Featured Speaker: 06/10/2009: Alumni Association Conference

This morning I talked to a large group of Alumni Association staff about ideas related to connecting communities.  The talk was titled, Emerging Trends for Connecting Communities, and focused on the emergent opportunities within social environments, content creation spaces, and with the rise of mobility.  It is always quite a bit of fun getting to talk to people outside my specific area of focus and I always discover that we have far more in common than I expect going in.

Presentation: 05/14/2009: Faculty Academy 2009

I will be a featured presenter and a workshop leader at the University of Mary Washington's Faculty Academy 2009. I'm not sure what I will be talking about specifically, but I know since I am heading down to Jim Groom's turf I'll need to step it up a bit. I'm using the same title as I usually do for my talks, although I have some plans to mix it up a bit.
Engaging the New Classroom Conversation
During this talk we will investigate key trends impacting educators in their overall design of learning. Focusing on the emergence of user-created content, social spaces, and mobile devices we will take an integrated look at how we can better utilize technology within these areas to meet the needs of our students. We will also explore how these technologies have, and continue to, impact both faculty and learners and review some active examples within each area. During this talk, we will focus attention on how educators can leverage selected disruptive technologies to shape learning outcomes in new ways.
From the conference website:

The Faculty Academy for Teaching and Learning Technologies is a free annual event hosted by the University of Mary Washington. This year's conference will be held May 13-14, 2009, at the University of Mary Washington's College of Graduate and Professional Studies. For the past 14 years, Faculty Academy has brought together faculty and staff from both campuses at UMW to share and celebrate the year's efforts and accomplishments in the classroom, with teaching and learning technologies as the specific focus (or, one might say, catalyst) of the event.

Keynote: 04/29/2009: Annual One to One Computing Conference

I have once again been asked to participate as a keynote for the 2009 Annual One to One Computing Conference to be held April 27-29 here at Penn State. I have been involved the last three years, keynoting two years ago, and participating in an informal conversation last year. It is always a great time! My good friends Kyle Peck and Catherine Augustine make this amazing event happen and I am honored to be a part of it once again.
This year I did a talk titled, "If that's scholarship then we are all doomed."
I enjoyed this very much. Great questions from the audience and I found that we are all dealing with the same set of issues for the most part. David Warlick was there and wrote an overview of the session.
Download a PDF of my Slides.

Panel: 04/06/2009: Chronicle of Higher Education Technology Forum

I was already attending and presenting at the Chronicle of Higher Eduction Technology Forum in April, so when my friend and colleague from Apple, Jason Ediger called and asked if I would help kick the event off I said yes immediately. I've known and admired Jason's work for many years now and have always wanted a chance to work with him on a presentation … a perfect opportunity to pull our collective voices together.
Building the Classroom of the Future
From iTunes U to Twitter, the world is a classroom more than ever before thanks to technology. Today's students learn the scientific method from the Discovery Channel's MythBusters, hear the basics of physics from MIT's Walter Lewin on iTunes U, and debate politics on Facebook. Are these "classrooms" poised to be even more popular venues for learning in the future? How can colleges leverage these tools?
Presenters

  • Cole W. Camplese, director, education technology services, Pennsylvania State University at University Park
  • Jason Ediger, director of iTunes U and mobile learning, Apple Inc.

Download the PDF of my slides.

Panel: 04/06/2009: Chronicle of Higher Education Technology Forum

I will be attending and participating as a panelist at the Chronicle of Higher Eduction Technology Forum in April.  I will be part of the panel, From Eager Applicant to Generous Graduate: Managing the Student Life Cycle. From the event's page:

Technology is reshaping college admissions, course-management systems are making it possible to detect students in academic trouble before it gets too deep, and development offices are creating social networks that energize alumni giving. But not every high-tech strategy pays off for colleges. This session will highlight expensive pitfalls as well as rewarding opportunities.

I am really looking forward to being a part of this and to be simply attending the event. I am honored to be a part of the panel and for being asked to participate.
Moderator:

  • Jeffrey J. Selingo, The Chronicle of Higher Education

Panelists:

  • Stephanie Balmer, dean of admissions and financial aid, Dickinson College
  • John Campbell, associate vice president for information technology, Purdue University
  • Cole W. Camplese, director, Education Technology Services, Pennsylvania State University at University Park
  • Andrew Shaindlin, executive director, Caltech Alumni Association

Keynote: 03/27/2009: Penn State Harrisburg

I've been invited to keynote the instructional technology event at Penn State Harrisburg on March 27th.  It sounds like a good event to spread awareness of the things we are promoting for teaching and learning with technology at Penn State.  I'll share thoughts on how students are participating in emerging online spaces and thoughts on how we should work together to meet them there.  I'll post slides and follow up notes after the event.

Panel: 02/20/2009: Social Media and Twitter

I have been invited to participate on a panel at the College of Information Sciences and Technology's Graduate Symposium.  I'll share time with folks from higher education and industry to discuss and debate the role of social media in teaching, learning, and research. It will be fun going back and participating in an event from my old stomping grounds! From the Symposium site:

Collaboration and community are key characteristics of Web 2.0 technologies. These social mediating services have garnered considerable usage. One new form of social communication on the Web is micro-blogging, using Web services such as Twitter, Jaiku, Facebook (status postings), Pownce, and FriendFeed. Micro-blogging is a form of communication in which users can describe things of interest and express attitudes that they are willing to share with others in short posts (i.e., micro-blogs) distributed by instant messages, mobile phones, email, or the Web. These micro-blogs are short comments usually delivered to a network of associates.
Micro-blogging is new means of communication, allowing people to share these thoughts almost anywhere (i.e., while driving, getting coffee, or sitting at their computer) to almost anyone connected (e.g., Web, cellular phone, IM, email) on a scale that has not been seen in past. While the shortness of the micro-blog (usually limited to about 140 characters) keeps people from writing long thoughts, it is precisely the micro part that makes these blogs unique from other communication mediums like blogs, Webpages, and online reviews. In short, these micro-blogs are immediate, ubiquitous, and scalable. Since they are online, they are also typically accessible by anyone with an Internet connection.
There are also archival in the sense that these micro-blogs permanently exist and are searchable via Web search engines and other services. In this panel, we will examine micro-blogs as utterances and expressions and their possible long term effect on the way we communicate.

After the event I will be sure to post thoughts and a reflection.

Presentation: 01/21/2009: Educause Learning Initiative

Also while in Orlando for ELI, I have the additional privilege of sharing work being done here at Penn State as it relates to blogging and ePortfolios.  I get to share the stage with Dr. Carla Zembal-Saul and Brad Kozlek.  Both of these individuals have had a huge impact on the success of both our blogging and portfolio advancement in the last year.  Carla was a faculty fellow within ETS last summer and her work pushed us in new directions and have helped us rethink the blog platform as a social portfolio space.  Brad has been the project manager for our blogging initiative and has some serious insight into this space.  It will be a real blast to share these experiences!  Session description below:

The focus of this session is to discuss the blogging platform at Penn State as a vehicle for student e-portfolios. We will share the ways we have begun to take full advantage of the fundamental aspects of blogging and the richness of the blogging culture to engage Penn State students in professional discourse communities around frameworks and problems of practice associated with their chosen professions. In cases where this information might be used by programs for accreditation, reporting, and/or self-assessment purposes, we will share our vision for capturing student evidence at specified points across their programs.

See details at the Educuase site. You can grab our slides as a PDF.