Indiana University
Committee for Technology Review
Patty Mitchell
Paul Valdez
Melissa Vergara
Technology: Closing the Gap
• Our impetus for this committee presentation was to inform
ourselves as well as the faculty and administrators of the
Dean’s Council of five “hot topics” in campus technology to help
bridge the technology gap.
• The five topics are:
o Blogging
o Podcasts
o Adaptive Technology
o Integrated Information Systems
o Institutional Spam
Overview
• We will present each of these topics providing
o general information
o significance in higher education
o examples of these technologies in practice
o the issues involved with utility of the technology
• We will accomplish this through demonstrations of
the technology and through the use of hyperlinks to
direct your attention to quality examples of the
technology in action.
Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks, information
systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education, campus, students,
wireless devices, pods, higher education, campus, students, wireless devices,
pods, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks, information systems, computers,
mobile devices, higher education, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology,
RSS, networks, information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher
education, campus, students, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS,
networks, information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education,
campus, students, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks,
information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education, campus,
students, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks,
information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education, campus,
students, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks,
information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education, campus,
students, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks,
information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education, campus,
students, Blogs, social media, podcasting, technology, RSS, networks,
information systems, computers, mobile devices, higher education, campus, pods
Blogs
What is a Blog?
• “A blog is a user-generated website where entries
are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse
chronological order.”
• “Most blogs are primarily textual although some
focus on photographs (photoblog), sketchblog,
videos (vlog), or audio (podcasting), and are part of
a wider network of social media.”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
Blog is HOT!
• A Google search for blog reveals 1,090,000,000 hits. Likewise, a search
for George W. Bush reveals only 76,500,000 hits.
• A www.blogpulse.com search for Indiana University revealed 4,500+
messages posted about IU.
• The School of Education at IU maintains a blog to stay current on
instructional technology.
• In June 2003 the business community held the first international
conference on the business use of blogs (Williams & Jacobs, 2004).
• Other similar Big Ten institutions such as the University of Michigan have
made free blogs available to students, faculty, and staff.
General uses of the Blog
►Intranet
► Outreach
► Portfolio
► Recruiting
► Collaboration
► Communication
► Public Relations
► Course management
► Knowledge management
Source: Herzog, 2006
Other benefits of the Blog
• Can appeal to students in a more personal manner (Shupp, Prater, &
Dailey, 2006).
• A way to engage and connect Deaf students in and out of class (Read,
2006).
• Reflects the University’s technology prowess (Shupp et. al., 2006).
• Keeps the reader current on news in specific field (Herzog, 2006).
• Easy to create, publish, update, and collaborate, while being low
cost, and not requiring complicated software to implement and maintain
(Herzog, 2006).
• Williams & Jacobs (2004) concluded that, “Blogging has the potential to
be a transformational technology for teaching and learning.”
Blog use in Higher Education?
• Recruitment tool
• Alumni relations
• Collaboration internally/externally
• Monitor student culture
• Course management
• Reflection assignments
Blogging Exploration
• Here are some hyperlinks to current blogs and how
they are used:
o Drudge Report (Communication)
o Archinect (Information sharing, collaboration)
o Frosh Comp (Course management)
o Albion College Student Senate Blog
(Communication)
o MBA Admissions Blog (Outreach)
o Chronicle of Higher Education News Blog
(Communication)
Beware of the Blog
•
Legal implications mostly focus around confidentiality and defamation. Click
here for more detailed information about the legal implications.
•
When used in higher education uncontrolled user generated content will result in
greatest liability (Shupp et. al., 2006).
•
Constant monitoring is necessary (Shupp et. al., 2006).
•
Students or those targeted by blog may not have the patience to invest the time
needed to stay informed about the blog.
•
A blog can be a perfect distraction or procrastination tool for students, faculty, or
staff.
•
As a professional, a misguided blog can have negative implications for your
career (Drezner, 2006).
•
Blogs are dependant on the users that frequent them.
Podcasts
Picture retrieved from: http://campustechnology.com/article.asp?id=18001
What is a Podcast?
• Similar to a radio broadcasting, but are channeled through the
internet and specifically to a pod.
o Examples: iPod, personal computer, mobile phone
• Similar to blogs in accessibility and organization (chronological).
• Subscription podcasts rely on feed readers to constantly check
and update the consumer’s subscription with new content.
• Paid or unpaid subscriptions.
• Typically audio or visual, but can be images, pdf, text, or any file
type.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcasts
Podcasts are HOT!
• In 2004, Duke University started providing iPods for
every member of the freshman class.
• Frequent topic in student affair journals and
conferences.
• Recording artists have helped to popularize podcasts.
• Corporations like Macintosh and Microsoft also
popularize this social media.
General uses of a Podcast
• News updates
• Advertising
• Web seminars/web conferencing
• Tutorials
• Interviews
Image retrieved from: www.totalcatholic.com/podcast/index.html
Benefits of Podcasts
• Used at the leisure of the consumer.
