News 07-23-2002

Sponsor: Sophos Anti-Virus FREE Web Seminar

Why should schools use Sophos Anti-Virus Solutions? Find out, join us for a free web seminar. You'll hear from Michael Hodges, University of Hawaii, about why Sophos Anti-Virus Solutions, which were designed specifically for networks, offer an easily updated, flexible solution for managing the complexity of educational environments.

To register for this free web seminar, go to: http://101offer.com/goto/?SYL7902

Georgia Tech Forms E-Commerce Partnership

The Georgia Institute of Technology and a software developer for the computer-assisted engineering market formed a partnership to create multi-disciplinary projects and research in the areas of Internet-based collaborative product engineering and e-commerce. The university and Dassault Systemes will build the Georgia Tech Product Life Cycle Management Competency Center (GT-PLMCC) on the main university campus in Atlanta. The Center will provide Georgia Tech with the new computer-aided classrooms, intelligent synthesis environments, and virtual reality simulation theatres necessary for collaborative design evolution and education. The Center is pioneering efforts to produce an international standard 3D Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) technology demonstration site at Georgia Tech. Georgia Tech will initially use the PLM tools to produce aerospace technology in support of advanced vehicle design research. Additional development will take place in the areas of manufacturing, management, and enterprise resource planning (ERP).

For more information, visit: http://www.cad.gatech.edu/gtplmcc

Sponsor: Syllabus2002 Opens in Santa Clara, CA on July 27

Only two days left to register online! The ninth annual Syllabus education technology conference for higher education kicks off this Saturday, July 27 in Santa Clara, Calif. This five-day program is packed with workshops, seminars, and six tracks of breakout sessions covering topics such as infrastructure and IT planning, open source models, and web based environments. Internationally renowned keynote speakers include Diana Laurillard of the Open University of the UK, Stanford University Law Professor Lawrence Lessig, and Jack Wilson, Chief Executive Officer of UMassOnline. If you only go to one conference this year, Syllabus2002 is the one you can't afford to miss.

Berkeley Turns to Enterprise Database Software

The University of California at Berkeley is using an enterprise database platform to help organize its campus-wide Museum Informatics Project (MIP), through which it maintains the databases of the University museum collections, including the Botanical Garden, the History of Art Department Visual Resource Collection, and the Berkeley Language Center. To help sort through the collections, the University is turning to Business Objects, a developer of so-called "business intelligence (BI) solutions." The company says it pioneered the modern BI industry in 1990 by inventing a patented "semantic layer" that insulates users from the complexity of databases. Using the integrated query, reporting, and analysis software, the curatorial staff for each of these departments is able to answer faculty and researchers' questions about the contents of various collections and quickly generate their own reports.

Online U. Graduates Largest Ever Online Class

Minneapolis-based Capella University, a fully online school serving adult learners and employers, said it would confer the largest graduating class in its history at a commencement ceremony on July 27, 2002. About 400 students from around the globe will be honored at the event, more than doubling the size of last year's graduating class. Based on existing growth, Capella projects distance learning will increase by 900 percent in the United States to include 750,000 students fully online by 2005. The school's fifth commencement will draw more than 100 graduates who will travel to Minneapolis to attend the graduation, some from as far away as the United Kingdom, South Korea and Singapore. For students that cannot travel to Minnesota, the ceremony will also be broadcast live on the Capella University Web site.

For more information, visit: http://www.capellauniversity.edu

U California Launches AP Biology Online

The University of California has joined with a developer of online educational media for secondary schools to create a online Advanced Placement Biology course that will be available to high school students nationwide. Originally developed by the University of California College Prep Initiative (UCCP) and Science Media, the two-semester course will be modified for Apex Learning's online learning platform. Initiated by UC Santa Cruz Vice Chancellor Francisco J. Hernandez in 1998, UCCP seeks to provide online AP and Honors courses to high school students who otherwise would not have access to the program. "In just four years, UCCP has made tremendous strides in ensuring that underserved California high school students have access to rigorous college prep courses," said Sue Collins, Chief Education Officer, Apex Learning."

For more information, visit http://www.uccp.org.

Microsoft $25M Software Grant to UNCF

Microsoft Corp. expanded its support of the United Negro College Fund (UNCF) with a $25 million software grant. UNCF President William H. Gray III accepted the donation at Xavier University, a UNCF school in New Orleans. Microsoft also donated 150 full-loaded Dell computers to the TRIO Upward Bound program at Xavier University and five New Orleans public schools. "At Microsoft, we believe that technology can help everyone realize their full potential," Microsoft chairman Bill Gates said in making the awards. "It's our hope that today's donations will enable the UNCF to expand educational opportunities for students in New Orleans and nationwide -- today and for a lifetime."

For more information, visit: http://www.microsoft.com/giving

Awards, Deals, Contracts, in Higher Education

-- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) awarded Genuity Inc., a provider of enterprise Internet Protocol (IP) networking services, a contract to provide increased Internet access bandwidth. The new service, an Internet Advantage OC-12 (Optical Carrier Level 12) Internet access service, will augment MIT's existing OC-3 Internet access service from Genuity. The resulting capacity will provide MIT with the ability to grow to the equivalent of more than 500 T-1 lines, with speeds 13,500 times faster than that of a standard 56K dial-up modem.

-- Brown University signed a contract with PhoneticOperator to voice-enable the university's main phone directory. The directory of over 5,000 records will be available for use by university staff, faculty and students. Phonetic Systems currently supports more than 10,500,000 unique directory listings and over 225,000,000 calls per year across its deployments.

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