EMTC Minutes: January 2000

UW Educational Media Technology Council
January 27-28, 2000
The Pyle Center, UW-Extension, Madison

January 27, 2000

EMTC members present: Marcia Baird, UW-Extension; Charles Cottle, UW-Whitewater; Nick Dvoracek, UW-Oshkosh; Bob Fuller, UW-Eau Claire; John Grozik, UW-Milwaukee; Joe Hagaman, UW-Stout; Bob Jokisch, UW System; Jim Jorstad, UW-LaCrosse; John Nierengarten, UW-River Falls; Peter Nordgren, UW-Superior; Mark Vladick, UW Colleges; Ron Weseloh, UW-Stevens Point.

Absent: Colleen Garrity, UW-Platteville; Kate Pietri, UW-Parkside; Steve Siehr, UW-Madison

Guests: Rich Dirks, UW-Eau Claire; Joe Eisele, UW-Extension; Jeff Finlay, UW-Extension; Denny Gilbertson, UW-Extension; Lisa Livingston, UW-Madison; Dennis Rinzel, UW-Madison; Hal Schlais, UW System

Chairman Joe Hagaman called the meeting to order at 1:05 p.m.

Secretary's report: Minutes of the Nov. 8-9, 1999 meeting were approved by Ron Weseloh, seconded by Peter Nordgren.

Treasurer's report: In Steve Siehr's absence, Mike Schmitt reported that meeting expenses would be $10.25 per person.

Committee Reports
DE Working Group Report: Bob Fuller, John Grozik and Jim Jorstad represent EMTC on the DE Working Group. Fuller reported that the committee has met twice, with meetings scheduled through June. Background was provided on Ed Meachen's charge to EMTC and the Working Group. The group has begun to draft a draft mission statement; goals and subgoals. They are starting with a learner-centered view, rather than technology view. Group may also survey educational partners. Part of the group's goal is to increase communication with learning partners. Report is due July 1.

Fuller distributed a draft discussion document, focusing on a Teaching-Learning-Technology model developed at UW-Eau Claire.

Grozik showed the group the Blackboard site he has built as a tool for the DE Study Group.

Classroom Support Report: Peter Nordgren reported that UW-Superior has particular needs in the area of classroom technology support; maintaining and troubleshooting classrooms that have technology in them; and, as a subset, DE classroom support. Is there interest in exploring a joint training program for students in these areas? Bob Jokisch indicated there was funding for training and hiring 340 students Systemwide for second year of biennium. UW-Milwaukee had about five institutions send students to their campus for training. How tightly defined are student support dollars? Answer: You have flexibility to meet general purpose of the program. Interest was expressed in scheduling training in some flexible format to work with student schedules; some training could be offered in a distance format. System would be glad to help in coordination. UW-Milwaukee students are planning a June 2000 conference for high school and college students who have an interest in supporting technology. UW-Milwaukee has a large infrastructure in place for student technology services. See http://www.uwm.edu/IMT/STS. Many EMTC representatives expressed interest in developing a training program. Peter Nordgren and Charles Cottle will lead a steering committee.

EMTC Web Site Report: Joe Hagaman, Ron Weseloh and Marcia Baird are on the subcommittee. Marcia handed out current UW media-related links on the Distance Education Clearinghouse and asked representatives to review individual campus links. Those links can then also be posted on the EMTC web site: http://www.uwex.edu/disted/emtc. The subcommittee will discuss additional links that should be added.

Campus Updates
UW System: Major changes at System; Sr. VP David Ward retiring June 30. New acting VP of Business and Finance. New VP of University Relations. Hiring joint position with WiscNet. Also hiring joint technology consultant position with UW-Extension. Working on next biennial budget request, with workforce development as a theme. One of the major areas will be curricular redesign supporting faculty; also student technology. Recently hired David Hart on a full-time basis to coordinate PeopleSoft activities. Hal reported that he has hired Glenda Morgan. New editor for TTT is looking for scholarly articles and also for case studies.

