App developer David J. Trowbridge, Ph.D., is hosting a virtual presentation on March 11 from 1:00-2:00 p.m. to share information about a game-changing resource for researchers. Clio, a website and mobile application that connects the public to information about nearby historical and cultural sites, is a tool our researchers can add to their toolbox when carrying out important research projects.

Everyday UMKC faculty and staff challenge students to conduct research for a real purpose, write for public audiences and share their findings all while motivating them to do their best work in our classes. Now, Clio makes this work easier and more accessible for students and instructors. 

Hundreds of universities have chronicled their communities in Clio. It is a non-profit organization based in Kansas City that offers a variety of free programs and tools to help university faculty and students chart individual landmarks, build walking tours, and create virtual tours of museums and sites. To date, Clio has more than 39,000 articles and 1,300 trails and walking tours that users can access with their mobile devices.

Instructors in diverse disciplines can adapt Clio to serve the content of their classes. For example, a biology professor could ask students to map local sites for wildlife observation; a civil engineering professor could assign students to plot bridges; and an art historian could require students to catalog public art. For a report about a Boston University professor’s use of Clio, go to https://www.bu.edu/articles/2018/documenting-the-real-story-behind-Boston-memory-sites/

To learn how to incorporate Clio into your curriculum, join Dr. David J. Trowbridge, from 1-2 p.m. Friday, March 11, 2022, in Zoom. Dr. Trowbridge is the developer of Clio and an associate research professor of digital and public humanities in the Department of History at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. For a more detailed overview of Clio, go to https://humanitiesforall.org/projects/Clio

This event is open to all instructors at UMKC and area institutions and is sponsored by the UMKC Center for Faculty Excellence (CAFE).  

To register for this event, please go to  https://net3.umkc.edu/intapps/onlineworkshops/home/workshopDetail/1781

For more information, contact Henrietta Rix Wood, the UMKC CAFE Faculty Fellow for Teaching Writing, at woodhr@umkc.edu