– i.e. in transit, at the gym, when traveling
• Efficient and low cost way to present a message to a large
group of people (Fannin, n.d.).
• Relates well to millennial tech-savvy students.
• Infrastructure of computers (pods) is already in place at most
institutions of higher education.
• Foster connectedness between a group (Beldarrain, 2006).
• Can be as formal or informal as you desire.
• “Handled properly, a school's website, e-mail, RSS feeds
[podcasts], and even blogs can help streamline media
requests…” (Joly, 2007) .
Why use in Higher Education?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Lectures
Language teaching
Recruitment
Web instruction
Distance education
Marketing
Orientation programs
Radio broadcasting
2006)
Image retrieved from: ca.ucsc.edu/podcast/ (Blaisdel, 2006)
6)
Podcasts in Higher Education
• Advertising (i.e. monk-e-mail)
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology Orientation
• Perkins School of Theology Admissions
• English as a second language courses (ESL)
• Michigan State University campus radio
Drawbacks of Podcasts
• Time consuming if unfamiliar with application.
• Some contend that podcasts are not as helpful as perceived
(Holahan, 2006).
• Lack of administrative and technical support can cause
problems (Blaisdel, 2006).
• Be cautious of copyright infringement (Blaisdel, 2006).
• Quality is as good as you make it.
Want to know more?
• The University of Wisconsin-Madison offers this
service to create podcasts.
http://engage.doit.wisc.edu/podcasting/teachAndLearn/
Adaptive
Technology
Photo retrieved from: www.nanopac.com/Half%20Keyboard.htm
What is Adaptive Technology?
• Adaptive technology is a way to better serve persons
with disabilities who have:
o hearing
o learning
o or mobility impairments
Photo retrieved from: http://www.kingston.ac.uk/atrc/IMAGES/rv_image1.jpg
Why Adaptive Technology?
• Higher education is moving towards a direction of
advanced technology.
• It is important to understand how we can use
technology to better serve our students and
colleagues.
• Be inclusive: It is critical that faculty and practitioners
understand the impact these accommodations have
for the classroom environment when serving persons
with special needs.
Benefits of Adaptive Technology
• Inclusion in the classroom through information access
for all students.
• Being cutting edge on adaptive technology initiatives
for the individual student and the classroom
environment.
• Promote practical changes in the classroom and not
pedagogy (Lockyer & Bennett, 2006).
Examples of Adaptive Technology
• Hearing
o Video captioning: captions are added to videos when using
web sites.
• Remote transcription: a student who is deaf receives the
spoken part of a class by remote and the information is
transferred to a laptop.
• Software
o JAWS for Windows: helps low vision or blind users browse
the web, send and read e-mail, and create spreadsheets.
o Studio Recorder: records, edits, and produces spoken word
audio documents in an efficient manner.
Source: http://www.indiana.edu/~iuadapts/technology/
Learning and Physical
• Learning
Co-writer 2000: a type-and-speak writing assistant
with word prediction capabilities, designed to help
users write correct sentences with few keystrokes.
• Physical
Dragon NaturallySpeaking: a word processor
controlled by voice commands which limits the use of
hand, wrist, and finger movements.
Source: http://www.indiana.edu/~iuadapts/technology/
Emerging Adaptive Technology
•
Microsoft Vista
– As a Microsoft operating system computer user, Vista will be
standard operation in the near future.
Why it’s beneficial?
o Provides magnification for graphics (Williams,
2006).
o Individual can interact with computer by voice
(Williams, 2006).
o It is easy to access the information (Williams,
2006).
Image retrieved from: http://it.gizmodo.com/Microsoft%20Vista%20Soft%20Drink.bmp
Source: http://www.indiana.edu/~iuadapts/technology/
Problems with Adaptive Technology
• Initiatives are costly.
o Dragon NaturallySpeaking = $969
o Jaws for WINDOWS = $859
• More research and investigation is needed in this
area.
• Applies to only a specific population.
Source: http://www.indiana.edu/~iuadapts/technology/
SPAM!
Photo retrieved from: http://www.alaska.net/~royce/spam/spam-collection-2005-04.jpg
Spam: Impact on Campus
• Unsolicited emails (spam) have a negative impact on the
reliable delivery of academic, work, and personal email
messages.
– Examples of spam:
SALE
o Commercial advertisements
o Promotion of products and/or services
o Sexually explicit content
o Private, political, and nonprofit e-mail speech is not
considered spam (Wigen, 2004).
Impact continued…
• Spam threatens network security with hostile file attachments
and embedded codes.
o Jeopardizing email service trustworthiness.
o Creates rising costs on Internet users and providers.
o Burdens students, staff and faculty to identify unwanted
emails.
• Consumes Internet resources by using massive network
bandwidth.
o Mail takes longer to get where it’s going. Especially
LISTSERV mail.
o Causes “traffic jams” that delay delivery of important email
messages.
