Cole W. Camplese

cwc5 | at | psu | edu
814-863-2271
Learning & Innovation Blog

Cole W. CampleseI am the Director of Education Technology Services for Penn State University. In this role, I have the opportunity to help direct and drive the direction of the University’s commitment to teaching and learning with technology. I am lucky enough to work with an amazing staff who are dedicated to transforming the use of technology in teaching and learning. We focus our energy on instructional design, educational technology, digital media, and faculty development. Currently at ETS, we are part of teams leading the efforts to bring University wide podcasting and blogging services to faculty, staff, and students. We also have administrative responsibility for the Digital Commons initiative, the TLT Symposium, components of the Blended Learning Initiative, Adobe Connect Pro, iTunes U, the ETS Communities, the PSU Serious Gaming Initiative, and supporting the use of ANGEL for teaching and learning … there are a bunch of other things that we deal with as well.

I focus all the time I can thinking about how technology can be used to extend the reach of teaching and learning. I travel quite a bit — meeting with other Institutions, participating in the CIC Learning Technologies Committee, working with industry partners, giving talks, and exploring new opportunities. You can keep up with the work I do and the stuff I am thinking about by reading my blog, Learning & Innovation and by keeping an eye on my PSU Updates blog.

I continue to teach here at the University. Recently I am taught a new course in the College of Education, Curriculum and Instruction 597C: Disruptive Technologies for Teaching and Learning. I love teaching … the classroom offers me a living laboratory to try many of the things we think about here at ETS.

Before becoming the Director of ETS, I spent the previous six years as the Director of the IST Solutions Institute in the College of IST at Penn State University. In that role, it was my responsibility to set the strategic goals of the Institute and to direct a majority of the activities. I was given the opportunity to create an Institute from the ground up and was responsible for the Online IST project, Edison Services, several industry partnerships, grants, and other initiatives. I remain very proud of the things we did and the people who did them.

While at IST, I taught IST 110 nearly every semester to our incoming freshman and loved every minute of it. In addition to the face to face teaching we designed, I taught the first hybrid and online sections of 110. I was also the PI and chief administrator for the Pennsylvania Governor’s School for Information Technology. This program brought 75 of the Commonwealth’s best and brightest rising seniors to campus for a five week residency program.

Prior to Penn State I was part of a small start-up in the greater Philadelphia region. It was with Cogence Media that I got my first taste of using technology to enhance learning. We focused energy on the creation of OSHA training courseware first on CD-ROM and then via the web. While I was there I started our web presence and worked to create the first versions of our high and low bandwidth online courseware. We did some pretty amazing things back in the day working with good old fashioned HTML, home grown content management, and Macromedia’s Authorware. Cogence taught me a ton about what I do now and the people I worked with there showed me how you can be both committed to quality and innovation. There are days I miss the little shop in the woods where so much of what I do now was created.

I have a BS in Psychology from West Virginia University, an MS in Instructional Technology from Bloomsburg University, and am currently pursuing a Doctorate in the College of Education. My wife, Kristin, and I are the parents to two wonderful little children. My daughter, Madeline is six years old and her little brother, Max is almost one and a half.

You can keep up with me on Flickr, Twitter, del.icio.us, and Pownce where my screen name is colecamplese.