TO:

One Book, One Campus (OBOC) Committee

FROM:

Michael Gervase, ENC 3250 Professional Writing Student

DATE:

February 8, 2016

SUBJECT:

Book Recommendation Report

This recommendation report includes a summary for three potential books to be

read by all first year students at Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) who will be
enrolling in fall 2016:

Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the
Better

How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World

Virtual Unreality: The New Era of Digital Deception

Author, Title

Clive
Thompson,
Smarter Than
You Think:
How
Technology is
Changing Our
Minds for the
Better
Steven
Johnson, How
We Got to
Now: Six
Innovations
That Made the
Modern World
Charles Seife,
Virtual
Unreality: The
New Era of
Digital
Deception

Publisher,
Publication
Date
Penguin
Press,
August 26,
2014

ISBN

Cost/Numb
er of Pages

Summary

97801431258
22

$12.53/352
pages

Focuses on real stories

that harness the ways
in which the rapid shifts
in technology enhance
our knowledge and
improve our lives.

Riverhead
Books,
September
22, 2015

97815946339
35

$15.55/320
pages

Traces the historical

effects of technological
innovation to their
evolution into society
and shows how these
discoveries changed
the world.
Penguin
97801431276 $16.00/256 Provides internet users
Press,
73
pages
the tools to decipher
August 4,
fact from fiction in a
2015
time when technology
is altering the very
nature of work,
knowledge and human
relationships
Fitting into the parameters of the first-year reading project and the Universitys
guiding principle to develop the whole person for success in life and work, I found
that The University of Florida, The University of Central Florida, and Cornell

University utilized a well-researched-based selection of books from Penguin Random

House. The table provides an overview of my recommendations:

Technology serves as the cornerstone to deepen student learning, expand on STEM

academics, and opens a global network students must be educated on. Each
selection establishes to build on the intellectual heritage of the past in order to
plan its evolution systematically for student success in the twenty-first century. A
first year FGCU student would like the books I am recommending and would identify
with some of the themes due to the rapid shift of technology in not only their
everyday lives, but in the workplace.
Please contact me at (863)777-7777 or michael.gervase@email.net to set up a
meeting where we will further discuss my selections. It is an honor to be involved in
the efforts of FGCU to foster a common intellectual experience across the campus.