Wednesday, November 10, 2004
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Continuing Coverage From the League for Innovation in the Community College's 2004 Conference on Information Technology
Tampa
Two State Leaders Discuss the Future of Technology at Community Colleges
The images were impressive -- an orange ball hurtled through space toward the viewer, then swung backward and popped through a blue ring; a car engine's pistons rose and plunged; complex renderings of brain scans and other medical images floated and rotated before viewers' eyes. Mr. Cundiff said a NASA study had found that students who see 3-D images of what they're learning about absorb information 11 percent faster and retain it 40 percent more accurately than they would otherwise. Rather than an illustration, he said, a projection becomes an "experience," which "bypasses short-term memory and goes to long-term memory." "Your mind accepts this as real," Mr. Cundiff said. When he failed to get a response from his crowd, though, he half-joked: "This is pretty revolutionary, people -- you're supposed to be oohing and ahhing." After the demonstration, several participants stuck around to find out more about the company's products. One was Larry LaClair, manager of the private-security training program at Miami Dade College's North Campus. "I'm very impressed," he said. "The 3-D thing makes it personal, instead of just sitting there watching a video tape." The company's officials say they are working with eight community colleges that plan to create visual models using the company's system. -- J.R.Y. What's in a Name? Instructors of 'Hybrid' Courses Consider NOVEMBER 9, 4:30 P.M. -- What should colleges call courses that combine classroom instruction with online or distance learning? Georgia Perimeter College, like many other institutions, calls them "hybrid classes." Three professors from the college, which is outside Atlanta, led a session here during which they offered advice about teaching such classes. But a faculty member who attended the session said his institution calls the courses "blended classes." "I like that better," said Lee Jones, an associate professor of humanities at Georgia Perimeter. "Hybrid" implies the course is some kind of "weird mongrel," he added. -- A.L.F. More and More Essays Graded by Computer NOVEMBER 9, 12:30 P.M. -- When students begin studying at the University of Houston's downtown campus, they must take standardized tests to determine whether they'll be in remedial or regular English classes. In the past, two humans graded the essay portion of each test, but now a machine grades the essays, assigning scores of 1 to 8. The automated grading service is provided for a fee by the College Board, which also administers the standardized test, called Accuplacer. But before the university started using the service, its English professors had to be persuaded that robots could handle the grading. So Gary Greer, an assistant dean at the university, put the automated graders to the test. He ran 112 exams from entering students through both the human and automated grading systems, and then he compared the scores. In 60 percent of the cases, the scores were identical. On the rest, the scores differed by 1 or 2 points, with about half of the tests getting higher scores from the computer than from the humans, and half getting higher scores from the humans than from the computer. At a session here, Mr. Greer said he saw the results as proving that the system works. But one audience member pointed out that a 2-point difference in a test graded on a 1-to-8 scale is "significant." Mr. Greer responded that a professor who feels the computer may have goofed can request that humans grade any student's essay, although that has only happened a few times. And, he said, even the human graders sometimes grade the same test differently. Sandra Holst, an Accuplacer director at the College Board, also defended the automatic grading system during the presentation. "Human graders get fatigue," or they might have personal problems that make their work inconsistent, she said. But the computerized grading system "doesn't get tired" and "has no issues, no personal problems." Andrea Sanders, who teaches writing at Chattanooga State Technical Community College, said she was "open minded" about the use of automatic essay grading. But she said most of her colleagues were not. If her college turned to robot graders, she said, "I think it would cause a huge furor." She said that in some cases, automated grading could be appropriate, and that it could even be used in courses, rather than just in standardized exams. "It wouldn't be the only way I grade," she said, but it could allow students to get more feedback without burning out their professors. "I'm just trying to relieve the workload," Ms. Sanders said. -- J.R.Y. Bunker Hill Community College Goes Where the Students Are NOVEMBER 9, 11:30 A.M. -- To increase enrollment, community-college instructors and administrators might want to consider taking their classes to their students. Janice M. Bonanno, dean of student affairs at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston, said the college teaches some classes at Villa Victoria, a low-income-housing project in Boston's South End. The goal is to get young adults there interested in Bunker Hill's offerings. Villa Victoria, Ms. Bonanno said, has many Spanish-speaking residents. Many are immigrants or first-generation Americans who never