News & Stories

Examining the French stage during the Enlightenment and French Revolution

The MIT Press recently published “Databases, Revenues and Repertory: The French Stage Online, 1680-1793,” an innovative collection of original essays that explore an important initiative in the digital humanities, the Comédie-Française Registers Project (CFRP). This international online collaboration consists of high-resolution reproductions of the detailed daily box office receipts for the Comédie-Française theater troupe in […]

Why soldiers fight

Matthew Cancian concluded his service in the U.S. Marine Corps in 2013, but in some ways he never left his Afghanistan battlefield experience behind. A rising fifth-year doctoral candidate in political science, Cancian researches what motivates people to enlist and to engage in combat. “It could be said that my dissertation is a poorly disguised […]

Learning by doing, remotely

Experiential learning is alive and well at MIT — even when it’s remote. Just ask Julian Zulueta, a sophomore in biological engineering. Last May, he spotted an intriguing social impact internship opportunity in the PKG Public Service Center newsletter: The CDC Foundation, a Congressionally-chartered nonprofit created to support the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention […]

Diverse international cohort first to earn MIT master’s degrees in data, economics, and development policy

This past January, 22 students from across the world joined the MIT campus as the first cohort in the new MIT master’s program in Data, Economics, and Development Policy (DEDP). Developed by MIT’s Department of Economics and the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), the program represents a new approach to higher education by […]

How tutoring programs can combat the “Covid-19 slide”

The current pandemic has led to unprecedented disruptions in student learning in the United States. Remote learning, decreased instruction time, and fewer opportunities for personalized interactions with teachers have set the stage for widespread learning loss, also referred to as the “Covid-19 slide.” These risks are greatest for low-income students, students of color, and students […]

Action learning in the virtual world

This year marked the third time that MIT Hong Kong Innovation Node hosted a fintech entrepreneurship program designed for students from MIT and from Hong Kong, but this summer marked the first time the experience was hosted online. Called MIT Entrepreneurship and Fintech Integrator (MEFTI), 33 students participated remotely across five different time zones due to […]

Fostering friendships and films from across the globe

What do you do when a pandemic shuts down international travel, and you can’t do your internship in Japan? For MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives (MISTI) students this summer, the answer was the Virtual Language Conversation Exchange with the Tokyo Institute of Technology (also known as Tokyo Tech). MIT Japan’s managing director, Christine Pilcavage, […]

MIT-Wits Program continues to thrive

Now in its seventh year, the MIT-Wits Program is one of MIT’s most active in Africa. Whether through MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives (MISTI)-organized student opportunities and faculty seed funds, visiting professors, or its array of edX courses, the relationship is as strong as ever. Known fondly known as Wits (and pronounced “Vits”), the […]

$25 million gift launches ambitious new effort tackling poverty and climate change

With a founding $25 million gift from King Philanthropies, MIT’s Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) is launching a new initiative to solve problems at the nexus of climate change and global poverty. The new program, the King Climate Action Initiative (K-CAI), was announced today by King Philanthropies and J-PAL, and will start immediately. […]

Fellowship is at the heart of emergency response in Nigeria

When Amir Bature came to MIT from Bayero University Kano (BUK) in Nigeria as part of the Empowering the Teachers (ETT) program, he was amazed at his shift in perspective during his time on campus. “The first time we arrived at MIT, there were a lot of things where we said ‘no, this is impossible.’ […]