Application || 1998 - 1999 Project Descriptions || 1999 - 2000 Project Descriptions
2000-2001 Project Descriptions || 2001-2002 Project Descriptions || Buffalo State College1998-99 TIP Challenge Grants
In November 1998, the Interim Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs and the Vice President for Finance and Management awarded $50,000 in TIP (Transformative Technological Innovations to Invigorate Instructional Practices) Challenge grants to 6 collaborative teams of faculty and staff. The winning proposals fulfilled the original aim of the TIP program to foster "realistic, substantive involvement of broad-based groups of faculty and professional staff…to infuse technology into instructional practices" at Buffalo State. Following are executive summaries of the projects funded under the 1998-99 TIP Challenge Grant program.
Multimedia on the Internet for Instructional Purposes; Project Coordinator – Joaquin Carbonara, Mathematics Department; Project Collaborator(s) - Ilya Grinberg, Technology Department
This project is designed to carry out a small, but important piece of the big puzzle that people call "using multimedia for instructional purposes with the aid of computers." The project team will prepare a series of instructional modules as samples of what can be done using the WWW or WWW-like networking tools that could be incorporated into practically any course. Experimenting with a variety of tools, the team will prepare a series of instructional modules for sharing with the campus community. Their plans include preparation of digital broadcasts on campus that can be received by desktop computers using multiple broadcast technology and multimedia presentations embedded on Web pages using Quick Time Pro, Movie Player, Real Audio server or other software. The team also has plans to develop an interface so that equipment can be remotely controlled. The data will be analyzed and used for demonstration purposes in the classroom.
Campus Self Help Resource Centers and Web Page; Project Coordinators – Stephen Chris, Counseling Center and Joseph O’Gorman, Counseling Center; Project Collaborators – Terry Stephan-Hains, Weigel Health Center, Stephanie Zuckerman-Aviles, Career Development Center, Karen Johnson, Academic Skills Center, Donna Limburg, Education Intervention Program.
Among the many applications of the Worldwide Web are its use as a source for career, psychological, and health education as well as psychosocial support and self-help (Suler, 1998). Of course the Web, while accessible to all, is not subject to censor, review or quality control and there is growing evidence of unhealthy, even addictive, use of the Net, particularly by college-aged students. The project team will research Web resources relevant to psychosocial support, health promotion, psychological education, and study skills. A Buffalo State "Self-Help Web Page," integrated to the BSC web site, will be constructed linking viewers to resources that have been reviewed for their quality, safety and appropriateness. Central to the purpose of this project is the concept of providing quality control to the self-help and support resources on the Internet as well as providing a service to those who may need help associated with unhealthy Internet use.
Integration of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) into Elementary and Middle School Curriculum; Project Coordinator - Tao Tang, Geography and Planning Department; Project Collaborators – Raymond Waxmonsky, Geography and Planning Department, Maria Ceprano, Elementary Education and Reading Department.
The project team will conduct a workshop to introduce GIS technology, which is the use of personal computers to map and analyze spatial data, into elementary and middle school curriculums across Western New York. The workshop will enroll in-service teachers and elementary education majors who have completed one of the GIS in Education courses offered by the Department of Geography and Planning in the spring semester, 1999. The workshop will combine elementary education majors and teachers into teams with each team developing a lesson plan that is based upon and uses GIS and fits into the New York State curriculum at the elementary and middle school level. Completed lesson plans will be disseminated to selected elementary and middle schools in Western New York in the course of the fall semester, 1999. The workshop will be offered during the week of June 28 through July 2, 1999, in the new GIS Laboratory under construction in the Department of Geography and Planning.
Portfolio Development: Preparing Portfolios Electronically; Project Coordinator – Carol Stevens, Elementary Education and Reading Department; Project Collaborators – Wendy Patterson, Elementary Education and Reading, Leslie Day, Elementary Education and Reading, Sharon Raimondi, Exceptional Education, Robin Freedman, Earth Science and Science Education, Barbara Bontempo, English, Maria Pacheo, Chemistry, Jill Kinney, Hoover Elementary School
Portfolio development has long been a goal of professional studies majors at Buffalo State. The departments of Elementary Education and Reading, Exceptional Education, and the Secondary Education Interdisciplinary Unit (SEIU) have been working with preservice teachers on portfolio development both as a means of assessment and as a professional document useful in job interviews. The project team plans to investigate portfolio development using electronic media. Given various directives from the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education, presentation of teacher candidates’ portfolio materials could only serve to illuminate a focus on reflective practices currently encouraged by teacher education programs and other instructional programs at Buffalo State. This project is designed to allow students to have earlier experience with this type of assessment that may facilitate the development of their own portfolio over time rather than confining this activity to the last few quarters of their undergraduate program. Additionally, developing electronic portfolios for professional purposes will enhance preservice educators’ ability to use this same type of portfolio with their future students in elementary, middle, and high school settings.
Infusing Image Processing Technology into BSC Courses and Beyond; Project Coordinator – Robin Freedman, Science Education; Project Collaborators - Jack Mack, Earth Sciences, Art Gielow, Whitworth Ferguson Planetarium.
The science education unit is dedicated to service those students who wish to become secondary science teachers and to assist future and current teachers master a variety of skills with different technologies. In order for this to happen, students must be supplied with knowledge and experience with a variety of technological tools. The project team will use the TIP grant to upgrade the projection system of the Whitworth Ferguson Planetarium to incorporate the use of image processing technology into planetarium shows. The planetarium will be an information resource that uses visual models to teach content and problem solving. Technology and its use can only enhance instruction, especially in the science methods courses. Astronomical and meteorological concepts are difficult to conceptualize. With the use of the planetarium as a technological tool, conceptual understanding should come easier to students. The reinstatement of public shows will also help in attracting students to the sciences and to increasing their understanding of planetary and stellar motions.
‘CommonSpace’: A Network Independent Cross-Platform Collaborative Writing Environment Project; Project Coordinator – Sarah Slavin, Political Science; Project Collaborators – Mary Davis, Business, Cynthia Eggleston, Educational Opportunity Program, LeeAnn Grace, International Education, Susan Mondscheim Leist, Humanities, Terence McDonald, Performing Arts, Lisa Murray, Academic Skills Center, Robert Pursley, Criminal Justice, Bill Raffel, Communications, Robin Sanders, Mathematics, Cherry Searle, Nutrition, Hospitality and Fashion, Ron Stewart, Sociology, Ralph Wahlstrom, Sandra Weatherbee, New Student Programs, Sally Weidler, Elementary Education and Reading, Stephanie Zuckerman-Aviles, Career Development Center, Cass Clark, Just Buffalo Literary Center, Inc.
The project team plans to introduce the campus to ‘CommonSpace’ 3.0, a software package developed by the Sixth Floor Media Division of Houghton Mifflin, through a group project focused on quality campus-wide technological support with community-based application. CommonSpace is a quality pedagogical means for providing effective asynchronous, chronological feedback on written projects. It functions synchronously, facilitating, among others, research referral via cyberlink, co-authoring, distance learning, and conferencing through on-line chat. Significantly, CommonSpace is network independent. It may be used with different systems and may also include separate locations, lending itself overall to building common workspace by means of a cross-platform component. The CommonSpace project looks forward to an intensive spring semester rotation among direct collaborators and clients indirectly affected by collaborators’ involvement. The project team hopes to familiarize the college community with this package and, thereby, positively reinforce and extend community among us.
Direct questions and applications to Nancy Herrmann at ext. 6910,
or e-mail: herrmanl@bscmail.buffalostate.edu
