Classroom Technologies | News

Ithaca College, North Dakota State U Roll Out Classroom Clickers Campus-wide

• By Kanoe Namahoe
• 07/03/12

Thousands of students at Ithaca College (IC) and North Dakota State University (NDSU) will have access to classroom clickers by next fall. Both institutions plan to implement Turning Technologies' student response system, ResponseCard NXT, campuswide, according to statement released this week by the company.

The NXT features cell phone style text entry for short answer and essay questions, plus self-paced test mode for individual assessment. Instructors can also poll students from a number of applications including PowerPoint, Word, Excel, Keynote, PDFs, whiteboard software, and Web browsers, when using the device with TurningPoint software. The solution supports integration with Moodle, BlackBoard, Sakai, and WebCT learning management systems.

The clicker's integration capability was a driving factor in Ithaca's decision, according to Marilyn Dispensa, instructional technology coordinator for the school. "We believe that integration with Sakai and better hardware performance will improve the experience using clickers for both the faculty and the students," Dispensa said.

For NDSU's evaluation committee, comprised of instructors and members of the school's technology services department, ease of use and mobile capability were its top priorities.

"We wanted to offer our faculty a simple and reliable response solution that allowed for numeric input. The ResponseCard NXT’s easy numeric functionality and text entry met the needs of the various departments and faculty using student response at NDSU,” said Luke Prather, instructional services consultant at NDSU. “In addition, we wanted to partner and grow with a continuously evolving company. It was important that the chosen company offered a web-based mobile solution as well as ResponseCard clickers."

Adoption of the new clicker systems at both campuses is slated for fall 2012. More information about Turning Technologies clicker solutions can be found at the company's Web site.