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Lawrence Lessig to Present Keynote at 2008 Symposium

Faculty and staff are invited to attend the free 2008 Symposium for Teaching and Learning with Technology, to be held Saturday, March 29 from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, University Park.

Lawrence Lessig, professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of the school’s Center for Internet and Society, will be the keynote speaker, and will be introduced by President Graham Spanier. Lessig is the author of Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity, The Future of Ideas, and Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace. He chairs the Creative Commons project, and serves on the board of the Free Software Foundation, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Public Library of Science, and Public Knowledge. He is also a columnist for Wired. For more information on Lessig and his work, see http://symposium.tlt.psu.edu/keynote/.

The Symposium will feature concurrent sessions presented by Penn State faculty and staff describing how they have used technology to enrich teaching, learning, and research. Topics will include social computing tools, new ways for teams to collaborate, virtual worlds, and digital expression. Hands-on learning sessions will allow attendees to try out blogging, podcasting, and student response systems. In addition, they can meet members of the teams who support various Penn State technology initiatives.

A continental breakfast and lunch will be provided. For more details and to register, visit http://symposium.tlt.psu.edu/. The Symposium is sponsored by Teaching and Learning with Technology, a unit of Information Technology Services.

Poster session proposals sought for 2008 TLT Symposium

Faculty and staff are invited to submit a proposal for a poster session to be held at the 2008 Symposium for Teaching and Learning with Technology on Saturday, March 29 from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, University Park. In line with the Symposium theme of “The Collaborative Campus and the Culture of Teaching and Learning,” poster sessions can address such topics as collaborative tools, ways of incorporating student-created digital media, practices that foster student ownership of their learning, creation and use of shared learning resources, and the use of new learning spaces to extend the classroom experience. Because of an overwhelming number of presentation proposals, this session has been added to the program to allow more faculty and staff to share their stories. It is an informal way for people to gather together, network, and talk about their projects.

To access the proposal form, visit http://symposium.tlt.psu.edu/posterproposal/. The deadline to submit a proposal is February 7. For any questions, e-mail tltsymposium@psu.edu. The Symposium is sponsored by Teaching and Learning with Technology, a unit of Information Technology Services.

Presentation: Educause Learning Initiative

Cole Camplese and Allan Gyroke presented at the 2008 Educause Learning Initiative annual meeting in San Antonio, TX. The talk is titled, Building the New Platform for Digital Expression. The focus is to to share the approach we’ve taken at PSU to encourage, support, and manage faculty and students’ use of digital media for teaching and learning.

Here is a blog entry recapping the session from the University of Washington.

Download the PDF of the presentation.

Session recording is now available for download.

Our session description as submitted to Educause:

Given the increased acceptance of digital media as a form of academic evidence, Penn State University’s Education Technology Services group has invested in the creation of what we call the platform for digital expression. We have worked to create a scalable University-wide infrastructure that supports faculty, staff, and students in the design, development, delivery, and management of digital media. Building on Penn State’s strong information technology underpinnings, we have worked to create a suite of services that provide all members of the University community with opportunities to integrate digital media into the teaching and learning landscape.

Within the last 18 months we have launched University wide blogging and podcasting services, moved elements of our support services to a Community Hub model where members of the University community support each other, begun the implementation of 21 Digital Commons facilities across the Commonwealth of PA, reinvented our faculty Engagement Process, forged new relationships with our public broadcasting station, and opened the walls of our own organization through the use of technology and physical events to create new ways to learn about what we do. This investment is leading to new ways for faculty to provide opportunities for students to utilize digital media throughout their learning.

In this session we will share the PSU Platform for Digital Expression and take the opportunity to discuss how disruptive technologies can be integrated into the teaching and learning with technology landscape by leveraging existing University infrastructure. Furthermore we will discuss how we have worked to blend physical infrastructure, human resources, and social environments to create new ways for our audience to
engage with us.

This new digital media eco-system has allowed faculty to feel comfortable integrating digital media in their teaching and learning. In addition, students are now supported in the creation of digital media at every step — from initial planning, through creation, and ultimately through sharing.

Our approach will illustrate a digital media value chain that leads faculty from awareness, through design of curricular components, to student outcomes via the University wide initiatives described above. Much of this work is based on faculty, staff, and student academic computing data Information Technology Services at Penn State has been collecting for the last 20 years. Approximately three years ago we saw a shift in faculty and student interest in digital media and recognized that we need to make changes to the ways our physical spaces are designed, how our faculty are supported in their curricular design, and the types of services we need to offer to encourage the use of digital media for teaching and learning. In addition, the work of bodies such as Educause and the Pew Internet and American Life Projects have helped shape our understanding of our students and have pushed us to think critically about where we invest. Based on what we have learned in the last three years it has become evident that it is incumbent upon us as central information technology providers to create a new landscape for faculty and student use of digital creation and publishing tools.

Keynote Presentation: Maricopa Mesa Community College

On January 9th, 2008 I will be giving a keynote talk I am titling, Building a Platform for Innovation in Teaching and Learning. I was an invited featured speaker at Maricopa’s Teaching and Learning with Technology conference this past year and have been invited back to open one of their events this year. I am really looking forward to it! Below is the description for my talk.

During this talk we will discuss strategies for realistically achieving innovation in teaching and learning by understanding your environment, leveraging existing infrastructure, and tapping the power of your community. We’ll explore how Penn State University has worked to utilize existing tools to create new opportunities and achieve an IT culture based on agility and with an eye towards innovation. One of the other things we will look at is the ETS Engagement Process and our Hot Teams approach. I’ve included a PDF of the Engagement Process here as well.

Download PDF of the Slides.

Breakout Session: Maricopa Gateway Community College

On January 8th, 2008 I will be talking to a group of faculty from Maricopa about RSS and its overall use. I have decided to do a presentation I am calling, Personal Content Management & Modern RSS: Reuse, Reduce Recycle. Description is below.

When we first became enamored with Really Simple Syndication we thought of it as a time saver for acquiring new and fresh content. When it was introduced to us we were often told something like, “with RSS you can read 100 websites in 15 minutes.” Now that our understanding and use of RSS has matured the ability to create content in simple environments and reuse it across the static web. RSS is no longer simply about consuming other people’s content quickly – it is now about finding innovative ways to embed content from multiple sources into your work. We will discuss how by using a personal content management tool – a blog – you can discover ways to syndicate news into your course website, a department page, or create new ways to engage students through fresh news sources.

In our sessions we will discuss the basics of RSS for content consumption, but will also look at several new ways to reuse existing material, reduce redundant content creation, and recycle things you create for new uses.