UW-Green Bay: Constructing a new academic building; AV and DE concerns; anticipated completion fall 2001.

UW-Madison: The new IMDC Director, Lisa Livingston, highlighted the IMDC web site: http://imdc.education.wisc.edu . The unit is moving from traditional video production to various interactive solutions.

UW-Whitewater: Finished workshops supported through a Title III grant; first week was Web Course in a Box. Supporting 140 faculty and staff over four years; web site under revision.

UW-Stevens Point: Web team looking at redesign of site; looking at building in e-commerce components into it; course in production in Wellness, Environmental Education; curricular redesign project with Stout and Stevens Point. Another DE classroom planned for 2001, bringing total to five. Will be getting a DVD authoring system, in partnership with College of Natural Resources.

Rich Dirks: Serving on the DPI Technology Task Force, representing WADEN. Very inclusive process, with representatives from many educational groups and others with interest in K-12 education. Report to be published in late spring.

Joe Eisele, Cooperative Extension: Reported on links with the Lac Courte Oreilles Indian Reservation..

UW-Oshkosh: Ron Reid retired; developing new position assisting students doing presentations.

UW-River Falls: In second year of a three-year network upgrade; making some internal changes on staffing; appointed new user services manager, help desk and training initiatives; planning on complete redo of IT services websites; campus to hire a full-time webmaster.

UW Colleges: Finished a major building program at Baraboo including three new buildings; rest of campus given a facelift; some internal facelift; equipping an audio studio; many Colleges adding a second or third compressed video classroom.

UW-Eau Claire: Started renovation of Science Hall, shutting down two wings for next year; then other wings; relocating classes. At end of that project will have 14 comparably equipped classrooms; retirement of video support position; reviewing needs; work with computing and network folks to share streaming media service; administrative changes; interim positions.

UW-Milwaukee: Student task force on web design activities; students work with faculty and staff in establishing goals, designing and maintaining web sites; finished campus design work of campus broadband system; can support up to six broadband backfeed channels of high quality video; took over some dark fiber, feed back to control room, and improved quality of productions; major classrooms in design; DE classroom that will seat 85, in one of buildings that has disabilities education program; Chancellor rolling out Milwaukee Idea initiative -- UWM is here, we're part of the community and how can we help you with whatever you need.

Ed Meachen, Wisconsin ADL Co-Lab: In November Judy Brown and Ed Meachen participated in a PC Week Shoot-out, hosted by Department of Defense on Learner Management Systems. DOCENT was the winning product among seven products evaluated. DOCENT demonstrations are planned in Wisconsin at LI and WTCS. Advanced Distributed Learning Lab, hosted at DOD, has a charge to develop distributed learning systems, including developing learning object standards. Several Co-Labs have been established. Wisconsin was named as the first higher education co-lab partner. The partnership includes the UW System and WTCS. Learning object standards and learner management systems are the two defined projects to date. A Memo of Agreement was signed January 10th at The Pyle Center. We have committed to some space and efforts in partnership. One of the next steps for this initiative is formulation of a think tank to get this moving forward. A steering committee will guide the CO-lab The biggest advantage we have is to bring faculty in to test products and standards, participate in carefully regulated demonstrations of products that will enhance teaching and learning, etc. CO-Lab fits into an overall direction that we're going with the utilities, supporting distributed learning. There is potential for more utilities down the road. See: http://www.wiadlcolab.org.

TEACH ad hoc video committee report has been released. World moving to convergence. DOA has created a research and development arm, staffed with four people.

Denny Gilbertson: Status report on the ATM project. Installed a new MCU in The Pyle Center in December to support increasing ISDN use, plus allow ATM capability. Also installed gateways. UW Colleges converted five sites from ISDN capability to ATM. However, experience has proven that the network is not sufficiently stable to reliably support classes. Problem manifested itself with frozen video, lost audio, etc. The focus is now on the ATM network, First Virtual equipment at sites and centrally, and rest of BadgerNet. UW Colleges staff converting five sites back to ISDN. Network and other testing will continue in a more deliberative mode.

