CAUSE/EFFECT

This article was published in CAUSE/EFFECT journal, Volume 21 Number 4 1998. The copyright is shared by EDUCAUSE and the author. See http://www.educause.edu/copyright for additional copyright information.

Readers Respond

Question:

Has your central IT organization established a partnership with your institution's Faculty Development/Excellence program to support the development of skills related to using technology in teaching and learning? Please describe briefly your collaborative activities and provide URLs for any related Web sites or documents.

Georgia Tech's Office of Information Technology is a key partner in faculty development efforts at Georgia Tech. We created an Educational Technologies Directorate three years ago to serve as the technology advocate for the academic faculty. The Directorate has since spearheaded development of a campus Teaching, Learning and Technology Roundtable; an Instructional Support Services group within the Directorate that employs instructional designers to provide training, pedagogical expertise, and consulting services for faculty projects; a Development Center that provides the personnel and systems support necessary for project development; and a Grant Program that provides development support and project management services for faculty projects rather than direct dollar funding.

Our success in this partnership comes from (1) having voiced and gained support for a clear, coordinated vision of the instructional needs of the campus, (2) making it clear we do not own any programs we create but are simply the coordinators for the campus effort, (3) developing our initiatives through collaboration and cooperation with other campus organizations, (4) having the Direc-torate headed by a former faculty member who brings peer credibility and real-world application to the position, and (5) earning credibility through one-on-one interaction with individual faculty members, not by administrative mandate. For more information, see our Educational Technologies Web site at http://edtech.gatech.edu/; our Instructional Support Services site at http://edtech.gatech.edu/iss/; and our Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning at http://edtech.gatech.edu/cetl/.

Gordon D. Wishon
Associate Vice President and Associate Vice Provost for Information Technology
[email protected]

 

At Bethel College in St. Paul, Minnesota, our director of Academic Computing and Network Services (ACNS) has worked with the Faculty Development Coordinator to offer faculty training on Web Course in a Box during the past summer. The head of ACNS co-chairs the local Teaching, Learning, and Technology Roundtable (TLTR). Both the head of ACNS and the Faculty Development Coordinator collaborated on a $20K planning grant request within the last month, seeking a $250K grant for a 3-year ongoing training program. The Web site for the Web Course in a Box is http://www.bethel.edu/wcb/. The TLTR has been the primary means of "partnering." Through it, we will have four faculty with two-course release time during the next year to mentor other faculty in their areas.

Rich Sherry
Dean of Faculty Growth and Assessment
[email protected]

 

Case Western Reserve University has started such a process. We have started a discussion amongst the members of the library, the University's IT support staff, and UCITE (which is the faculty-run University Center for Innovations in Teaching and Education). I am the person from UCITE on this committee and currently we have planned a series of 2-hour sessions for faculty addressing some of the key issues involved in using technology in teaching. The goal of each session is for the participating faculty member to have concrete success with setting up some aspect of technology (creating a course Web page, setting up and monitoring a bulletin board, managing e-mail, etc.) at varying levels of difficulty so that an individual faculty member can start at whatever level comfortable to him/her and slowly acquire more and more skills as s/he gets "hooked" on the benefits of using this resource. UCITE's involvement is to try and ensure that pedagogical issues involving best teaching practices drive the selection and use of technology, and not to let the technology become a gee-whiz end in itself!

Mano Singham
Associate Director, UCITE Office
[email protected]

 

I'd like to reverse the wording on [your question]. Have the Faculty Development folks formed a partnership with IT? Do faculty "own" the importance of developing their technology skills, or must IT always be "pushing" this? What difference does it make to the success of this partnership when it is initiated by faculty rather than being initiated by IT?

Anna Kircher
Director, Computing and Communications
The Evergreen State College
[email protected]

 

At Michigan Technological University, IT works closely with the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Faculty Development offering seminars and discussion forums to achieve our shared goal of educating faculty on the use of technology in instruction. The key to making our collaboration effective grew out of our

To initiate our collaboration, the Center sent two department and one IT staff members to a national seminar on starting a Teaching, Learning, and Technology Roundtable. We had our first campuswide meeting of our TLTR during the first week in November. In addition to this initiative, staff from the Center and IT have team-taught two series of workshops on using Web software, e-mail lists, and threaded discussion groups.

For more information, review the Center's page at http://www.admin.mtu.edu/ctlfd/, Distributed Computing Services page at http://www.it.mtu.edu/dcs, and our Teaching and Learning with Technology page (under construction) at http://www.tltr.mtu.edu.

