July 5 — A leading STEM advocate, Dr. Helen Turner has been named a plenary speaker for the XSEDE16 conference taking place July 17-21, 2016, in Miami. Turner is Chaminade University‘s Dean of Natural Sciences and a tenured Professor of Biology. In this dynamic keynote address, Turner will discuss gaps in the Pacific educational ecosystem for science and technology, and the needed fusion of science and culture in STEM educational opportunities.
The Pacific islands offer the world stunning biodiversity, millennia-old models for sustainability, and uniquely rich indigenous cultures. These ‘paradoxical paradises’ are also globally-relevant sentinel locations for the ravages of climate change, food insecurity, health inequity, wealth gaps, migration and erosion of indigenous culture.
Science and technology offer important components of the solutions to these problems, particularly as the era of ‘Big Data’ arrives. However, data science has the potential to become the latest in a series of colonizing Western scientific paradigms from which Pacific indigenous peoples are largely disenfranchised. Tensions between science and culture are an emerging threat to health, sustainability and prosperity in the Pacific.
This presentation discusses innovative data science research projects and educational approaches that embody principles of democratization (an inclusive STEM pipeline that transcends barriers of privilege); decolonization (inculturation of indigenous knowledge within a Western scientific paradigm); and (re)-discovery (export of Pacific-based models to address global challenges). The olelo no’eau of the title tells us that ‘not all knowledge is learned in the same school.’
Turner moved to Hawai`i in 2000 to take a position as Associate Director of Research at The Queen’s Medical Center. In 2007, she joined Chaminade where she has been the major architect of its STEM transformation and has led the initial development of its School of Nursing. In addition, Turner holds joint appointments at the University of Hawaii (UH) School of Medicine and graduate faculty appointments in several UH programs.
An acknowledged leader in Hawaii’s science and educational development, Turner has led a number of critical statewide and national partnerships that benefit Chaminade’s mission. Chaminade occupies a unique position in the American educational spectrum serving disenfranchised and disadvantaged students from indigenous Hawaiian and Pacific Island backgrounds.
Turner is committed to using research and inquiry in Chaminade’s laboratories as a vehicle to achieve this social change. Under her Deanship, Chaminade has made an institutional transformation from a teaching institution with no research capacity to a vibrant culture of undergraduate research. In her laboratory, and those of the faculty she has recruited to Chaminade to share in this mission, these students are no longer denied opportunities to become scientists, health practitioners and educators. Their emerging success in gaining entry to graduate school and health professional programs has a striking impact on their communities.
Turner earned her PhD at the University of London and performed post-doctoral work at Harvard Medical School as a Wellcome Trust International Prize Fellow.
XSEDE16, the 5th annual conference, will showcase the discoveries, innovations, challenges and achievements of those who use and support XSEDE resources and services, as well as other digital resources and services throughout the world. This year’s theme is DIVERSITY, BIG DATA, & SCIENCE AT SCALE: Enabling the Next-Generation of Science and Technology.
Registration Details
To register, please click here. Online registration ends on July 15 at 5 p.m. ET. You will still be allowed to register onsite.
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Source: XSEDE