Meeting Notes

Vicki Kolowitz
James Lee
Wallace McClendon
Ed Neal
Greg Newby
Jim Noblitt (Chair)

Call to Order
Welcome and Introductions
Announcements

FITAC annual report well-received. Sue Estroff sends her thanks to the committee.

Bob Henshaw has updated the FITAC Web site. If anyone has suggestions for documents to include on the site (such as copies of letters from FITAC to the provost), let Jim know.

CIO Search Committee

• Search firm (Jerry Baker, Atlanta) has been hired.
• Chancellor would like to see diversity in search process.

Knowledgefoundry (Skip Bollenbacher and Megan Bell)

Creating multimedia learning materials in a wide range of disciplines.

• Funding model: carry-over funds from initial investments (Provost, CIO, IBM) and external grants.
• Moving away from mediabooks to modular content. More attractive to funders.
• Looking at fee-for-service arrangements on campus.
• Students working on the projects are gaining experience.
• Hiring some new internal staff to cut contract programming and design costs.
• Mediabook on Turner/Hardy/Wagner with English professor complete; mediabook with Business school professor still under development; genomics microarray module is also in development; projects with sciences, Dentistry, University Press being considered.
• Evaluation efforts proceeding on a number of fronts. Sheila Englebardt brought on board recently to spearhead that effort.

Additional information available at: http://knowledgefoundry.unc.edu

CCI Student Survey Results

Continued discussion on the survey on laptop use by freshmen who entered in 2001 and in 2001. The CCI Study Group includes representatives from the Center for Instructional Technology, the Center for Teaching and Learning, the College of Arts and Sciences (OASIS) and Institutional Research. Report presented at FITAC meeting includes some interesting findings not included in the report on the Institutional Research site. They were intended to stimulate discussion and did.

• FITAC can provide study group with additional questions. Examples (Why do some instructors use laptops in classroom and others don't? When and why do students bring their laptops to campus, and what computing resources do they use on campus when they do not? To what extent are students using Instant Messaging? Are students more likely to use computer-based distractions than traditional distractions? Laptop vs. desktop? What are students using laptops for when they bring them to campus? Laptops in the classroom (occasionally, regularly).
• True longitudinal study looks at same participants over time. This one doesn't.
• Mean information not taking outliers into account. (See question 18). Be careful about conclusions being drawn from various numbers. Must include all information, not just select.
• Know what you're going to do with data before you do the survey.

The survey questions and a copy of the full report are available online at the Institutional Research Web site: http://www.ais.unc.edu/ir/reports.html. The report presented at this FITAC meeting was designed specifically for the FITAC meeting and is not the same as the online report.

FITAC Agenda

Jim summarized FITAC's agenda for the remainder of the semester:

• Continue following the CIO search
  
• Open a discussion of the grants program: Should we start a new
  initiative, find our own funding, etc?
  
• Continue working on incentives for academic use of technology
  
• Continue discussions of IT assessment (focus on report presented
  today)
  
• Develop a Web site with examples (not necessarily exemplars)
  of instructional technology use
  

Instructional Technology Examples Site

Jim Noblitt will work with TICC members this summer on a format for demonstrating effective uses of instructional technology.

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Agenda: TBA