ELI Case Studies: Innovations & Implementations

ELI is no longer actively developing this series. This page is provided as an historical resource; it is not being updated or actively managed.

The EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative's Innovations & Implementations case study series highlights innovative teaching, learning, and technology practices in higher education. Each Innovations & Implementations piece provides a practical overview of an innovation, asking questions such as:

• What is the innovation?
• What problems does it solve?
• How did the institution successfully implement it?
• Why is the innovation noteworthy?

You can use Innovations & Implementations to:

• Increase awareness on your campus of solutions to specific teaching and learning challenges
• Explore effective, innovative practices that might have value for your institution
• Identify ways to integrate those practices into your institution

Innovations & Implementations case studies will help you explore alternative approaches to teaching and learning and make the case for pursuing these innovations. A variety of groups will find Innovations & Innovations case studies useful, including:

• Faculty members
• Administrators
• Technology professionals
• Planning committees

Review ELI Innovations & Implementations case studies and see how they can make a difference for you and your campus.

Student Success Initiative, Montgomery County Community College, December 2006

Montgomery County Community College is using technology to create a culture of evidence, drawing on campus-wide data and sharing information with other institutions to increase student retention. MCCC is mining campus information systems for performance indicators to better identify which students will need academic intervention so that programs can be devised to help them succeed. More>>

The Learning Grid, University of Warwick, November 2006

The University of Warwick's Learning Grid is a flexible social learning space designed to challenge, motivate, and encourage students to explore new ways of responding to their courses. Wireless-enabled and open 24 × 7, the Grid boasts a range of technologies to facilitate student-led discussions, group problem solving, presentation development, and multimedia production. More>>

USC Confluence: A Campus-Wide Academic Wiki, October 2006

The University of Southern California's Center for Scholarly Technology (CST) launched Confluence, a pilot campus-wide wiki service, to facilitate collaborative learning activities. USC found that the wiki flexibly combines features of an e-portfolio system, a content management system, and a blog, while also supporting collaborative knowledge construction. The pilot wiki supports over 35 course projects, reaching several thousand students. More>>

Polaris: An Online Portfolio System for Undergraduate Engineering Students, September 2006

Polaris is an in-house e-portfolio system for engineering students developed by The University of Texas at Austin's College of Engineering. Distinguished from other e-portfolio systems by being tailored to the specific needs of engineering undergraduates, it incorporates special exercises designed to help them reflect on the relevance of their academic experiences to their evolving sense of themselves as engineers. More>>

Mekong e-Sim: A Cross-Disciplinary Online Role-Play Simulation, August 2006

Primarily developed by Australia's University of Adelaide and University of Technology, Sydney, the Mekong e-Sim is an online learning environment that immerses students in the complexities of authentic decision making, helping them develop the communication, collaboration, and leadership skills they will need for future success. More>>

The Open Learning Initiative, Carnegie Mellon University, July 2006

The Open Learning Initiative develops and makes freely available a variety of stand-alone online courses designed to present the kind of dynamic, flexible, and responsive instruction available to students in small group settings. The courses are informed by cognitive research on beginning students and by ongoing, systematic course evaluations. More>>

Ancient Spaces, The University of British Columbia, June 2006

Students learn about antiquity by using the Ancient Spaces application to build 3D virtual models based on architectural plans and the latest archaeological reports. Ancient Spaces involves undergraduates directly in the kinds of research required to reconstruct sites. It also encourages cross-disciplinary collaboration and communication with cultures beyond the university. More>>

DukeCapture: Automated Classroom Lecture Recording, May 2006

Duke University is developing DukeCapture, an automatic lecture recording service. It will allow instructors to easily record audio, video, and visuals from a lecture, knowing that the files will be available online shortly after class. More>>

SciFair: Game Worlds for Learning, April 2006

Cornell's SciCentr is an online museum of virtual worlds that engages young people in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Its SciFair program helps students build virtual worlds and thus learn new ways of developing and sharing knowledge. More>>

DRE at Purdue: A Distributed Rendering Environment for Teaching Animation and Scientific Visualization, March 2006

Purdue University's Distributed Rendering Environment (DRE) allows students to render 3D models and animations using grid computing. The DRE's long-term goal is to lower the threshold of entry into grid computing for students and faculty in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. More>>

Ubiquitous Presenter: Increasing Interaction in a Digital Lecturing Environment, February 2006

The Ubiquitous Presenter (UP) application enables instructors and students to annotate slides during a presentation, knowing that both sets of notes will be saved to the file and available online for access anytime, anywhere. It also allows instructors to increase student engagement by displaying students' slide notes in real time during the presentation. More>>

The Computing Center at Cox Hall, Emory University, January 2006

In 2001, Emory University opened a student computing center designed to foster digital literacy and collaboration among students and faculty. The Cox Hall Computing Center reenvisions the traditional student computing lab as a creative, mixed-use facility. More>>

START: Student Technology Assessment, Resources, and Training, December 2005

DePauw University's Student Technology Assessment, Resources, and Training (START) Program is a technology assistance program for students staffed by students that serves as a replicable model for other liberal arts institutions. More>>

Online@UCF, October 2005

The University of Central Florida's Online@UCF initiative serves tens of thousands of students across Florida and engages 75 percent of UCF faculty. It offers 15 online degree programs, 10 online graduate certificate programs, approximately 1,300 fully online and blended courses, and hundreds of other courses that enhance face-to-face instruction with online resources. More>>

Instructional Development Initiative (IDI), October 2005

In 1993, Virginia Tech launched the Instructional Development Initiative (IDI), using technology to foster curricular and pedagogical innovation. IDI-related investments have led to a suite of nationally recognized, campus-wide professional programs for faculty and staff that provide a replicable model for other institutions. More>>

ITAP: Information Technology Associates Program, September 2005

DePauw University's Information Technology Associates Program (ITAP) is a selective, four-year honors program that allows students to develop advanced skills in a wide range of information technologies. Because students participate in ITAP for their full college careers, the university is able to draw on a reliable pool of talented, well-trained, and affordable workers. More>>

Calibrated Peer Review: A Writing and Critical-Thinking Instructional Tool, September 2005

Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) is a Web-based program that allows instructors to incorporate frequent writing assignments into their courses without increasing their grading workload. UCLA hosts CPR and makes it available free to participating institutions, who receive technical assistance from the development team via e-mail and a listserv. More>>

SCALE-UP: Student-Centered Activities for Large Enrollment Undergraduate Programs, September 2005

The SCALE-UP Project provides an effective and affordable model for introducing hands-on, team-based learning into large-enrollment undergraduate courses. SCALE-UP's approach was first applied to introductory physics and chemistry courses at North Carolina State University in 1997. Since then, the model has been replicated at more than two dozen other institutions. More>>