Ann West
Manager, Distributed Computing Services
[email protected]

 

The University of Wisconsin-Superior has taken powerful action to establish a partnership between IT and Faculty Development and Excellence. UW-Superior has dedicated the yearly system funds coming to this campus for curricular redesign to the establishment and staffing of a Faculty Development Center. The Faculty Development Specialist hired to direct the Faculty Development Center serves as one of five member/directors of the campus Information and Instructional Technologies Center. The other directors of the IITC are the director of Academic Computing, the director of Administrative Computing, director of the Library and the director of Media Services. The IITC directors, in collaboration with the vice chancellor, address the opportunities and challenges related to information and instructional technology at UW-Superior. Placing the Faculty Development Center director at the IITC table has created a powerful partnership that facilitates the conversations that are so vital to support the development of skills related to using technology in teaching and learning. This insightful organization of the IITC ensures that the voices (and the needs) of the faculty, as well as teaching and learning concerns, are brought to the technology table.

M. Kayt Sunwood
Faculty Development Specialist
[email protected]

 

Faculty development is a core function of our Center for Instructional Development & Distance Education (CIDDE) at the University of Pittsburgh. This Center includes instructional designers, instructional computing specialists, graphics designers, video producers, and others who assist faculty with a wide variety of instructional enhancement projects, many of which involve technology. Our unit works in close partnership with the University's Computing and Information Services (CIS) unit to ensure appropriate support for instructional initiatives. A current project, for example, involves adoption and training for course management software adopted by the University, CourseInfo. The software was selected by a committee involving faculty, library, CIDDE and CIS representatives. These units cooperated in the design and delivery of faculty training, as well as student and faculty support services. We've collaborated in the evaluation of the project, too, drawing in a University measurement and evaluation specialist. The project has been a great success, and we're convinced this could not have happened without partnership among these critical University service units.

You also may be interested to know that the University of Pittsburgh has formed a "Learning Technology Consortium" with the following institutions: University of Delaware, University of Florida, University of Georgia, Indiana University, Notre Dame, Virginia Tech, and Wake Forest. Faculty development is one of several major issues identified for collaboration in our recent (November) meeting.

I shall be happy to provide any additional information you may request. We have recently clarified our overall philosophy and strategies for faculty development, a function which I'm sure you know presents special challenges at the research university. Our recent experiences suggest that the changes we've made are positive, and expanding the scope of potential faculty development services has been a major factor.

For more on CIDDE, see http://www.pitt.edu/~ciddeweb/. This address will allow easy access to the University home pages and our CIS and Library units.

Diane J. Davis
Director, CIDDE
[email protected]

 

Here at University of Delaware, we have partnerships with the Center for Teaching Effectiveness, the Library, the School of Education, and more recently with the Institute for Transforming Undergraduate Education. (See http://udel.edu/~leila/UDfacdev.html for a summary of our efforts in faculty development; this site includes links to a number of other resources.) The nature of the collaboration varies from formalized joint efforts such as the Faculty Institutes to informal participation in each others' programs. I believe that there is a history and culture of collaborating on our campus that enhances these efforts. We also do joint consulting and joint review of various tools for faculty such as our "syllabus template."

Janet de Vry
Manager, Information Technologies/User Services
[email protected]

Leila Lyons
Director, User Services
[email protected]

 

At the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis Center for Teaching & Learning, Office of Faculty and Senior Staff Development, we are situated on the ground floor of the main University Library, at the geographical center (heart) of a thirty-year-old urban campus. The Center opened in November 1994 dedicated to the professional development of IUPUI faculty. The Center exists to provide faculty with assistance in their quest for self-improvement. It is designed to provide an opportunity to explore new avenues of teaching; develop new courses or redesign existing ones; test new methods and delivery systems; create new ways to utilize technology to enrich teaching, research, and service; and encourage discussion and sharing of these methodologies.

The Center came into being and continues today because of the cooperative efforts of the Executive Vice Chancellor, Dean of the Faculties, Associate Dean of the Faculties, Director of University Libraries, and Vice President of Information Technology/University Information Technology Services, as well as several faculty identified as "early adopters" of technology. Each unit contributed staff, space, financial support, or mentoring for other faculty, according to their abilities. A board of directors representing each of these constituencies functions to maintain the philosophy of the Center and to be certain that the full measure of its promise is reached. To learn more about our Center and to become acquainted with our variety of collaborative activities, please visit our Web site at http://www.center.iupui.edu/home.html.

Ann B. Kratz
Interim Director
IUPUI Center for Teaching & Learning
[email protected]

 

Louisiana State University's Division of Instructional Support and Development organizes four service programs into a single administrative unit for the support of teaching and learning. Integrated services are provided by the Division's Center for Faculty Development, Center for Instructional Technology, Center for Distance Education, and Measurement and Evaluation Center. This unified structure reflects the Division's holistic philosophy of instructional support, whereby the efforts of each area are actively supported by all others. This approach transcends shared administrative interests and involves active collaboration among the professional staff to bring resources, experience, skills, and expertise to bear on initiatives.

