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These projects have been developed by participants in the Bildner Family Foundation New Jersey Campus Diversity Initiative at Bloomfield College. 

Career Services Project. Career Services, developed by Director, Office of Student Development and Career Services, Teri Corso. "At the heart of a learning organization is a shift of mind -- from seeing ourselves as separate from the world to connected to the world, from seeing problems as caused by someone or something 'out there' to seeing how our own actions may contribute to the problems we experience. A learning community is a place where people are continually discovering how they create their reality. And how they can change it."

Cultural Encounters in Early America. Humanities, developed by Associate Professor of History, Barbara Machtinger. A revision of a course which looks closely at the lives of Native Americans, Africans, and the Europeans in the early centuries of American history. Two new units of the course will address Prof. Machtinger's goal of developing a better understanding of the worlds from which the Africans and the Europeans came. A unit on the African world before the Atlantic Slave Trade examines the interconnectedness of village life on the west coast of Africa before 1500 and explains the differences between slavery in Africa and slavery in the Americas. Another new unit on English society in the 1600s examines the economic, religious, and political conditions that created pressures for migration to the New World. A second goal is to better connect student's lives to the course. Students will discuss where they and their parents are from, and how they think their nations of origin connect to the class. Students' research projects may include slavery and their country of origin.

Hip Hop Poetry. Paul Genega, Associate Professor of English. The poetry I read and the music I listen to are light years away from the current generation. In an attempt to get to know our students better and to bring myself up to speed, I want to learn more about hip hop, from its inception in the late 70s through today. I have begun that learning this semester through my Intro to Creative Writing class and a set of assigned papers in the Sophomore Core. The real work will happen in the spring semester when I hire students to teach me. At that point, I will be interested not only in the content and the aesthetic, but also pedagogy -- the way students approach their work as teachers to a teacher. I expect this to be a real boon as I work with developing writers on the introductory and advanced levels.

Hispanics in Top Management. Accounting, Business, CIS, & Economics, developed by Professor of Business Administration, Luis Gonzalez. The focus of this project is to identify and analyze managers who occupy top management positions such as Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and Chief Operating Officer. This study will identify the factors that might account for their success. These factors are: (1) how many are first generation immigrants; (2) how many were born in the United States; (3) identifying and analyzing their college and graduate programs; (4) other factors such as race, command of the English language, etc. The finding will be used in the following manner: (1) to develop an article for a business management journal; and (2) to integrate these findings in an introductory management or international business course.

New Jersey: A sense of Place and People. Humanities, developed by Lecturer in History, Robert Burnett.  Robert Burnett will employ some of the insights and perspectives that emerged from the Bildner seminar in his "Topics in New Jersey History" course to be offered during the Spring 2004 semester. Students will examine selected New Jersey communities from different parts of the state and the population groups that have inhabited them. The course will examine both how various groups of people (ethnic, racial, religious, etc.) shaped these places over time and their experiences in these communities

The communities to be studied include Camden (initially settled by English Quakers), Hope (German Moravians), Lawnside (African Americans), Newark (English Puritans), Swedesboro (Swedish Lutherans), Woodbine ( Russian Jews), and Perth Amboy (Scots Presbyterians).

Quilt-making and the Quilting Bee. Creative Arts and Technology CAT, developed by Assistant Professor Nancy Bacci. This course will honor the craft of earlier generations and pass the craft to another generation. It will also examine the influence of culture on design. Instructors will be CAT faculty also drawn from the local community ("The Grandmothers"), building a new campus community of creators and scholars. Speakers will make oral presentations as students quilt, on quilt-making in history and literature, pictorial symbols in quilts and their cultural origins, abstract and symbolic aesthetics of quilt-making, the role of quilt-making and needlework in passing on cultural knowledge (e.g. Hmong of Southeast Asia, sunjuni kathas of India, arpilleras from Latin and South America), types of quilts and various construction methods. Using FLASH software, a quilt-making website will be constructed. Quilts will be displayed in the Westminster Art Gallery (Bloomfield College) and traveling quilt shows will be booked there. Quilts will be donated to charitable organizations and a non-profit business plan will be developed for selling work from India.

The Ultimate Arts Experience. Creative Arts and Technology CAT, developed by Director of Arts Education, David Rosenak. Each of us have a story -- a history of our very own -- part family, part private memory, part awareness, part dreams. A self-evolved vocabulary we hear as we walk -- a vision of the world, however wide, however narrow. We believe our own truths -- shelter from our fears, measures of our stride. We hold these stories inside -- forgetting their value, uncertain of their validity. But what if we gave these stories as a gift? Not just to share, but to give in trade -- our story traded for another's story. Our story taught to our partner -- their story taught in return. We will each of us then be responsible to live in respect of our partner's story -- and then retell their story with humbled truth.

This will then be the basis of a redesigned Ultimate Arts Experience -- partnering each student with another human being totally unlike themselves -- elders of the community, survivors of the Newark riots, of the Holocaust, of Vietnam, of segregation, of emigration, of prison. Over the course of a semester, students will learn their partner's stories. They will create an expression of the essence of each story, presented through a project of their own design.