Campus Computing NewsBy Dr. Maurice Leatherbury, Senior Director of Academic ComputingNew Student E-mail PolicyAt its February 11th, 2000 meeting, the UNT Board of Regents approved a new policy on student E-mail. The brief policy reads:
The purpose of the new policy is to allow UNT officials, including faculty members, to send official messages through E-mail rather than through "snail mail" (standard postal mail.) Academic Computing Services is in the final stages of developing and testing a bulk E-mail system from which authorized individuals on campus can send messages to selected groups of students at UNT: that system should be operational by the end of February, 2000. In the meantime, we are encouraging students to sign up for UNT's student E-mail service. In December, ACS brought up a new Web-based E-mail client that doesn't require the installation of a separate mail client, since the new client (which we named "EagleMail" and which is accessible at http://eaglemail.unt.edu) runs on any standard Web browser. Students can activate their mail service through a Web form at http://getlogin.unt.edu/ without ever setting foot on campus.* Academic Computing will send fliers to faculty and administrators announcing the availability of the bulk E-mail system as soon as it's ready for use. We are asking all faculty members, in particular, to publicize the mail policy and the easy-to-use mail client since the success of the bulk E-mail system is dependent upon most if not all students reading their E-mail. Multimedia Production Workstations Being Rolled OutA grant from the Telecommunications Infrastructure Fund last year enabled UNT to purchase eight multimedia production workstations that are primarily intended for development of distributed learning courseware. The powerful workstations were designed through a collaboration between the Center for Distributed Learning and the Microcomputer Maintenance Shop. The computer portions of the workstations have been built by MMS, while other peripheral equipment, such as digital video cameras, VCR's, video monitors, etc. were purchased separately and have been integrated into the workstations. Numerous software packages to edit and publish multimedia, such as Adobe Premiere, Real Producer Pro, and Adobe Photoshop, are included in the workstations. The grant proposal specified that the workstations are to be used to enhance distributed learning course materials through the delivery of streaming audio and video that are created using the new machines. To that end, Academic Computing has ordered a streaming video server, RealVideo software, and a 300GB disk storage device to hold audio and video content. The hardware hasn't been delivered yet (mid-February,) but we expect that the server will up and running by the Summer I term. The following colleges, schools, or departments are receiving the multimedia production workstations and interested faculty should contact the appropriate computing support person in these areas:
A word of caution is advised here: There is a steep learning curve in learning how to do multimedia production and those faculty members who want to get started in integrating audio and video into their online course materials will have to be deeply committed to the process. We are advising everyone to "think small" in the beginning, perhaps just videotaping a short introduction to a WebCT course, for example, and linking it into the course as a way of putting a human voice and face onto what can be an impersonal mode of instructional delivery. * See "Campus Computing News -- January, 2000" for further discussion on EagleMail. |