Dr. Joseph A. Hutchinson
Associate Executive Director
Division of Instructional Support and Development
[email protected]

 

At the University of Georgia, the Office of Instructional Support & Development (OISD, UGA's faculty development program) and University Computing & Networking Services (UCNS, the central IT organization) are jointly and centrally supporting WebCT, Web Course Tools. WebCT is Web-based course management software for faculty members who want to put their entire courses or just portions of these courses on the Web. The WebCT server and software are maintained by UCNS. Staff from OISD and UCNS have been working together since the spring of 1997 to give workshops and seminars on WebCT and related topics, such as the creation of Web pages. Faculty members can contact staff in either organization for questions about WebCT. More information about our two organizations and about WebCT at the University of Georgia can be found by going to the following URLs: http://webct.uga.edu/, http://www.uga.edu/~ucns; http://www.isd.uga.edu; and http://webct.uga.edu/hostsys/cumrec/cumred98.html.

Margaret S. Anderson
Assistant to the Director for Technology
Office of Instructional Support & Development
[email protected]

 

At Notre Dame, both the Office of Information Technology and the Teaching/Learning Center provide consultation for faculty about pedagogy and technology. Collaboration occurs in several ways: (1) constant sharing among consultants from both centers, and (2) a common workshop, "Teaching Well With Technology," offered to faculty periodically. At this workshop, faculty do not yet learn hands-on ways to use particular technologies; rather, they are led through a course-planning process in which they identify the learning goals for their courses, then review the literature on best teaching methods for higher education, then analyze the times and spaces available to them and their students for learning, then overview the ways in which various technologies can facilitate the best methods and/or extend and change the in-class and out-of-class times and spaces, then construct a course plan. This day-long workshop is followed by shorter workshops on specific technologies such as e-mail or presentation software. Our goal is that before they spend their time learning a particular technology, faculty will have considered their goals and best strategies and overviewed their technological options. Handout for the workshop is available at http://www.nd.edu/~edtech/twwt.html.

Barbara E. Walvoord
Director, Kaneb Center for Teaching and Learning
[email protected]

 

In August of 1998 Ohio University created the Center for Innovations in Technology for Learning to facilitate changing central IT support and faculty development needs. This unit is organizationally located under the Provost's Office to maximize its reach as a resource for the entire University community. Our activities include:

Ann Kovalchick, Ph.D.
Director, Center for Innovation in Technology for Learning
[email protected]

 

At the University of Arizona we have the Faculty Development Partnership, which was established in July of 1995. The founding members of the Partnership include the Center for Computing and Information Technology (CCIT), the University Library, the University Teaching Center, and the Treistman Fine Arts Center for New Media. We have since added VideoServices. The Partnership drafted a New Learning Technologies funding proposal which secured administrative support, was presented to the state legislature, and funded at $940K annually. We believe that by working together the Partnership has created a more robust and effective technology / pedagogy infrastructure than would exist if the units operated independently. An overview of accomplishments to date includes the creation of the Faculty Center for Instructional Innovation (located in CCIT), a Prototype Information Commons in the Library, workshops and consulting support for faculty, a "laptop program" for general education faculty, and a grants program for faculty. Our current Web page is at http://www.ltc.arizona.edu.

Karen Williams
Social Sciences Team Leader
University of Arizona Library
[email protected]

 

Faculty development has been Duquesne University's primary focus in the technology area for the past nine years and the results are truly exciting. Duquesne's Computing and Technology Services began a partnership with our Center for Teaching Excellence in the spring of 1990. Virtually all programs concerning the use of educational technology to enhance teaching and learning have been jointly developed and presented by these two units. Examples of some of these programs are satellite downlinks, Lunch Bytes sessions, Teaching with Technology Fairs, Summer Institutes on Teaching with Technology, half-day workshops following spring commencement, "Introduction to the Campus Computer Network" workshops for new faculty, and Teaching with Technology grants.

The Director of the Center for Teaching Excellence attends the biweekly meetings of the educational technology group to assure good communication between the two groups. Also, Duquesne's University Educational Technology Committee (similar to the AAHE Teaching, Learning, and Technology Roundtables) includes representatives from the computer center, library, teacher center, and each of the ten schools of the University.

The recently created Center for Academic Technology, which supports our distance learning programs, has joined the computer center and teaching center in faculty development efforts as well. The Center is teaching an online course for seventeen of our faculty (using FirstClass conferencing software). In this way, the faculty experience the role of learner while at the same time reflecting on the teaching/learning process and designing their own online course.

As a faculty developer, what I find fascinating about the use of technology to enhance teaching and learning is that it leads faculty to rethink the entire teaching/learning process. In both the study groups and the online course, faculty are rethinking the role of presentation (whether via lecture or text); considering small group work, simulations, case studies, etc.; and pondering how best to foster the deep learning of ideas and develop student thinking skills. Indeed, technology enables many pedagogical strategies that were impossible or impractical only a few years ago.