January 28, 2000

EMTC members present: Marcia Baird, UW-Extension; Charles Cottle, UW-Whitewater; Nick Dvoracek, UW-Oshkosh; Bob Fuller, UW-Eau Claire; John Grozik, UW-Milwaukee; Joe Hagaman, UW-Stout; Bob Jokisch, UW System; John Nierengarten, UW-River Falls; Peter Nordgren, UW-Superior; Ron Weseloh, UW-Stevens Point.

Absent: Colleen Garrity, UW-Platteville; Jim Jorstad, UW-Lacrosse; Kate Pietri, UW-Parkside; Mike Schmitt, UW-Green Bay; Steve Siehr, UW-Madison

Guests: Rich Dirks, UW-Eau Claire; Joe Eisele, UW-Extension; Jeff Finlay, UW-Extension; Denny Gilbertson, UW-Extension; Jody McCann, DOA; Terry Reda, UW System; Guy Stalnaker, UW-Madison

UW-Eau Claire is addressing fair use and copyright issues; gathering information. Rich Dirks asked how many campuses have campus-wide copyright policies and a copyright representative. He has met with Glenda Morgan of UW System on this. He indicated he would develop a list of copyright contacts at each campus. Morgan is also working on a systemwide copyright policy/working group.

UW Superior: Upgraded one of two DE classrooms; close to state standards. Using Endeavor Voyager system for equipment loan; looking forward to implementing reservation module. Department with no name; merger of Media Resources, PC and Networking Services; department to be named.

Jeff Finlay, Cooperative Extension: DE Video Production unit renamed Digital Media production. Producing eight national satellite videoconferences, including six with the Learning Institute for Non-Profits. Exploring converting downlinks to digital. Involved with video streaming initiatives.

UW-Extension: In the search/screen process for a new Chancellor; installed the new video bridge in December to allow for expanded ISDN capability, plus ATM and IP video capability; Governor Thompson signed part of the budget bill in a ceremony at The Pyle Center; some of the CO-Lab activities will be housed in The Pyle Center.

UW-Stout: Stout Solutions handout. New Communications Center building on schedule for next fall; all systems will be transitioned over during holiday break. 13 classrooms scheduled to upgrade to multimedia classrooms. WONDER retreat scheduled in February; existing contract expires in 2002.

J. Guy Stalnaker, Media Communications Technology, UW-Madison DoIT, gave a presentation on MS Office 2000 features. His PowerPoint visuals are located at: http://bagend.doit.wisc.edu.

Jody McCann, DOA: Oversaw migration of BadgerNet; director of Telecommunications since 1988; in Wisconsin state government since 1984. He is now in a new position as Director of Research Development. He and staff are interviewing agencies about research and development needs. Part of his role is to facilitate interchange between agencies. Wants to strengthen relationships with UW. He has an open agenda; is open to ideas. Wants to identify practical information within agencies and external sources. Staff will take on one or two applied projects -- IP telephony is one example among many that multiple agencies are interested in.

Terry Reda, Office of Capital Planning and Budgeting, met with the group. She reviewed the history of some of the classroom remodeling funding over the years. A 1996 survey reaffirmed need for funding in classrooms; 95-97 first received funding; have been successful each biennium; secured over 25M in classroom renovation and instructional technology funding; plan to receive 3-6M in capital budget; additional moneys being requested; 300 classrooms over last four years and through 01; need is greater than 50M; need to reassess real needs out there. She handed out a draft survey that will be used to quantify current magnitude of need. It will be sent to IBRs and CIOs. Plan to distribute in the next week or two and give about six weeks to complete. EMTC reps were encouraged to send input on draft document to Joe Hagaman; Hagaman, John Nierengarten and Bob Fuller will meet via teleconference for final input.

Spring meeting date: to be determined.

Minutes submitted by Marcia Baird, secretary.