
Crosstalk

The Crosstalk series that commenced last semester will continue this Fall. A series of presentations and discussions are planned, on a variety of topics relevant to the evolving landscape of educational technology applications at MIT.

Topics will include: 

- Web based Course environments, the range of Web applications in MIT courses and   strategies for providing meaningful support  to promote more extensive and effective use of the Web for teaching and learning.

- Applications and requirements of the Next Generation Internet for MIT ( Education for the extended community/Advanced Visualization) including updates and implications of the Internet 2 initiative.

- Evaluating the transformational influence of technology on MIT education - how can information technology positively impact those aspects of the MIT educational experience that are most valued? integration of teaching-learning-research and the  role of technology

 The meetings will also provide the opportunity to discuss the work and recommendations of groups that have been engaged in understanding and developing visions for educational technology at MIT, namely the Council on Educational Technology and the Task Force on Student Life and Learning.

Crosstalk meetings are planned to be held on the following days : September 19, October 14, November 14 and December 12. Confirmations on session topics and dates will be sent to the 'crosstalk' mailing list and also posted on the Crosstalk Webpage - http://web.mit.edu/acs/www/Practice.dir/crosstalk.html. If you wish to be included in the 'crosstalk' mailing list please send e-mail to Naomi Schmidt (nschmidt@mit.edu).

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Support for Academic Computing Initiatives

This year's Athena renewal process for academic departments  involves a directed effort to provide support for educational computing initiatives, in a manner that encourages innovation and that is responsive to changing needs. For this purpose we invited proposals from departments for IS (Academic Computing) support of projects. ( Insider Spring 97)
At this point hardware grants mostly take the form of Athena workstations, but other
platforms  are not excluded where warranted. Other support needs, such as those for applications development, will be addressed based on the needs of individual projects and available resources.

Eight initiatives have been selected for support through this process so far with 3 more being reviewed. The selected projects vary in scope and the area of application - from courseware development projects to mini-Athena clusters for student use in departments. The guidelines for selection reflect preference for factors such as innovative use,
extensibility of projects, and the department's priority for a project.

Please contact Vijay Kumar (vkumar@mit.edu) or Naomi Schmidt  (nschmidt@mit.edu )if you are interested in information about this process or if you would like to discuss your application. Proposals should be sent electronically to ac-proposals@mit.edu.Guidelines for submission of proposals are available on the World Wide Web at URL http://web.mit.edu/acs/www/guidelines.html