URLs for our programs include: http://www.duq.edu/Technology/SITT/; http://www.duq.edu/Technology/training/fa98LunchBytes.html; http://the-duke.duq-duke.duq.edu/etc/etc-hp.htm; and http://horizon.unc.edu/projects/monograph/CD/Instructional_Technology/Frayer.asp.

Dorothy Frayer
Associate Academic VP
[email protected]

 

I am responding as chair of the University of Wisconsin, Superior's campus Academic Computing Advisory Committee, a committee of our Faculty Senate's Academic Affairs Council. Our faculty feel very strongly that curriculum should drive the technology, not vice versa, and take a proactive approach to maintaining that technology is a very powerful and useful set of tools for instruction and learning.

Every department on campus was surveyed in person and asked "What services would you be interested in receiving from a faculty development person?" and "When you think of a 'Faculty Development Center,' what do you see?" The survey results were used to draft the position description of a Faculty Development Specialist and to shape a Faculty Development Center. We took special pains to hire into the position a person who is knowledgeable about instruction and learning as well as technology.

The faculty indicated preference for a unique Faculty Development Center where they can go to do more than just learn to use machines or specific software programs. The formerly established Center located in the library was created without input from the campus faculty, and they didn't use it for their "development" or curricular re-design because it did not meet their needs. We are working on cooperation from our central IT organization. The new Faculty Development Specialist meets regularly with the directors of AV, library, and academic computing, and these directors serve in an ex-officio capacity on our faculty technology committees.

S. D. Heide
Teacher Education Department
[email protected]

 

At the University of California, Los Angeles, support for innovation in instruction, faculty and graduate student development, instructional grants, and the use of media and technology in instruction have all been integrated in the Office of Instructional Development (http://www.oid.ucla.edu) for almost twenty years. The increased infusion of information technologies into the teaching and learning environment has been supported by an ongoing collaboration with the University Library (http://www.library.ucla.edu), the Office of Academic Computing (http://www.oac.ucla.edu), and distributed computing centers across UCLA (http://www.ucla.edu/campus/computing).

An active workgroup composed of representatives from these organizations undertakes projects of campus-wide impact. It has organized and co-instructed a faculty training institute. It sponsors a faculty forum series entitled "Scholarship in a New Media Environment: Issues and Trends" (http://www.oid.ucla.edu/sianme) which is attended by faculty, graduate students, librarians, and tech-nology support staff. These fora are videotaped for later viewing and are now also Webcast. The workgroup is currently developing a Web site on teaching with technology. The intent is to create a site which brings faculty together to discuss their experiences, in addition to providing a gateway to information about resources available, examples of teaching with technology, and training on tools.

OID is currently in the second year of a federally-funded (FIPSE) program (http://www.oid.ucla.edu/fipse) which offers advanced technology and pedagogy seminars taught at the departmental level by experienced teaching assistants who themselves first take a seminar taught by OID. This latest campus-wide collaboration also draws upon the expertise and support of departmental IT support staff and organizations represented in the workgroup.

Ruth Sabean
Assistant Director, OID
[email protected]

 

At George Mason in Fairfax, Virginia, the VP for Information Technology created a whole new unit-the Department of Instructional Improvement and Instructional Technologies (DoIIIT)-to join University Computing and Information Systems and University Libraries in supporting the technology needs of the University. Launched in July 1998, DoIIIT represents a unique collabora-tion inside and outside its own organization. DoIIIT (which includes GMU-TV, the faculty Instructional Resource Center (IRC), the Student Technology Assistance and Resource Center [STAR], and Classroom Technologies) provides facilities, training, and mentoring for both students and faculty to develop computer, multimedia/video, and Web skills for learning and teaching. DoIIIT's staff includes administrators, classified employees, faculty, and students, as well as two librarians shared with University Libraries. The IT Training Council, coordinated by DoIIIT, brings together training specialists from DoIIIT, UCIS, and the Library, as well as support specialists from individual schools and colleges in the University, to assess training needs, plan training events, and develop new training programs for faculty and students. DoIIIT and the Library are working collaboratively with the School of Information Technology and Engineering to develop an online learning module for information literacy skills to support Mason's Technology Across the Curriculum initiative (TAC). The TAC initiative itself is also a collaboration between DoIIIT and the College of Arts and Sciences to make sure that students in non-technology programs graduate with technology skills. More information about DoIIIT is available at www.doiiit.gmu.edu.

Dr. Anne Scrivener Agee
Executive Director, DoIIIT
[email protected]

 

At the University of Wisconsin-Platteville we formed a new unit, Training and Instruction Services, to address professional development needs of faculty and staff on this campus. We also offer computer training for students through this service. This unit, created over a year ago, consisted of four positions (we have since lost one) -- an instructional designer, a student trainer, a librarian, and a support position. We work as a team to plan, organize, and provide training, create courseware, and launch special projects. Two of the positions are funded by our Office of Information Technology (OIT) and two by the library. For years there has been talk of bringing the technology and library people together under one administrative head. This was the first attempt in this direction.

