Students and faculty are unlocking new possibilities at the crossroads of humanities and technology
Charlotte Hooker has never been one to follow just a single path.
A rising third-year student at ĐÓ°ÉĘÓƵ, she’s majoring in both neuroscience and dance—disciplines that might seem unrelated but, to her, reflect the same underlying fascination with movement and the human body.
“In dance class, I love walking behind someone and thinking about how they move,” she said. “People’s movements are like fingerprints.”
As a Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Fellow in Experimental Humanities—a cohort of nine undergraduates bridging disparate fields through study and scholarship—Hooker was provided resources to conduct a summer research project.
Using motion capture technology—similar to what’s used for computer-generated imagery for film—she studied how body movements differ between epileptic seizures and psychogenic spells, which appear similar but have distinct causes and treatments.
“Psychogenic seizures stem from trauma, not neurological dysfunction,” she said. “You can’t treat trauma with seizure medication, and misdiagnosis can have serious consequences. Doctors need to be able to tell the difference.”
Her fusion of dance, technology, and medical research exemplifies the spirit of the university’s Experimental Humanities program, which is rooted in the idea that solving complex challenges requires fluency across disciplines and a thoughtful, human-centered approach
to technology.
Backed by philanthropy and powered by students and faculty eager to connect disciplines in new ways, the initiative opens doors to scholarships, research and hands-on exploration.
“I used to think I had to choose between my passions,” she said. “But here, it’s not just allowed—it’s encouraged. We talk about reimagining the future, and that, to me, means changing what’s possible.”
Rethinking how we learn
What began as students and faculty forging their own interdisciplinary paths has become a university-wide priority—one championed at the highest levels of leadership.
Provost Joy K. Ward, in particular, sees the intersection of technology and the humanities as central to addressing society’s toughest challenges, from climate change to public health, and ethics in artificial intelligence (AI)—including bias, discrimination and fairness issues inherent in datasets and models.
“Our ability to do is often outpacing our ability to understand,” said Provost Ward, who is also executive vice president at CWRU. “We’re developing a new kind of student—someone who can navigate both the technical and humanistic dimensions of emerging technologies—
who will lead the conversation about the future.”
This initiative took root in 2023 with a $2 million gift from the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation to fund the creation of a new interdisciplinary major—humanity and technology—as well as to support research that blends humanities and STEM and establish the Mandel Fellows program. A year later, the Mandel Foundation deepened its commitment with another $1.5 million.
At its core, the new course of study emphasizes ethics, empathy and critical thinking—qualities that shape responsible innovation.
“ĐÓ°ÉĘÓƵ is uniquely suited to this initiative because it naturally blends a STEM institution with a traditional liberal arts college,” said Timothy Beal, PhD, Distinguished University Professor and Florence Harkness Professor of Religion.
“We’re not inventing interdisciplinarity—we’re giving structure to the creativity that’s already here,” added Beal, a faculty fellow in the Experimental Humanities program who helped design the new major. “Our students and faculty have always been engineers who dance, pre-med philosophers, historians who dive into AI. Now we’re making it central to our identity.”
Merging innovation and inquiry
Building on this momentum, additional opportunities have emerged—backed by major philanthropic support.
In 2024, The Eric & Jane Nord Family Fund committed $15 million to expand the humanities’ role in ĐÓ°ÉĘÓƵ’s research landscape while increasing opportunities for students from underrepresented backgrounds.
More than half of the investment—$8 million—is helping to construct the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Building (ISEB), scheduled to open in 2026. The Nord Family Fund’s commitment will help to integrate humanities and STEM research within the 189,000-square-foot building. Designed specifically to promote collaboration, the building features flexible labs, open workspaces, and dedicated areas where students and faculty from different disciplines can naturally cross paths, exchange ideas, and launch new projects.
As part of this investment, the Baker-Nord Center for the Humanities—established in 1996 to nurture and support public engagement with the arts and humanities—has been renamed the Baker-Nord Institute for the Humanities. Long known for promoting dialogue around the interplay between culture and technology, the institute will now be positioned to embed humanistic inquiry directly into the heart of STEM research.
The Nord Family Fund also committed $3 million to grow the newly designated Nord Family Emerging Scholars Program. Designed to support first-generation college students, primarily those from Cleveland-area high schools, the initiative provides personalized mentoring, hands-on research experiences, and a credit-bearing, residential summer program to prepare students for college life and connect them with the campus community. This investment will expand the program by 25%, increasing its annual cohort to 15 students.
“My parents often said that technology is only as good as its ethical compass,” said Virginia “Gini” Nord Barbato (FSM ’72), a CWRU trustee and daughter of Eric Nord (CIT ’39, HON ’98) and Jane Baker-Nord (GRS ’76, art education). “By creating a
tangible home for the humanities at the ISEB—and expanding opportunities for first-generation students—we’re planting seeds for a future where advanced science and human-centered thinking go hand in hand.”
Complementing the Nord family’s investment, the Mandel Foundation is contributing an additional $2 million to establish the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Studio—an open, flexible space within the ISEB designed to spark
collaboration between humanities and STEM scholars and serve as a gathering place for Mandel Fellows.
“The Mandel Studio embodies what ĐÓ°ÉĘÓƵ does best—promoting intellectual exchange across the humanities, sciences and engineering,” said Jehuda Reinharz, PhD, president and CEO of the Mandel Foundation. “We’re supporting more than a research hub—the studio will be a place designed for ideas and innovation to intersect, expand and ultimately reframe how we approach complex challenges.”
Pioneering a new major
That same drive to connect disciplines that is reshaping campus spaces is also redefining the academic experience for students.
