WCET: The Cooperative advancing the effective use of technology in higher education.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 19, 2006
Boulder, Colorado 

-- PRESS RELEASE --

WCET Announces Awards for Outstanding Work
in Using Technology for Education

Arizona State University, California State University-Office of the Chancellor, Cochise College, the Southern Regional Education Board, and the University of Washington will receive the 2006 WCET Outstanding Work (WOW) Award for their innovative and effective uses of technologies in educating and serving students.

"As always, the people behind these awards outshine the technology. Each of these awards is a story of dedicated faculty and staff working together to use innovation and technologies to overcome educational obstacles,” said Russell Poulin, WCET’s Interim Director.  “Whether it is serving students relocated by Hurricane Katrina, creating statewide services for K-12 students and teachers, opening classes to serve deaf students, or developing new software tools that improve learning, each of these stories is a remarkable testament to how we can apply new technologies to meet human needs.” 

WCET, the cooperative advancing the effective use of technology in higher education, recognizes two institutions and two systems as recipients of its third annual WCET Outstanding Work (WOW) award.  For the first time, a “WOW Humanitarian and Leadership Award” is being bestowed on the Southern Regional Education Board for its work in assisting students relocated by Hurricane Katrina.

“WCET members are always on the cutting edge in using educational technologies for instruction both on- and off-campus,” said Mollie McGill, University of Colorado System and chair of the Awards Committee.  The four recipients of the 2006 WCET WOW Award are:

ArizonaStateUniversity – IDEAL: Integrated Data to Enhance Arizona's Learning.  In partnership with the Arizona Department of Education, this web-based learning environment offers access to online courses, tutorials, and communications to teachers and students throughout the state.  IDEAL is a model of cooperation and community connectivity.

California StateUniversity, Office of the Chancellor - Math Success and English Success Websites.California high school students use the engaging tools on these interactive websites to meet CSU Math and English placement requirements and to better prepare for college level work.

CochiseCollege - Serving Deaf Student Needs.  When faculty learned of the inability of deaf students to use a new web-based conferencing system, they developed innovative and inexpensive solutions for deaf students to participate in these courses.

University of Washington – Catalyst.  Catalyst meets the daily demands of teaching, learning, and research through innovative and effective technologies and services. Bucking the trend of using off-the-shelf software, Catalyst’s Learning Spaces, Web Tools, and Knowledge Services were developed by tapping the expertise of faculty, students, and staff to meet campus-wide needs. 

For its work in addressing the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the members of the WCET Awards Committee also decided to create the first “WOW Humanitarian and Leadership Award” which was given to:

Southern Regional Education Board – Sloan Semester.  A complete “virtual” institution was created and was operational within 21 days.  It’s free online courses and services, resulted from generous support of the Sloan Foundation and institutions throughout the country.  The initiative created an academic “bridge” for students to continue their studies and to return to their home institution in the Spring term.

The recipients of the 2006 WCET WOW award will receive their awards and make presentations on their works at WCET’s Annual Conference to be held in Portland, Oregon on November 1-4.

WCET (formerly the Western Cooperative for Educational Telecommunications) is a membership-supported organization open to providers and users of educational telecommunications.  Since its founding by the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education in 1989, WCET’s members have included the most innovative thinkers in the use of educational technologies.  WCET members come from the higher education community, nonprofit organizations, government agencies, and corporations. They represent 46 U.S. states and eight other countries.

 

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Longer Descriptions of the 2006 WCET WOW Award Recipients

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Arizona State University – IDEAL: Integrated Data to Enhance Arizona's Learning
IDEAL (Integrated Data to Enhance Arizona's Learning), developed by the Applied Learning Technologies Institute at Arizona State University in partnership with Arizona Department of Education, is an innovative, open source, online learning environment available to every Arizona certified teacher and student-presently over 1 million K-12 students and 58,000 teachers. 

More than a website or portal, IDEAL establishes a personalized, sustainable, and dynamic lifelong learning environment, providing:

• Advanced online training and resources for teachers and administrators.
• Instructional videos aligned with Arizona Academic Standards.
• Practice AIMS tests and tutorials.
• High school and University courses.
• Feedback on student performance for parents and teachers.

"The IDEAL partnership enables a pathway to lifelong learning", explains Dr. Samuel DiGangi, co-director of IDEAL and Associate Vice President for University Technology at Arizona State University.  "Through IDEAL, ASU demonstrates its commitment to lead social change—to establish and enable an education system that meets the needs of all Arizona communities and the global cap"
 
"IDEAL is a means for connecting and communicating" adds Dr. Angel Jannasch-Pennell, Assistant Vice President and IDEAL co-director. IDEAL is an exemplary model in instructional delivery and community connectivity.