imagined they could pursue college educations and are unfamiliar with computers. Some had never heard of Bunker Hill, even though the college is less than five miles away, she said. But after the manager of Villa Victoria, Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción, raised money to build a technology center and a classroom at the development, Bunker Hill instructors began going to Villa Victoria to teach residents about computers, including how to use e-mail and the Web. The college helped pay for the program with a $350,000 grant from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education, which is administered by the U.S. Department of Education. The three-year grant runs through the end of 2006. Ms. Bonanno said the program, called the Pathway Technology Campus, has been a success, inspiring many Villa Victoria residents to take classes at Bunker Hill's main campus. -- A.L.F. Planning Can Help Make Smart Classrooms More Affordable NOVEMBER 9, 8 A.M. -- Smart classrooms -- as technology-infused teaching spaces are often called -- don't come cheap. And more and more faculty members are calling for them. What's a college to do? Bob Cunningham, director of academic services at Monroe Community College, in Rochester, N.Y., and Donna Pogroszewski, Monroe's director of communication and network services, outlined the college's strategy for smartening up classrooms affordably. For one thing, don't overdo it, said Mr. Cunningham. Think strategically about which rooms to equip, and with how much gear. "Everybody wants a smart classroom, but we have to be really, really honest about how much faculty use them," said Mr. Cunningham. "You don't want to overbuild these things because Joe has this great thing he wants to show once during the semester." And don't forget maintenance costs. Just replacing a bulb on a computer projector can cost $400 to $500. At Monroe, officials usually replace the computers in smart classrooms every two to three years, and replace the projectors every four or five years. Meanwhile, come up with a few basic standardizations for smart classrooms, so that many rooms are equipped with identical equipment, the presenters said. That can help colleges save money by buying in bulk, and gives professors a consistent set of tools so they don't have to learn new tricks for each room. And don't go buying every new toy possible -- look for cutting-edge approaches that are affordable. "Bleeding edge," said Mr. Cunningham, "will kill your budget" -- J.R.Y. New Program Teaches Faculty Members to Train Cyber-Security Experts NOVEMBER 9, 8 A.M. -- Community colleges have a central role to play in training people to become cyber-security experts who can assist businesses and governments in fighting computer crime, according to three faculty members. The three men run a program that helps community colleges develop cyber-security curricula, and that also trains faculty members to teach classes in network security. The program is called the Center for Systems Security and Information Assurance. It is based at Moraine Valley Community College, in Palos Hills, Ill., but works in cooperation with several other community colleges in the Great Lakes region. Two of the faculty members, Erich Spengler and John Sands, teach at Moraine Valley. The third, James Lewis, teaches at Washtenaw Community College, in Ann Arbor, Mich. Mr. Spengler is the center's director. The center was started last year with a $3-million, four-year grant from the National Science Foundation, Mr. Spengler told community-college instructors and administrators here. Faculty members who want to learn more about cyber-security can attend the center's summer classes, which run from June to August. Tuition and fees are waived. -- A.L.F. Professor Mixes Poetry and Computers in an Assignment That Inspires Passion NOVEMBER 8, 8 P.M. -- To many people, poetry and computers seem incompatible. But not to Joseph Ugoretz, an associate professor of English at the Borough of Manhattan Community College.
One of his students developed PowerPoint slides and a soundtrack around the poem "Tomorrow," by the late Tupac Shakur, a rap artist. The work begins with an image of Malcolm X above the text of the poem's first line -- "Today is filled with anger." Succeeding slides depict images of other political and revolutionary leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr., above successive lines of the poem. Though the assignment was for extra credit, the students embraced it enthusiastically, said Mr. Ugoretz. They stayed up late and worked on weekends. One student even removed a splint from his broken finger to complete the project, said Mr. Ugoretz. Students viewed each others' artistry on the last day of class. Mr. Ugoretz told a roundtable session of faculty members here that the project helped students gain a deeper understanding of poetry. Students annotated many of their interpretations, explaining why they chose the images they did and how the images are linked to the poems. Mr. Ugoretz wants to encourage other community-college faculty members to develop similar poetry projects. "Teachers are often afraid of technology," he said. "But this is more interpretation and analysis." -- A.L.F. Instructors Describe the Pros and Cons of Tablets NOVEMBER 8, 2:30 P.M. -- The tablet PC is the coolest gadget to have in the classroom this year, at least judging from several well-attended sessions here on how to use the devices in teaching.