Spam: Keeping Safe
• New filtering systems on campus automatically delete
unwanted messages from “Spam” or “Junk E-mail” folders five
days after receiving them — freeing valuable mailbox space.
• Some people outside of campus may not receive email you
send them. This is because spammers send messages that use
the school’s domain in fake reply-to.
• Protect your email address.
• For more information visit: Campus Technology
Source: http://uitsnews.iu.edu/new/?p=656
Integrated
Information
Systems
Diagram retrieved from: www.segue.com/solutions/erp-crm/peoplesoft.asp
Integrated Information Systems
• Rising educational cost, fragmented data, competition for students, faculty,
administrators, and regulatory requirements are driving the demand for
accurate information (Oracle, 2006).
• Data is used as a tool for data reports, performance management,
supporting regulatory compliance requirements, and improve learning
outcomes.
o Enrollment Statistics.
o Retention and Graduation Rates.
o Ethnicity Classification.
o Grade Point Average Reports.
• The systems are designed to enable institutions to influence their student
enrollments (Hossler & Bean,1990).
Integrated Information Systems at Work
Faculty and staff can filter
applicant information by
academic plan, GRE’s and GPA.
In the end…
• We hope that you found these hot topics to be
interesting and worth further exploration.
• We suggest using this presentation and the
hyperlinks available to continue your learning
process at your leisure.
• Lastly, we thank you for your time and interest in
understanding how technology shapes the everchanging college environment.
References
Beldarrain, Y. (2006) Distance Education Trends: Integrating new technologies to foster new student interaction
and collaboration. Distance Education. 27(2), pp. 139-153.
Blaisdel, M. (2006) Special double feature! Academic MP3s: Is it iTime yet? Campus Technology. Retrieved on
February 13, 2007 from http://campustechnology.com/article.asp?id=18001
Blog. (n.d.) Retrieved on February 12, 2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
Drezner, D.W. (2006) Can blogging derail your career? The trouble with blogs. The Chronicle of Higher Education,
52(47), B7.
Fannin, B. (n.d.) Podcasting agriculture news. Retrieved on February 13, 2006 from
http://www.higheredblogcon.com/index.php/podcasting-agriculture-news/
Herzog, S. (2006) Blogging 101. Retrieved on February 12, 2007 from http://herzogs.wordpress.com/
Hossler, D., Bean, J.P., and Associates. The Strategic Management of College Enrollments. San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass Publishers. 1990.
Indiana University, University Information Technology Services, Retrieved: February 17, 2007 from
http://uitsnews.iu.edu/new/?p=656
Indiana University, University Information Technology Services Adaptive Technology Centers – IUB and IUPUI
Retrieved: February 13, 2007 from http://www.indiana.edu/~iuadapts/technology
Joly, K. (2007) PR on the web 101. University Business. Retrieved on February 13, 2007 from
http://www.universitybusiness.com/ViewArticle.aspx?articleid=679
Lockyer, L. & Bennett, S. (2006). Understanding roles within technology supported teaching and learning:
Implications for staff, academic units, and institutions. In J. O’Donoghue (Ed.), Technology supported learning
and teaching: A staff perspective (pp.210-223). Hershey, PA and London: Idea Group, Inc.
References continued…
Oracale. (2006). PeopleSoft Campus Solutions Warehouse For Higher Education. Retrieved February 10, 2007,
from Oracle Data Sheet: http://www.oracle.com/industries/education/peoplesoft-campus-solutions.pdf
Podcast. (n.d.) Retrieved on February 13, 2006 from
http://ucomm.iweb.bsu.edu/blogs/HighEdBlogCon/index_files/frame.htm
Read, B. (2006) Technology and influential blogs helped galvanize protests at Gallaudet. Chronicle of Higher
Education, 53(12), A40.
Schneider, R. (2006) Attack of the pod people. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 53(16), B5.
Shupp, H., Prater, N., Dailey, J.C. (2006). Case Study: Blogging and Podcasting for Student Recruitment.
Electronic source retrieved on February 12, 2007 from
http://ucomm.iweb.bsu.edu/blogs/HighEdBlogCon/index_files/frame.htm
Wigen, W. (2004, January/February). Educause Review. Retrieved February 13, 2007, from
www.educausereview.edu: http://www.educause.edu/apps/er/erm04/erm0417.asp
Williams, J. M. (2006). Microsoft’s Vista guarantees people with special needs access to
computers. EP Magazine, 36, (8), pp. 54-57.
Williams, J.B. & Jacobs, J. (2004). Exploring the use of blogs as learning spaces in the higher education sector.
Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 20(2), pp. 232-247.
Yap, R., Muirhead, B., Keefer, J. (2005) Blog RUBRIC: Designing your business blog. Retrieved on February 12,
2007 from http://www.itdl.org/Journal/Nov_05/article06.htm