I have been following the Bates Online Media blog for about a year.  They have been blogging as they’ve worked through a pretty dramatic redesign of the college web site.  The fact that is built on WordPress is probably the least important feature (but the WordPress geek in me does thrill just a bit at the news.)  With my eldest now a freshman at Springfield college, we all spent a lot of time as consumers on college sites — and from the user perspective the Bates site is very smartly laid out, and is easy to use.  Nice to see such a great end-result after a careful and productive planning process.

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One of the new tech-memes is that the Internet brings a new information abundance, and businesses built on a model of information scarcity, like newspapers and universities, are doomed.  I think many aspects of the delivery of information and where learning takes place is changing — and it needs to given the many new opportunities offered by the internet.  But to predict that the experience of taking on-line courses replaces the in-person experience of participating in a learning community is foolish.  The experience of going to college is so much more than just the time spent in class.  Institutions that only focus on the traditional classroom are probably at risk.  But those that recognize and embrace the full value of a multifaceted learning community have a value that will endure, and will actually be enriched by the internet.

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Peer to peer university — couldn’t that be a description of the web in general?  YouTube alone has an incredible wealth of educational videoa.  From learning how to play a popular (even not so popular) song on the guitar, to how to install a local version of WordPress there is a already a lot of peer to peer learning available.   The mission statement of P2PU says their purpose “is to leverage the power of the Internet and social software to enable communities of people to support learning for each other.”  Do we need institutions there to organize and validate these resources?  Or will they just get in the way?  If they can offer credit, CEUs, certificates, degrees, federal student aid, and other trappings of traditional educational institutions, does that help? (none of which currently seem to be there at P2PU)  Time will tell.

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My college career started at Middlesex Community College.  It was there when I needed it, and I had an excellent semester.  It gave me the boost I needed to get back onto the college track.  In fact it is still one of the more memorable semesters of  my many college experiences.   My professors exhibited a real commitment to teaching.  Bravo to our president for his focus on the community colleges.

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Campus Technology Magazine‘s latest issue lists 11 innovative projects.  In the portal category is a series of special research portals provided through the library.  The aim is to make faculty and student research work more efficient.  The portals utilize open source software,  WordPress and CWIS.  The stated benefits of using these technologies include an easy interface for end users and relatively easy deployment.

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Server administrators, web-application programmers, web site designers, help desk support, software companies, technology providers, government officials, and yes, even end-users — we are all responsible for information security on the internet.    We need to not fall for knee-jerk, and ineffective solutions — i.e.  strong passwords — or assume that certain technologies will keep us safe — i.e.  “I use a mac and they don’t get viruses”.  What can we do?  I am not a security expert with specific prescriptions to give — but remember, easy prescriptions don’t exist.  What is needed is an ongoing conversation — at my workplace the CIO recently held the first of a series of campus-wide forums to provide technology staff with information, and to gather ideas from all of us.  This is a good first step.  Here are a couple of other ideas: Read the rest of this entry »