Training and Instruction Services currently offers a training schedule which changes monthly and incorporates classes/workshops on productivity tools, Internet applications, networks/systems, e-mail, multimedia tools, library resources and special topics, e.g. online learning. We recruit people from both the library and OIT to stretch the instruction. We also organize a Brown Bag series on an irregular basis. Here faculty shares innovative teaching strategies and creative integration of computer applications in an informal setting over lunch.

The Training/Instruction group is also involved in producing an online information literacy tutorial with animation, and state-of-art interactive components, loose supervision of the library instruction program, distance education support and high school outreach programs. We are working more closely with our Teaching Excellence Center (TEC) to organize an in-service for librarians (and possibly others across campus) this spring on best practices in teaching.

For more information, visit the Training and Instruction Web page at:

http://www.uwplatt.edu/~training/

The Teaching Excellence Center at:

http://www.uwplatt.edu/~tec/

The Office of Information Technology at:

http://www.uwplatt.edu/~oit/

Ulrike Dieterle
Training/Instruction Coordinator & Distance Education Librarian
[email protected]

 

At Indiana University's Bloomington campus, the Teaching & Learning Technologies Lab (TLTL) is a partnership focusing on instructional technologies, sponsored by the Office of Academic Affairs and the Office of the Vice President for Information Technology. TLTL provides a single point of access for faculty members and instructors who want to explore and develop uses of instructional computing and integrate technology-based instruction into their teaching. A team of consultants and developers from Instructional Support Services (ISS) and University Information Technology Services (UITS) staffs the facility. Over the past two summers, the TLTL coordinated a Teaching & Learning Technologies Conference and a series of Faculty Roundtable Discussions, Construction Workshops, and Technologies Project Demonstrations for faculty, instructors, and their departmental instructional support staff. These events endeavored to expose faculty to what others are actually doing with teaching and learning technologies, demonstrate the considerable talent and resources the campus is now directing toward instructional support, and introduce faculty to selected course-enhancing software that they can readily master themselves. In addition, ISS offers instructional development grants for the summer, awarded for the revision or creation of an undergraduate course to more actively engage students in learning. Many of these grants are awarded to faculty using instructional technologies creatively to support active learning strategies. For more information, see http://www.indiana.edu/~tltl/.

David Goodrum
Director, Instructional Support Services
[email protected]

 

At Boston College we are having remarkable success decentralizing faculty development, rather than pursuing university-wide centralized support and training. In an experiment a bit over a year old, BC hired a few technology specialists who were also familiar with the work of specific departments or schools and placed them within those departments as their exclusive responsibility. (For example, I taught high school English for 25 years and had become a school technology specialist. The BC School of Education hired me in this experiment to take charge of their issues of technology.)

The result has been such a high level of trust between the faculty and these narrowly placed experts that it has served to crystallize the level of suspicion faculty sometimes have for a pure techy coming to solve problems that may be academic, collegial, and intellectual in combination with the technological aspects. Faculty use of technology for research and in the classroom has increased at a rate far outstripping progress in previous years. (This has been particularly significant in the school of education, where faculty are expected to model classroom practices.) IT has been equally happy with the re-alignment, since IT now interacts with a technologically sophisticated representative who speaks their language and respects them.

As of this writing, the experiment is a declared success and the whole university will be organized according to this "local service center" model by January 1.

Robert Frank
Technology Manager, School of Education
[email protected]

 

At Buffalo State College, we recently completed our technology planning process, and one of the recommendations was to create the Faculty and Staff Technology (FAST) Development Center. FAST is an interdisciplinary unit designed to support faculty and staff in their use of information technology. The Center's main functions are to coordinate all technology training on campus, promote IT initiatives, and provide support through the FAST Project Development Team.

The Center is jointly funded through two vice presidents, Academic Affairs and Finance & Management. Personnel include two members from Computing Services (a programmer and the person who is currently coordinating software training), one member from Instructional Resources (graphic designer), a staff assistant, and a faculty intern (helps on curriculum issues). The center is located in the CyberQuad training facilities in the library. Representatives from the library and distance learning participate in weekly meetings. The interim director (myself) is the chair of the campus' Technology Council, and reports to both vice presidents.

The center held an open house in October, and was received with much enthusiasm. The Project Development Team received its first proposals (four) at the end of October, and is proceeding to work on them (most projects are directed at Web-based course development).

It's an exciting collaboration. The faculty and staff have expressed excitement about the center; the development team concept has rejuvenated the personnel involved; and the administration has shown strong support.

More information can be found at the Center's Web site at http://www.buffalostate.edu/~kimmarie/fast (it's a work in progress at this time).

