faculty who come together to work on projects that aim to teach the world through technology. During her time in this organization, she started her research project on the digital workplace that led her to a conference presentation. “Professor Swift helped me throughout the entire process… from figuring out what conferences we should submit our project to, and how to go about presenting,” Christina said.
Christina received an Academic Conference Fund (ACF) grant from the Office of Undergraduate Research and Scholarship to travel to Boston, Massachusetts for the conference from August 1 to 3, 2018. The conference hosted a variety of topics including education, business, and technology. Christina’s research project focused on running a website as a way to teach people. “Our website used a Google AdWords grant to advertise to people who are looking for specific information,” Christina said. “These ads would direct people to our site and explains things in an easier context... Our website specifically looked at legal cases involving technology… So, we would try to take things from court briefs and videos to explain what is going on.”
Christina and her research partner, Pradeep Charath (pictured above), learned a lot from the conference experience. “The conference was an amazing experience that had professionals from all around the world presenting on different topics,” Christina said. “I was able to add some on LinkedIn… and talk to others about what is happening at their universities.”
Although the conference is over, Christina believes the research will be carried on by other undergraduate students in the t3 organization.
For more information, contact the Office of Undergraduate Research and Scholarship at [email protected].
Written by Emma Sluiter, Advertising & Public Relations Major
Share this spotlight
Return to the listing of student spotlights.