The AIMS Digital Innovation Center, modeled after Miami University’s Luxembourg Campus, offers a semester-long immersive experience for Miami students in the Bay Area. AIMS plans to bring a cohort of students to live, work, study, play, and embed themselves in the heart of global innovation.

Background

For fifteen years, the Interactive Media Studies (AIMS) program at Miami University has been a national leader in the study and practice of digital media. Crossing all five academic divisions (business, engineering, fine arts, education, and arts & science), the AIMS program offers an interdisciplinary major, two minors, and other curricular options for students interested in the frontiers of digital media.

The AIMS program’s long history of client-based projects, corporate partners in research, and focus on innovation and design thinking, has often brought it to the Bay Area. From workshops with IDEO to client projects with Gensler, AIMS has continually found itself drawn westward, even having an advisory board meeting in San Francisco. The magnetic draw of the Bay Area for AIMS is no surprise. Both share a common passion for innovation and technology. And while guest lectures and case studies are useful, there is no “bringing the Bay Area to Oxford,” so we must look to bring Oxford to the Bay Area.