Ted Schmidt
Interim Director, FAST Development Center
[email protected]

 

St. John's University IT department in conjunction with its Center for Teaching and Learning sponsors a Faculty Technology Consulting (FTC) group consisting of approximately twenty faculty members from several University colleges and disciplines. I am a co-coordinator of that group representing the IT department. The mission of the FTC is:

Specific goals and objectives are:

There are many actions and activities the FTC engages in to achieve these goals and objectives, too numerous to go into here. Please send e-mail if I can help.

Bob Barone
Manager, Professional Development and Training Centers
[email protected]

 

At Azusa Pacific University we have ongoing classes for faculty during the year on software that is supported by the University. In addition we put together an Academy of Instructional Technology with faculty teaching faculty. For further information, see last spring's Web site at http://www.apu.edu/~bsimmero/academy/Academy.htm.

Bruce D. Simmerok, Ph.D.
Director, Office of Faculty Development
[email protected]

 

At the College of Notre Dame of California, we outsource our IT organization; COLLEGIS runs our Office of Information Technology (OIT). We also have an "older" Faculty Development Committee. Because IT on the campus is a relatively new phenomenon, OIT and the Faculty Development Committee do not interface in any remarkable manner. IT faculty development is run by OIT for the most part with approval and direction of a Technology Advisory Council. The Council is made up of representatives from Graduate and Undergraduate Faculty, Administration, Senior Administration, and OIT. The Faculty Development Committee is doing very little with IT, and its tasks today vary little from what they were several years ago, before the advent of IT on our campus. We are currently involved in strategic planning and implementation efforts and there is a possibility that the relationship between the Faculty Development Committee and OIT may change. In any case, neither friction nor conflict appear to exist between the Committee and OIT.

Roger Goodson
Chair, Department of Business Administration
[email protected]

 

In response to your question about a partnership between central IT and Faculty Development, at Florida Memorial College we have a Director of Academic Computing who has been conducting twice weekly training sessions for the past year. The sessions are intended to help faculty develop skills related to using technology in the teaching and learning process. The training sessions have focused on the use of e-mail, Internet search engines, and the development of course materials for World Wide Web sites. Central IT is responsible for upkeep on the hardware and software, while Academic Computing is responsible for training.

Jesse Silverglate
Director Academic Computing
[email protected]

 

At Nova Southeastern University's Fischler Graduate School of Education and Human Services (FGSE), plans are nearing completion for the development of a media union or Technology Learning Center (TLC). The University library and the School's Technology Office have been meeting and planning for the past year to establish an integrated resource center where clients and students can locate, access, and use information that they need. In addition, facilities are provided for training in both credit and non-credit classes. Currently, the University's central Office of Information Technology (OIT) works with us to provide extensive staff and faculty training classes in the new facility.

We have an entire floor for technology and library resources. However, we made the decision to provide the resources in an electronic format where feasible. Therefore, the new facility will emphasize the use of computers spread throughout the floor instead of print materials. A limited number of reference books and periodicals will be maintained in hard copy but the emphasis will be on electronic searching and retrieval of information. A microlab facility of 16 machines will be located on the floor but integrated into the total facility in such a way that the computers will be available for general use any time classes are not being conducted. A formal training room of ten computers and a multimedia preparation and training area are provided in closed rooms for formal training when needed. Three small rooms are provided for small group meetings and where mediated presentations and projects can be worked on and locked up overnight so work can be carried on without being disturbed. New technologies will be provided in the facility as they become available. Wireless connections are being considered and two-way compressed video is a significant aspect of the facility. A Microsoft grant has made it possible to include a K-12 Teacher Software preview and training area for local teachers.

The University is currently carrying out a major renovation (over $1 million) in the main building at our North Miami Beach site to provide a "Teacher Universe" in cooperation with local businesses and the Broward and Dade County School Boards to provide teachers with free and inexpensive resource materials. The University will also provide training in the use of the donated materials and in the use of technology as an outgrowth of the Teacher Universe and Teacher Store.

Additional information may be located on the FGSE/NSU Web page at www.fcae.nova.edu or by sending me e-mail.

Al Mizell
Director of Technology
[email protected]

 

The University of Wisconsin, Racine Falls, Faculty/Staff Development Initiative has sponsored the following:

The UWRF Faculty/Staff Development Initiative funded summer grants for faculty (Summer 1998). Throughout the summer 8 faculty recipients of the grants worked in and out of the IDEA Center with support from my student staff and me. Throughout the summer we collaborated with experts from Television Services and with Information Services to better address the needs of the grant recipients. Projects had to be completed by August 25 and 26 for presentation at a Faculty institute. Recipients of grants had to agree to serve as campus consultants to fellow faculty. Faculty from Theater, Physics, English, Art, History and Biology were represented. Reactions of these first-time recipients and audiences were favorable.

Outcomes of relocation and grants:

There is a call for additional grant proposals for summer 1999.

The UWRF Faculty/Staff Development Initiative has a Web page at http://www.uwrf.edu/facdev/welcome.htm.