For decades, many undergraduates at ĐÓ°ÉĘÓƵ have combined STEM and humanities majors, but often those fields existed in parallel tracks, rarely intersecting. Now, the university is formalizing these connections through the new humanity and technology major, currently in its final stages of state approval.
“Students were already double-majoring in STEM and humanities, but their courses weren’t really speaking to each other,” said Aviva Rothman, PhD, inaugural dean’s associate professor of history and a faculty fellow in the Experimental Humanities program. “We wanted to create a way for them to intentionally connect these fields—and think about the unprecedented pace of our technological changes and their human consequences.”
To design the new major, faculty and student Mandel Fellows collaborated closely for nearly two years—shaping a curriculum where students earn at least a minor in both a STEM and humanities field, with shared courses that focus explicitly on their intersections.
This interdisciplinary approach, faculty members say, represents not something new, but rather a return to earlier academic traditions.
“People forget that, for centuries, mathematics, logic and music were taught together—but with specialization, STEM and the humanities drifted apart,” said Daniela Calvetti, PhD, the James Wood Williamson Professor of Mathematics and a faculty fellow in the Experimental Humanities program. “Now we’re reuniting these fields because the challenges we face demand a combination of technical proficiency and humanistic insight.”
That renewed connection is woven into the major’s design. Students will complete a capstone project that blends their technical expertise with a deep exploration of its ethical, philosophical and cultural implications—challenging them to grapple with the broader impact of their work.
“These students won’t just be engineers who took a history class or humanities majors who dabbled in coding,” said Beal. “They’ll be true hybrids—people who are equally comfortable in a lab, a think tank and a policy meeting. That’s the future of leadership.”
But being fluent in multiple disciplines takes more than coursework. For Beal, another kind of learning happens in the doing—experimenting with technology, testing ideas in practice and seeing firsthand how different fields inform one another.
“I’m a big believer in open-ended play with advancing technologies—not just as tools, but as catalysts for new ideas,” said Beal. “Transformative experiences come from exploring without a fixed goal—and discovering what emerges.”
Beyond either/or
Many of the students connected with the Experimental Humanities program are securing internships or co-op positions where their varied skill sets stand out.
That kind of opportunity reflects a growing demand across industries. “We hear from leaders and employers all the time: They want students and graduates who can communicate effectively, think critically and adapt to new challenges,” said Lisa Nielson, PhD,
executive director of the Experimental Humanities program. “These students really embody the future of education—and the workforce.”
That future is taking shape across campus. Interdisciplinary thinking is being woven into how faculty teach and how research questions are framed—not just between STEM and the humanities, but in fields such as nursing, social work, business and public health.
This mindset prepares students to tackle questions no single field can solve alone, said Provost Ward.
“Every field benefits from a more holistic approach,” said Provost Ward. “How we engage with knowledge is evolving, becoming more expansive and interconnected. What we’re doing at CWRU is part of that transformation.”
For Beal, efforts like the Experimental Humanities program reflect this shift in real time. It’s the university’s answer to a moment of profound change, one he likens to the upheaval sparked by Gutenberg’s printing press.
“Technology changes us as much as we change it—the printing revolution totally reshaped how people thought for centuries,” he said. “We’re in another period of radical change, and the way forward is to share ideas, passions, even doubts.
“That’s exactly what’s happening here,” Beal added, “and I can’t wait to see where it leads.”
Where curiosity can lead
Across campus, students are connecting seemingly disparate disciplines. Meet two students who are redefining what research, learning and leadership can look like.
Neuroscience meets Mozart
Shreya Girish came to ĐÓ°ÉĘÓƵ fascinated by the neuroscience of music—how sound shapes brain activity, influences
movement and even regulates vital functions like breathing.
As a Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Fellow in Experimental Humanities, she’s exploring how the rhythmic structure of Western classical music relates to respiration. Over the summer, she played Mozart and Beethoven for mice injected with a retrograde virus, tracing connections between auditory and motor-related brain regions.
Her findings suggest that the most predictably structured music could be used therapeutically to regulate movement and respiration in patients with motor disorders—insights that could inform treatments for neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s.
“I want to see how far this intersection of music and science can go,” said Girish, a third-year student studying systems biology and music. “The fellowship and major don’t just encourage me to explore in deeper ways—they provide the resources to do it.”
Opening the future
As students turn their interdisciplinary skills into real-world opportunities, they are forging new career paths—and some are creating opportunities for others.
Amber Tilling-Richards is doing both. She wants to change how young people think about research, and who gets to take part.
With a grant from the university’s Expanding Horizons Initiative, also supported by the Mandel Foundation, Tilling-Richards—along with classmates and mentored by Rothman—is creating a tool to connect high school students, especially those from under-resourced
backgrounds, with research opportunities. Their efforts include building a website to connect students with mentors, grants and
internships in the humanities.
“STEM research opportunities for high schoolers are everywhere, but humanities-based research is often overlooked,” said Tilling-Richards, who is studying mechanical and aerospace engineering and philosophy as a humanity and technology major.
For Tilling-Richards, the project is personal. Growing up in South Africa, she had little exposure to philosophy in school, only discovering it through a scholarship program in Singapore, where a mentor introduced her to the field. That experience shaped not only her academic trajectory but also her belief in the power of mentorship—one she now hopes to pass on.
“We wanted to create a space where students can ask big questions—and receive real guidance in exploring them,” she said. “We need more minds approaching problems from all angles—and you don’t get that if entire populations never see themselves in the equation.”
Originally published in the summer 2025 issue of Forward Thinking magazine