CT Briefs
:: NEWS
MORE ITUNES. The University of South Florida now boasts more than 3,000 educational podcasts hosted through Apple's iTunes U. In order to boost faculty participation, a "Make It Happen" committee within the College of Education was charged with answering questions on podcast production and content development. A team from USF shared its iTunes U successes with a standing-room-only crowd at this year's FETC conference in Orlando. Read more here.
ENGAGING COLLABORATION. The University of Washington's collaborative computing studios are nearly always bustling with both student and staff activity. Six stations are set up at various locations on campus, in classrooms, libraries, and corridors. They each include a 50-inch plasma display and a networked computer running TeamSpot from Tidebreak, paired with a locally developed tool called ShareSpace. Groups begin their collaborations in the studios using TeamSpot, then load their files into ShareSpace for later online follow-up. Read more here.
A UNIFIED DIGITAL CAMPUS. Temple University (PA) is switching its disparate campus computing systems to SunGard Higher Education's Unified Digital Campus as part of an initiative to improve and unify campus services, including both administrative and academic functions.
HIGH-DEF ARCHIVING. The Digital Media Repository at Ball State University (IN) has been providing access to numerous forms of digital content-such as photos, audio, video, and electronic journals-since 2004. Now, a project has been launched to add high-definition TV to the digital formats being stored and managed. Read more here.
STUDENTS NOW CAN handle their SAT prep in Second Life.
SAT PREP IN SECOND LIFE. The Princeton Review has its SAT LiveOnline courses, and Ohio University has an island and an expert developer in Second Life. Now, the two are offering a series of SAT strategy sessions at a virtual site within the OU island in Second Life, oddly reminiscent of traditional face-to-face SAT preparation. Read more here.
BI BOOSTS ENROLLMENT, RETENTION. At The University of Alabama, first-year enrollment is up 40 percent, and retention figures have increased from 82 to 85 percent. The positive numbers are the result of a combination of efforts, points out Cali Davis, associate director of data analysis and specialized recruitment. But UA's strategies have been fueled by good data and analytics, using SAS to analyze data collected in the university's SunGard Banner student information system. Read more here.
STUDENTS NEED FILE TRANSFER, TOO. Pepperdine University (CA) has licensed Accellion on-demand secure file transfer capabilities for its faculty and staff. But the best part may be that students, too, will be able to use the services as a result of a new global education initiative announced by Accellion in January. The company is providing free user licenses to students at colleges and universities that license the Accellion secure file transfer solution for all faculty and staff.
:: PEOPLE
HELEN CHU joins U of O as director of academic informationservices.
NEW DIRECTOR OF ACADEMIC IS. Helen Chu is the new director of academic information services at the University of Oregon. Chu previously served as the director of library information technology at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, where she spearheaded that university's Learning Commons and online search services, and developed an Internet2 faculty research and development lab.