Julie Schneider, an instructor of computer technology at Red Rocks Community College, led a round-table discussion at which she showed off her small electronic tablet, made by Hewlett Packard. "As long as you have a projector, you can have it be your whiteboard," Ms. Schneider said of her machine. "Use your stylus as if it was your marker." Instructors here say the biggest value of the technology is that it allows them to roam, instead of having to stand at a fixed computer to give a PowerPoint presentation. "It gives you the freedom to walk around the classroom," said Bonnie Smith, an instructor at Lakeshore Technical College, who said she thinks the devices will take off in the next few years. Keith Ellis, an educational-technology coordinator and chemistry instructor at Douglas College, in Canada, said he uses his tablet both to lecture and to communicate with students. When students ask him questions by e-mail about concepts, he said, he often draws pictures or equations on his Tablet PC and e-mails the images with his answers. But the technology is still new, and not all the kinks have been worked out. Shane Graham, a computer information specialist at St. Petersburg College, encountered several glitches during a presentation about Tablet PC's, including having to restart one application several times before a video clip would play. And some models lack a fan, so they can get too hot to handle -- though one instructor noted that those models are good to cling to in a cold classroom. -- J.R.Y. High-Definition Television? It's Coming Sooner Than You Think NOVEMBER 8, 2:30 P.M. -- How many televisions, video cameras, VCR's, and video cassettes does your college own? Someone on the campus should try to figure that out, said Sharon Wyly, program director for digital-media technology at Valencia Community College, because they'll need to be replaced with new high-definition television devices -- and sooner, rather than later. Starting in 2006, all U.S. broadcast television networks must switch to HDTV format. While that might not have an immediate impact on most colleges -- unless they run broadcast-television operations -- it will put pressure on them to convert, as many manufacturers of equipment and programming will probably abandon current formats. "In another three years you probably won't be able to buy VHS machines" to replace those that break, said Ms. Wyly, who led a roundtable discussion here entitled "The Monster in the Closet: Preparing for High-Definition Television." She compared the changeover to the switch automobile manufacturers made from leaded to unleaded gasoline, after which leaded gasoline disappeared from fuel pumps fairly quickly. But she said most institutions do not even have inventories of where existing video equipment is kept -- some in audio-video service departments, some in speech and language departments, some in broadcasting departments, and more. "The problem is there are pockets of this all over our campuses," she said. "We have to really start ferreting out all of these places where the technologies are living." The change to HDTV will benefit colleges, participants in the discussion said. One official said that the crisper HDTV picture will improve teaching by allowing more accurate representations of scientific and other images. -- J.R.Y. To Profit From Technology, Professors Must Rethink Courses NOVEMBER 7, 11 P.M. -- Technology can help colleges make teaching more effective and cheaper, but only if professors are willing to completely rethink the way courses are delivered, according to Carol A. Twigg, executive director of the Center for Academic Transformation at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. In a keynote speech to kick off the annual technology conference of the League for Innovation in the Community College, Ms. Twigg challenged institutions to be more strategic about using professors' time. Just as a senior partner at a law firm leaves legal research to paralegals and other assistants, professors should be able to delegate activities like grading assignments and answering basic questions about homework to automated systems or assistants. And colleges should embrace hybrid models that replace some in-class time with online activities, she added. Ms. Twigg said the problem with many colleges' experiments with technology is that they try to replicate traditional teaching methods using technology, resulting in instruction of a similar quality at a higher price. "We've essentially bolted on the technology," she said. She compared the situation to the early days of banks' using automatic-teller machines. The first such machines were placed inside banks and only available during regular banking hours, she said. The real revolution in access did not come until ATM's moved to new locations, like convenience stores and mall food courts. Over the past five years, her center has worked with 30 colleges to redesign large courses in popular subjects so that they incorporate technology. She said the efforts had reduced costs by about 40 percent on average, yielding a collective savings of about $3.1-million. Details about the project are available at the center's Web site. More than 3,000 participants from 45 U.S. states and 10 countries have gathered here this week for the conference, which is in its 20th year. -- J.R.Y. The Professor With a Virtual Doppelgänger NOVEMBER 7, 7 P.M. -- Ken Baker, an associate professor of business and information systems at Sinclair Community College, now has a virtual double who has taken over his least-favorite aspects of teaching online.
