CITIE Steering Committee Meeting
3/6/2002

Attendees:  Roger Loyd, Pat Halpin, Abhijit Prabhu, Nevin Fouts, Lynne
O'Brien, Lee Willard, Melissa Mills, Mike Baptiste, Linda Goodwin

Agenda
-    Announcements and review of minutes
-    Faculty support and services initiative
-    Time permitting: Facilities, computers, and support

Announcements and review of minutes
Lynne O'Brien chaired the meeting.  She asked if there were any changes that needed to be made to the minutes before they are posted to the web.  No changes necessary.

Lynne O'Brien asked if there were any announcements. She had a couple of announcements.
- A call for highly innovative grants has been posted on the CIT website.
- The CIT Fellows Program, a one year long program, was posted on the CIT website.  Deadline for application is March 25th.

Melissa Mills mentioned that there is a faculty member in Computer Science, Bob Wagner, who is interested in how to leverage technology but didn't feel that his needs fit either of the CIT grants/programs.  Lynne mentioned that she will get in contact with him.
Lynne O'Brien announced that the CIT Showcase of Excellence is scheduled. There will be 28 faculty presentations from 6 different schools.  The Keynote speaker is Steve Lerman.  Mr. Lerman is the Director, Center for Educational Computing Initiatives; Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, MIT. He will be discussing the OpenCourseWare Project he is leading. There will be a number of open houses out within the schools.

Faculty support and services initiative
Lynne O'Brien explained that she took the comments she heard at the last steering committee meeting and made revisions.  The revisions are highlighted in gray.Revisions to the section: Measures of faculty use of technology in teaching Page 1 item 8. Reworded based on comments from Robert Wolpert.  Made sure it captured the fact that there are some courses that use technology as a core component of teaching - computing intensive. New wording - "Faculty use computing-intensive activities as needed to teach core concepts in the discipline.  For example, faculty teach in interactive computer classrooms, have students bring mobile computing devices to class or assign projects where students make extensive use of technology to learn key concepts."

Page 2 item 10 (new item).Lynne mentioned that she does not really see this as a separate item because the integration of research into teaching could be a component of any of the other 9 items. However, she added this to emphasize the potential of technology to encourage the integration of research into teaching.

Melissa Mills recommended some rewording. Faculty use technology to facilitate the integration of research. Nevin Fouts suggested that the wording contain the phrase "through the use of technology faculty integrate their research". Lynne O'Brien said she would continue to work on the rewording of this item.

Revisions to the section: Resources for helping faculty use technology in teaching Page 5 item 10. This item covers the implications for support.

Faculty integrate their research into teaching with the use of technology.

Available

- Incentive grant programs provide funding for development of new software,
new digital resources, new teaching strategies (CIT)
- Special facilities available for creating digital materials such as animations, simulations (CIT, Schools)

New
$:Additional departmental support may be needed if faculty technology use increases substantially. (Schools)
$: Faculty may need some release time or other incentives if tech projects consume a lot of time. (Schools)
$: Possibility of new infrastructure needs, such as high end hardware/software for student use, programming support for educational materials development. (OIT, Schools) CIT IT Fellows program, which starts in May 2002, could provide opportunity to rethink a course with assistance from graduate student, extra support services.

Roger Loyd suggested that another bullet be added under available.  The bullet should include - some staff is available in departments/schools to assist.

Nevin Fouts suggested that another bullet be added under available. The bullet should include - there are some partnerships beyond the Duke Community (e.g., NCSC provides visualization software training).

Page 2 item 1. Changes were made based on comments from Pat Halpin regarding the need to make sure that the systems are secure and reliable since a Duke is relying on the system for access and storage of such a significant portion of Duke coursework. The following was added "Note: With significant number of courses using BB, we must plan for highly reliable and highly secure hardware/software support." P

age 2 item 1.  New item under new resources. "$: Need more assistance with copyright questions, copyright clearance. Goal is not to have a copyright official but rather to provide more coherent advice for faculty and to make it easier for faculty to obtain copyright clearance where needed. (Library)"

Roger Loyd mentioned that he really liked this change.

Lynne O'Brien asked if anyone saw the recent article in Syllabus titled "Embarrassment Factor." She mentioned that she will send a copy out to the committee. The article discusses what schools should be embarrassed by - e.g. the author is surprised that when he gives a presentation he still has to ask if a projector will be available.  What should be the standards for embarrassment?

Melissa Mills mentioned that she is interested in posting experience cards in the classrooms and encouraging faculty who utilize the technology to comment on the experience they had using the technology in that particular classroom.  She mentioned that most likely A&S doesn't hear about the problems that arise using the technology, and the faculty doesn't realize how easy it is to get help.

Pat Halpin said that he would be interested to see how such a program could be implemented - how it can be propagated out to the departments.

Lynne O'Brien mentioned that what she was hoping to get out of today's meeting is to get an endorsement from the committee that the 10 items outlined in the memo would be the set of measures for assessing faculty use of technology in teaching. In addition, to look at those items that require funding and come up with the top 2 or 3 items which need immediate attention.

Melissa Mills asked if we looking for self reported information or leave it up to schools to determine measurement.  Lynne suggested that by establishing a set of standards it would allow us to compare across the schools.

Roger Loyd asked if we should establish a ranking scale 1-5.  Someone mentioned that the information that could be gained from such an instrument would have been helpful for the SACS self study.

Lynne O'Brien asked if the Provost should request all faculty complete the assessment and ask that the Deans summarize the information from the faculty in their schools.

Roger Loyd suggested that the assessment instrument be written in the first person.

Pat Halpin stressed that the wording of the instrument must be taken very seriously and it is important to control for biases. Pat also mentioned that we should also consider an external review team.  Look at infrastructure and personnel resources currently in place. This information won't come from the assessment or from the Deans. The combination of an external review and the assessment would be the best way to gather the necessary information.

Lynne O'Brien mentioned that at NC State every faculty member received a questionnaire from the Chancellor.  The questionnaire asked the faculty to check off the items that they are currently doing in their classes.

Nevin Fouts stressed that the way we structure this is really important, and we must be careful to not be misleading. The Dean's response must be structured along the assessment structure.

Lynne O'Brien explained that she will post this information and put out a proposal for broader faculty comment.

Nevin Fouts mentioned that if we get it right this could be an excellent planning tool.

Lynne O'Brien mentioned that she will put together a straw man proposal and get it out to the committee for feedback, and then reach out to get wider input.

Facilities, computers, and support

Ginny Cake stressed that as the CITIE initiative grows it is important that we continue to work together.  Make sure our plans match and that our efforts are coordinated.

Robert Wolpert explained that he has a couple of questions. Arts and Sciences has done a good job putting technology in the classroom. The other schools haven't done quite as good a job. Shouldn't the uplift of technology in the classrooms be elevated to the University level? Should a funding mechanism in place for periodic updating of these spaces?

Michael Baptiste mentioned that the uplift of classroom space has been cut from his budget.

Ginny Cake explained that the uplift of the classroom space needs to be looked across the board not just by the individual schools.

Pat Halpin commented that he is getting indirect money to support the teaching labs. He is taking unallocated endowment and allocating it to regenerating the teaching classroom.  

Someone mentioned that there are donors out there who want a brass plaque on the door.

Someone mentioned that it would be a good idea to have the people from Corporate Development Office attend the CIT Showcase of Excellence.

Pat Halpin mentioned that there are 4 different kinds of computer clusters - basic general purpose labs, multimedia teaching labs, collaborative environment - work rooms, and instructional computer labs used for class instruction.