Education Technology Services

Paths to our Mission: Path Six

Cole Camplese — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 19:20:01 +0000

Please take a little time to help us think critically about our organization and cite examples of where we are doing well and areas where improvement is needed. Please leave thoughts in the comment section below. I thank you in advance!

Hosting both physical and virtual events that are designed to bring members of the teaching and learning community together to engage in meaningful activities.

Paths to our Mission: Path Five

Cole Camplese — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 22:23:21 +0000

Managing University-wide technology implementations that are designed to support teaching, learning, and research

Paths to our Mission: Path Four

Cole Camplese — Mon, 18 May 2009 13:55:30 +0000

Enhancing curricula through the use of instructional design

New Video on Penn State and Second Life Available!

bxb11 — Thu, 14 May 2009 13:04:08 +0000

See https://streaming.psu.edu/media/?movieId=8240

Leslie, Shannon, and I worked together on this. Leslie wanted a video to show adult learners and practitioners the possibilities for SL at the 2009 Hendrick Best Practices for Adult Learners Conference. Shannon and I wanted a video to show anyone what’s happening in the space.

Kim Winck of ETS did a great job advising us and producing the final video. We now have a great video for all to watch and learn about Penn State and Second Life. Enjoy!

Schreyer Honors College Blogging Project

Allan Gyorke — Tue, 12 May 2009 17:26:29 +0000

ETS is working with the Schreyer Honors College (SHC) to investigate the use of the Penn State blogging platform to support student portfolios and ongoing reflection. As part of this initiative, members of ETS will support SHC scholars as we jointly explore the impact of personal publishing on academic advising, personal reflection, and personal content management. Scholars will be asked to maintain a blog (powered by the Blogs@Penn State) to track reflections of their experiences. Categories will be used to help better organize reflections and to align them with SHC programmatic goals and outcomes. Additionally, SHC scholars’ faculty advisors will be asked to participate by periodically tracking scholar progress via their blogs.

As of the spring 2009 semester, there are nine SHC bloggers taking part in the pilot program. ETS representatives meet with them approximately once a month to discuss the project and form ideas to move forward. Christian Brady, Dean of the Schreyer Honors College, has included setting up Web space as part of FTCAP and creating blogs during the freshmen orientation training for incoming SHC students this August. While not mandating, Dean Brady will highly encourage all incoming SHC freshmen to set up their portfolios and maintain a blog.

To keep up with the pilot group and their blog postings, you can look at or subscribe to the PSUHonors tag. Other categories (tags) that are being used in this project are: academic excellence, civic engagement, global perspective, honor, integrity, and leadership.

Paths to Our Mission: Path Three

Cole Camplese — Mon, 11 May 2009 14:25:27 +0000

Participating in research opportunities to better educate faculty, staff, and students in the use of emerging technologies as they relate to teaching and learning.

Paths to Our Mission: Path Two

Cole Camplese — Thu, 07 May 2009 11:02:22 +0000

Supporting technology innovation and adoption to support teaching and learning

Paths to Our Mission: Path One

Cole Camplese — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 14:03:10 +0000

Creating opportunities to engage faculty to further their use of technology for teaching and learning.

New Form of Organizational Reflection

Cole Camplese — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 19:23:55 +0000

We are approaching the end of our fiscal year here at Penn State and that means we are rapidly thinking about staff reviews, new budget cycles, and our annual report. In an effort to be more open and transparent I am suggesting that we attempt to examine ourselves according to the six stated paths to our mission as a community. Starting on Monday I will be posting the first of the six paths and asking those both inside and outside ETS to contribute evidence, stories, or reflections related to our attempt to meet these stated objectives. Through this process I am hoping to gain not only some tangible evidence of progress, but also thoughts from the community related to how we are going about our work. I can envision some active dialogue while we move through this new process and I want everyone to know that you are invited to be an active participant.

Our primary mission is to provide leadership and support in the appropriate use of technology for teaching, learning, and research. We do this by:

Creating opportunities to engage faculty to further their use of technology for teaching and learning

Supporting technology innovation and adoption to support teaching and learning

Participating in research opportunities to better educate faculty, staff, and students in the use of emerging technologies as they relate to teaching and learning

Enhancing curricula through the use of instructional design

Managing University-wide technology implementations that are designed to support teaching, learning, and research

Hosting both physical and virtual events that are designed to bring members of the teaching and learning community together to engage in meaningful activities

So on Monday you’ll see a post that will ask for some feedback on our first path towards our mission. Please take a little time to help us think critically about our organization and cite examples of where we are doing well and areas where improvement is needed. I thank you in advance!

Selber to Join ETS as Fellow

Cole Camplese — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 13:45:33 +0000

ETS is thrilled to announce that Dr. Stuart Selber, Associate Professor of English and Sciences, Technology, and Sociaety, will join ETS as a Faculty Fellow this Summer. During his time as a Fellow, he will be exploring the topic of that “Changing Nature in Online Instruction Sets” in collaboration with TLT/ETS staff. You can learn more about his project by visiting the emerging description at the ETS wiki. Stuart has been working with ETS for the past year in a redesign of English 202C. We are all thrilled to have him spending time with us this Summer and we know it will lead to some exciting outcomes and discoveries.

My argument is that Web 2.0 environments have begun to recast the instruction set in concrete and meaningful ways. The relevance of the instruction set has been amplified and widened by an online participatory culture that encourages involvement, collaboration, and information exchange. More than simply a good example, the instruction set has become something of a metonym for the complex world of Web 2.0.

Faculty Fellows engage with ETS to integrate technology within emerging educational projects that can be shared and implemented widely throughout Penn State. To be considered for a Fellowship please visit our Faculty Fellowship page.