NERCOMP is hosting a day-long event  called "Connecting Technology & Liberal Education: Theories and Case Studies." It will take place April 5, 2006 from 9:00-3:15 at the University of Massachusetts - Amherst, Campus Center.

DESCRIPTION:
Nearly all institutions of higher education profess commitment to the ideals of liberal education, although these ideals are often expressed in ambiguous language. In this session, we will consider various definitions of liberal education, explore how liberal education's goals might be both supported and changed by information technology, and outline strategies for evaluating the efficacy of various approaches to teaching the liberal arts. We will also showcase the recently launched Academic Commons (http://www.academiccommons.org) and demonstrate ways in which it can serve as a platform for ongoing investigation into these questions.

Event Schedule:
8:00am - 9:00am Registration and Coffee

9:00am - 10:00am What's So "Liberal" About Higher Ed?
Speaker: Jo Ellen Parker, Executive Director, National Institute for Technology and Liberal Education (NITLE)

"Liberal Education" is like "freedom" or "interdependence" - a term invoked to convey a sense of undisputed good while implying a wide range of contested meanings. The claims and aspirations of colleges and universities reflect various simultaneous theories of "liberal education," some incompatible and some complementary. And these various theories have fundamental implications for how an institution understands the potentials and the perils of digital technology. Parsing what is meant by "liberal education" can be a useful way to clarify institutional attitudes, values and strategy both generally and with specific regard to instructional technology.

10:00am - 10:15am Break

10:15am - 11:15am Emerging Literacies and the Liberal Arts
Speakers:
David Bogen, Executive Director Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies, Emerson College
Eric Gordon, Assistant Professor Visual and Media Arts, Emerson College
James Sheldon, Associate Professor New Media, Emerson College

Digital media have undoubtedly changed our interactions with the world around us. As a result, colleges and universities have invested in creating or adopting new methods of knowing that respond to these changes. These "emerging literacies" shape both potential topics and potential resources for the various fields of inquiry that constitute the Liberal Arts. We can, for instance, study the history of visual representation from the ancients to contemporary multimedia art; we can do so using the machines on our desks as access points to a global collection of images, texts, and other materials; and we can express our findings in a variety of textual and multimedia forms to a range of potential audiences. In this session, we will report on two projects-the "Digital Culture" first year program and the MediaBase multimedia environment-and explore how each addresses the relationship between the Liberal Arts and the new media. Our aim is to clarify and document practices, by which digital media are being incorporated into teaching and learning, and to thereby demonstrate the potential of these practices, but also to put them into perspective. While acknowledging that technology has created new contexts for knowledge production, we will question whether and to what extent these "emerging literacies" represent a fundamental break with other, presumably "receding" or alternative, methods of thought and artistic work, or simply offer new tools through which to expand existing ways of knowing.

11:15am - 12:15pm A Different Mission, A Different Method: Assessment of Liberal Arts Education
Speaker: Dan Chambliss, Eugene M. Tobin Distinguished Professor, Department of Sociology, Hamilton College

Many liberal colleges and faculties harbor a deep, and in some ways justifiable, hostility to the standard model of undergraduate education assessment. The nature of the education offered at such colleges, and the means, by which it is delivered, make a different kind of assessment necessary -- but it can be done. With major support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Hamilton College has conducted a seven-year study of undergraduate education in a liberal arts setting. This talk will share general, lessons learned about how to conduct assessment that is intellectually sound, practically useful, and true to the mission of liberal arts.

12:15pm - 1:15pm Lunch

1:15pm - 2:45pm The Liberal Arts College and Technology: Who Captures Whom?
Speaker: Bryan Alexander, Director for Emerging Technologies, National Institute for Technology and Liberal Education (NITLE)

What are the distinct ways by which liberal arts colleges approach information technology? How do non-liberal arts schools approach the teaching of the liberal arts? How do we leverage our campus practices and traditions to grapple with digital possibilities? What are uniquely liberal arts in using blogs, course management systems, podcasting, or learning objects? This faculty panel will show how faculty from an array of colleges and universities selects and repurposes technologies to express and enhances its identity. We will discuss experiments with new technologies in the context of practical support, as well as the history and implications of adoption curves. The conclusion surveys emerging technologies, their initial appropriation by liberal arts campuses, and next steps based on extrapolation from recent history.

2:45pm - 3:15pm Introducing The Academic Commons
Speaker: Mike Roy, Director of Academic Computing & Digital Library Projects
Wesleyan University

The Academic Commons (http://www.academiccommons.org) is a recently launched web publication and community that brings together faculty, technologists, librarians, and other stakeholders in the academic enterprise to foster collaboration, and to critically examine the complex relationship of new technology and liberal arts education. This session will provide a brief introduction to the Academic Commons, and highlight ways in which NERCOMP members can both benefit from and contribute to this initiative.

3:15pm End 

For registration information, please go to:
http://www.nercomp.org/events/event_single.aspx?id=344