Mr. Baker has recorded a set of audio clips for his double, and Virtual Ken comes to life while delivering the messages at predetermined points throughout the semester. "My mouth moves and my head tilts and that kind of thing," says Mr. Baker of his cyber self, adding that Virtual Ken is designed to give students more feedback and make them feel more engaged in the course. "At least they get to see my face, they get to see me talking and have the sense that I'm actually there with them helping them through the steps." A text-only version of the virtual assistant can answer frequently-asked questions on demand.
Cheryl Reindl-Johnson, chairwoman of the college's business-information-systems department, was the force behind the virtual-double idea. She says retention in online courses at Sinclair is 10 percent lower than in traditional courses. The three -- Mr. Baker, Ms. Reindl-Johnson, and Virtual Ken -- gave a presentation here about the promise of the technology. So far, they said, Virtual Ken has increased retention. While three students dropped a class delivered without Virtual Ken last quarter, only one dropped a class with the cyber assistant. But not everyone at the community college is a fan, says Ms. Reindl-Johnson. "One of our colleagues calls him Evil Ken, because it kinds of freaks her out." -- J.R.Y. Making It Hard to Plagiarize in an Era of Cutting and Pasting NOVEMBER 7, 7 P.M. -- Electronic resources and search engines like Google make it easy -- very easy -- for students to plagiarize. Cut here, paste there, and a passage from someone else's book or paper looks like it's your own. But two college librarians in Florida say faculty members can develop class assignments in a way that will reduce the chance that students will plagiarize. Carla Levesque, a librarian at Miami Dade College's Medical Center campus, and Janice Hall, the head librarian at the Clearwater campus of St. Petersburg College, offered their tips at a Sunday afternoon session on plagiarism. The librarians said faculty members should create assignments that have local angles. Don't just ask students to write about teen pregnancy -- ask them to write about teen pregnancy in your own community, said Ms. Levesque. It's difficult, if not impossible, for students to find previously written papers on local topics. And when students turn in their papers, require them to document the materials and sources they used -- for instance, by submitting photocopies of title pages of books they consulted. Students find it extremely difficult to locate sources for papers they have acquired online, the librarians said. Also, tell students they must use certain types of materials when doing their research. And ask them to turn in outlines of their papers, or a brief synopsis of what they plan to write about. Other possibilities include requiring students to talk about their papers in front of the class, perhaps even submitting to classmates' questions. Faculty members should also try completing assignments themselves. The librarians said students are more likely to plagiarize if they are unclear about how to proceed with the assignment or about what the faculty member is looking for. Ms. Hall said St. Petersburg also relies on Turnitin.com, a service that colleges can use to detect whether students' papers have been plagiarized. Papers submitted to the service are checked against a huge database of manuscripts, books, journals, and Web sites. Phrases that are suspiciously similar to those found in other sources are underlined for professors to consider individually. But Ms. Hall said she found the service most useful for educating students about what plagiarism is. Many students are not used to paraphrasing others' thoughts, she said. They copy what others have written into their papers but fail to cite the sources of the material. When students are baffled as to why Turnitin.com has flagged passages as unoriginal, faculty members can explain what it means to state ideas in their own words. "What I like most about Turnitin.com is the teaching function," said Ms. Hall. Between October 2003 and last month, 123 St. Petersburg instructors who used Turnitin.com frequently spotted unoriginal material, said Ms. Hall. Of the 2,610 students papers submitted to the service, 56 papers were between 75 percent and 100 percent plagiarized, she said. -- A.L.F. |
Copyright © 2004 by The Chronicle of Higher Education