Karen Ryan
Director, Educational Technology Center
[email protected]

 

The University of Alberta, the second largest research university in Canada, has chosen a two-pronged approach to professional development of faculty with respect to instructional technology. This amounts to a change model which is an eclectic blend of top-down, bottom-up and middle-outward change strategies. The first approach is based on the idea that (1) the key problem to be overcome is implementing change in a constructive way, (2) a research university needs a strategic rather than opportunistic approach to IT, and (3) the University needs a leadership program based in departments which will enable (empower) faculty members to implement that strategic approach within their departments.

The Training, Infrastructure and Empowerment System (TIES) is a change model that was developed and is entering its second year of implementation at the University. The second approach is a technical support and production centre which uses trained support staff, secondments, etc. This facility is available to all members of the University community. Faculty members with development projects can access Academic Technologies for Learning (ATL) on either a short- or long-term basis to produce sophisticated multimedia course materials. For further information, see the following URLs: TIES Change Model (http://www.atl.ualberta.ca/papers/change/tie.html); TIES Training Modules (http://www.quasar.ualberta.ca/edmedia/TIES/Ties_home.html/); TIES First Year Report (http://www.quasar.ualberta.ca/edmedia/TIES_Report.html/); Alternative Technologies for Learning Production Studio (http://www.atl.ualberta.ca/). For more information about TIES, contact me; for information about ATL, contact Dr. Terry Anderson ([email protected]).

Michael Szabo
Director, TIES Project
Professor of Educational Psychology and Technology
[email protected]

 

Two and a half years ago, I merged my office at the University of California Irvine (which used to be called Instructional Development Services and served as the unit responsible for enhancing faculty and TA teaching) with our Media Services Center. The integration was precisely to bring technology and pedagogy closer together. Previously, although part of the same Division of Undergradu-ate Education, the units did not work together. We have since become the Instructional Resources Center. This merger has proven to be incredibly beneficial, to both the teaching and infomatics missions of the University.

Soon after the merger, the Dean of Undergraduate Education provided some funding and space for us to create the Instructional Technology and Faculty Resources Centers. We provide a 30-seat PC lab for instruction, a 20-seat Mac lab for student walk-in use, a 20-seat teleconferencing center, and a room filled with both human and materiel resources to teach faculty how to integrate technology and teaching. Last summer we held our first Faculty Summer Institute on Instructional Technology. Geared specifically to novices, the week-long, hands-on Institute included a little bit about learning theory and a lot about the capabilities of the technology. In addition to peer demonstrations from other newly proficient faculty, the library, the Office of Academic Computing, and the Registrar's Office, faculty mostly approached the technology as a problem-based learning situation: why use technology in the classroom?

Treading lightly on overt presentations regarding learning theory proved to be an effective strategy with this particular audience. Their anxieties and their motivation were propelled by just learning the mechanics of the media available to them; theory was a distraction if too blatant. Instead, very practical questions arose in discussion that enabled me, as the faculty developer, to slip in questions and comments about how and why a technology might better serve student learning. Probably even more effective was the frank discussion from their peers of the imitations of the resources.

The evaluations of the program were far beyond our expectations. The one I value the most, however, was a spontaneous announcement from an engineering faculty member who, on the 4th day of the Institute, had an epiphany: "It's not really about the technology," he blurted, "it's really about teaching [students how to learn] and no one teaches us how to do that."

In the time since the merger, we have conducted numerous faculty and TA workshops on instructional technology, something neither unit, pre-merger, was doing. We have forged new and better relationships with other resource groups on campus, and gotten more financial support that might have gone elsewhere.

Nothing has been particularly easy, however. Combining what had been a traditional Media Services unit with a teaching one required more and different kinds of interactions with faculty for the technical staff. Our original plan to "teach teachers how to fish" has been slow to fruition; we find ourselves spending a great deal of time still in one-on-one consultation with faculty. And since I am the only full-time faculty developer at the University, my goal of infusing more pedagogically governed choices of technology into faculty consciousness is hampered by my inability to be in more than one place at a time.

Funding and just the day-to-day management and depreciation of equipment are also major challenges. The need for more cross training (including my own as I am probably the least technologically savvy person in the unit) means that people do more with less.

Still, the merger was the right thing to do. Staff continue to schlep overhead projectors to classes; we still order films and projectionists still show them; many faculty still insist on carting around their carousels of slides that they live in fear and dread of dropping. Some administrators continue to promote instructional technology as a means to teaching more bodies in remote locations, the primary focus being on teaching more not necessarily better. Others still feel that just by virtue of presenting information using multi-media students learn better.