 

California StateUniversity, Office of the Chancellor - Math Success and English Success Websites
The California State University Math Success (www.csumathsuccess.org) and English Success (www.csuenglishsuccess.org) websites have been designed to support the CSU Early Assessment Program in helping high school students prepare for college level work.  These interactive websites empower students to take advantage of their high school years to ensure academic readiness for the CSU.

Leveraging an attractive user-friendly design, the CSU Math and English Success Websites provide students with the necessary tools to become college-ready.  Specifically, the websites offer the following services:  

• A personalized roadmap advising tool which generates a customized “to-do” list to help students meet the CSU Math and English placement requirements.
• Automatic e-mail reminders sent to students at key times throughout the year to encourage the completion of all required tasks.
• Student testimonial videos which reinforce the importance of satisfying placement requirements in the most efficient and expeditious manner.
• A variety of online math and English test prep tools including an intelligent tutoring application.

The Math and English Success Websites were designed as part of a collaborative effort among web developers at the Center for Distributed Learning, policy experts in Academic Affairs, CSU math and English faculty, and representatives from the high school community.  The websites provide an exemplary model of how universities can effectively work to bridge the gap to promote college readiness for all students.

CochiseCollege - Serving Deaf Student Needs
Frequently, new technologies are unable to meet the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act and their adoption creates difficult challenges for faculty who desire to use them. This year, faculty members of the Cochise College online campus faced just such a challenge as they adopted a live Web Conferencing system and quickly discovered that it was not accessible to deaf students. Through an innovative and unusual application of voice recognition software in connection with both proprietary and open source tools, college faculty and staff created an inexpensive and novel solution that includes captioning for both recorded and live online sessions. This effort represented a great step forward in providing full accessibility to classes that use the latest in Web-based conferencing technology.

 
University of Washington - Catalyst
At a time when complex multidisciplinary problems, from public policy through national security to scientific discovery and economic competitiveness, have emerged as new drivers of education and research, complementing the historical focus on single disciplines, information technologies have become the fundamental tools to enable this work. Catalyst (http://catalyst.washington.edu/), from the Office of Learning Technologies, helps the University of Washington community meet these new daily demands of teaching, learning, research, and work with innovative and effective technologies and services.

With a collaborative approach that taps the expertise of faculty, students, and staff, Catalyst is able to offer tools and services that meet campus-wide needs.  This approach is grounded in five key principles:

• build and use Web-based communication and collaboration tools that are scalable, modular, and flexible.
• engage in strategic partnerships to provide general-access and innovative learning technologies and support resources.
• use formal and informal methods to ensure user-centered services and resources.
• provide information and resources via the Web.
• train and use student staff for core activities.

By following these principles, Catalyst is able to develop and deliver user-inspired, reliable, and inventive technology to the entire UW community, reaching over 70,000 people on three campuses, and to Washington K-12 and Northwest community partners.

 

- WOW Humanitarian and Leadership Award -
Southern Regional Education Board – Sloan Semester
When Hurricane Katrina struck the U.S. Gulf Coast in August, 2005, the impact on students was not only the loss of homes, businesses and campuses but also the loss of educational continuity.  In response, the Southern Regional Education Board and the Sloan Consortium, with support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, launched “Sloan Semester.” The initiative was designed to create an academic “bridge” for students to continue their studies and to return to their home institution in the Spring term. By providing free online courses and services affected students had an online option to continue their studies. A complete “virtual” institution was created and was operational within 21 days. A catalog of more than 1,350 courses from 155 institutions from 38 states was available, built on SREB’s  Electronic Campus.  Rapid “admission” to participating colleges and universities using SREB’s new “VESA”  alternative admissions/registration system permitted more than 1,750 students to complete a single on-line application and to complete enrollment in 3,000 courses—at multiple institutions—in minutes. Students had online access to academic counselors, financial aid, and other support services.  The response of the academic community, the quick deployment of administrative systems, and the value of online learning are all legacies of Sloan Semester.

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For more information

Arizona State University
IDEAL: Integrated Data to Enhance Arizona's Learning
Samuel A. DiGangi
Associate Vice President
University Technology
(480) 965-2047
sam@asu.edu

California State University, Office of the Chancellor
Math Success and English Success Websites
Jeff Gold
Director
Academic Technology Development
(310) 399-3636
jgold@calstate.edu

Cochise College
Serving Deaf Student Needs
George Self
Director of the Online Campus
(520) 515-5385
selfg@cochise.edu

University of Washington
Catalyst
Tom Lewis
Director
Catalyst Research & Development
(206) 616-8156
tomlewis@u.washington.edu

Southern Regional Education Board
Sloan Semester
Mary Larson
Associate Director
Electronic Campus
(404) 875-9211
mary.larson@sreb.org

WCET
Russell Poulin
Interim Director
WCET
(303) 541-0305
rpoulin@wcet.info