Encouraging faculty to move to more active learning environments and to create course materials that
are appropriate to use in distance learning efforts of the university is the primary motivation for
the equipping of General Use Classrooms with technology. Renovation of the classrooms to achieve an
appropriate learning environment for the courses to meet there is also apart of these efforts. A
motivation is to encourage departments to release some of their classrooms to the pool of general
use classrooms to acquire the technology and the continual maintenance of that environment.
Yet another motivation is to upgrade rooms to allow the offering of distance degrees and in some
cases to assist with accreditation efforts of the discipline.
TEC's will be maintained at the supported level of software and hardware, secured, specially scheduled, checked everyday by technicians and supported by a "hot line for immediate assistance."
Those departments willing to make one of their classrooms into a high tech classroom under the management have to agree to make the classroom into a general use classroom. At times there is a period of time specified for the department to have exclusive access to the room until it can learn to use the equipment. This is often a period of 1 to 3 years.
Policy for technologically upgraded classrooms is provided in Appendix 2.
Committees
A Technical Classroom Committee (TCC) was established to help the Director of the iTAC and the Vice Provost for IT Services office with the design of the classrooms and to oversee the maintenance. Maintenance is daily and as needed as specified in the classroom logs. Upgrade of the software is done as appropriate and hardware is done approximately every 3 years. The committee consists of technical and administrative individuals.
A classroom SWAT is designated for each classroom designed. This SWAT is formed with co chairs, one from the TCC and the other from one of the department faculties that use the room. The committee is generally balanced in numbers of members from the faculties and the TCC. The SWAT serves through the design process and implementation and for another year to assure the classroom functions as desired.
Selection
The selection of classrooms to be renovated is a process involving consideration of a number of factors: Need to improve a course or set of courses, whether it is a large general use classroom, need to allow a new degree to be created, whether it has been requested and finally if there is need for that size of classroom. Funding uncertainty often finds the committee in a position of designing a classroom prior to the acquisition of funding for it. The Provost and Vice Provost for IT Services do selection of classrooms to be designed and subsequently those to be implemented taking into consideration the recommendations of the Deans, TCC, iTAC, student and at times faculty committees like FSCOT.
Design
Members of the classroom committee (both facilities and computing) toured several universities including Renssaeler, Notre Dame, Michigan and Harvard before the classroom design project began. Plans were obtained from Harvard. Since then many others efforts have been reviewed. The members of the classroom committee each have a design specialty and are asked to use those skills as appropriate in the design process.
If renovation is required the Vice Provost for IT Services and Provost work with the VPAF to find funds for the physical renovation. Estimates for this phase are provided by Facilities.
The director of the iTAC is the Vice Provost for IT Services' representative on the TCC and assists the Vice Provost for IT Services in the management of the design and implementation process.
Maintenance
The maintenance of these classrooms is paramount. The guideline now is that daily maintenance is to be done on every classroom assuring that the hardware and software are in working order. The bulbs are replaced at about 95% estimated life. For all common core facility software is maintained at the level of the supported level of software on campus and hardware is replaced to assure it is an acceptable working order. The commodity computers are replaced optimally every 3 years.
A team maintains these classrooms under the direction of the iTAC. The CTS unit that maintains hardware is currently doing the daily maintenance with the hope that once the mainframe is retired the operations staff will take on this task as part of the Network Operations Center. The office of the Associate Provost manages the money available for maintenance.
Assistance to faculty in curriculum design and training is also the responsibility of the iTAC.
The Help Desk of the iTAC and the team from CTS provide immediate assistance to faculty during a class.
Progress
Late 1994 saw the initiation of this project with the strategy stated to bring a variety of learning environments into the large general use classrooms. After completion of the large rooms starting with those where freshman and sophomore level courses were held. In addition, courses at the lower level that could be improved dramatically through the introduction of technology are also part of the strategy. These latter included what was called studio classrooms, and so far, have been installed for Biology 101, Statistics 320, English 101, and Physics (Engineering Physics). Two "Harvard" style classrooms were installed early and subsequently two additional rooms were installed using this learning environment, an environment that is very popular.
The technologically enhanced classroom project is not funded so no schedule is set for the design of enhanced rooms. Installation depends upon grants, donations and extra earnings from DCE and Telecommunications.
At the present time there are 33 high tech classrooms 4 of these were departmental classrooms the rest were general use classrooms. All Common Core classrooms become general use classrooms. Four or 5 classrooms will be upgraded this summer and another 2 this Fall. The current upgraded classrooms are indicated in Appendix 1.