De Gallow
Director, Instructional Resources Center
[email protected]

 

The University of Alaska Anchorage has moved decisively in the past two years to establish a cooperative model faculty development program in the use information technology to support teaching. Using a combination of grant, campus-level and college level funds, UAA has created two New Media Centers for faculty support of curriculum development (including a corps of IT students to provide technical support), used a contract with the Gartner Group to make electronic learning of IT available to all faculty and students, and provided training sessions for faculty in everything from the creation of Web pages and electronic slides to moving class materials into a distributed learning model. Last year we created a grant program, providing faculty with laptop computers, with a submission of a plan for incorporating technology into their teaching. This year, we are adding an innovation grant program to stimulate faculty and departments to submit proposals that would use IT to improve teaching.

Richard L. Ender
Associate Vice-Provost for Information Technology/Chief Information Officer
[email protected]

 

Miami University's (Oxford, Ohio) Computing and Information Services division encompasses a broad range of technology support services to address the instructional, research and administrative missions of Miami University. Formed in 1991 through a merger of the Computing Center, the Academic Computing Service and the Audio Visual Service, it was intended that the consolidated organization not simply bring together existing parallel support services, but that a new interrelationship be developed which would most effectively address the opportunities inherent in rapidly developing technologies.

Current organization of MCIS includes divisions of University Information Systems which addresses administrative computing systems; Technical Services responsible for centrally managed operations, network support, and computer maintenance and repair; Client Services encompassing training, desktop computing support, and the HelpDesk; and Applied Technologies which supports communications needs and academic technology applications. These applications include support of teaching, learning, and research, assistance with distributed learning pedagogy, design and use of technology-based facilities, classroom equipment and materials, assistance with course development and evaluation, and an array of communication services including campus photographic support, videography, graphic arts, and printing and copying support.

The services of Applied Technologies combine the applications component of the former Academic Computing Service with broad programs formally contained under the department of Audio Visual Services, established fifty years ago this year. The unique combination of computing support services with audio visual support services is a match which epitomizes the concept of multimedia technologies. This relationship enables the merging of computing technologies with photographic imagery, video and videodisk technologies, CD ROM, distance image transmission and digital design for the creation as well as the transmission of information. Miami's broad definition of consolidated technology services, which extend beyond computing, positions us to offer an efficient and effective mix of services as we redesign a support organization which will serve the campus well into the 21st century.

The Teaching Technologies Center, within the MCIS Applied Technologies unit, offers a wide range of support services which assist faculty in the integration of broad-based technologies into the curriculum. In conjunction with the goals of the Center, staff and facilities are extended to support the programs and activities of the OAST Director for Faculty Development in Learning Technologies. The Director is housed within the Center and uses the staff and resources of the Center to address faculty development needs. As a catalyst for integrating technologies into the curriculums, the Director coordinates supportive application of cooperative cross-functional project teams which include library personnel and divisional representatives along with TTC staff.

A program of class audit consultation is extended which teams staff with faculty in addressing technology implications for major or partial course development or revision. A Small Group Instructional Diagnosis program of course and faculty evaluation facilitates student feedback for course improvement. A wide variety of resource materials are available within the Center for enhancing curriculum integration of broad technologies. Assistance is available for Web page development and the design and development of multimedia course materials involving image scanning, CD ROM production, electronic slide and transparency conversion, and desktop presentation development.

The Center provides a catalyst for incorporating the talents of graphic artists, photographers, and videographers in meeting the resource design needs of faculty. Additionally, the expertise of instructional computing staff is available in defining technology solutions, and the support of classroom services staff is applied to assuring that delivery needs are met within teaching facilities. Seminars and workshops are offered to assist with presentation techniques and to share developing technologies, and the ClassAction newsletter is regularly published to convey technology application information to the faculty.

Selected Activities 1997-98:

Bill King
Director, MCIS Applied Technologies
[email protected]

 

The Teaching and Learning Resource Centre at Carleton University (Ottawa, Canada) has been responsible for both faculty development and IT support since its inception in the fall of 1992. In Steve Gilbert's parlance you could call our operation a TL&T Centre-with the emphasis on Teaching and Learning. Good use of technology is integrated into all our Faculty Development activities, including TA Training, the annual Teaching Expo, workshop and presentation programs throughout the year, the university TLTR (coordinated through our Centre), the training and development program for First Year Seminar Instructors. The Centre is housed in the Library and works closely with the Library although the two are not linked in any formal way.

We are in the process of developing a new structure which will bring together the Teaching and Learning Resource Centre, Instructional Media Services, Instructional Television and Classroom and Examination Services. This grouping will be known as Instructional Services. See http://www.carleton.ca/tlrc

Carole E. Dence
Director, Teaching and Learning Resource Centre
[email protected]

Next Readers Respond Question:

Has your institution developed a business continuity plan to address that Year 2000 challenges, not only with respect to systems solutions but also from the broader campus community perspective? Please describe your activities in this area and provide URLs for any relevant Web pages or documents your institution has developed.

Send your response via e-mail to Elizabeth Harris, CAUSE/EFFECT managing editor, [email protected].

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