Past SITA Collaborations
Summer 2007
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Music Therapy (Summer 2007)
Kate Gfeller and Mary Adamek requested SITA support to turn a mass of old VHS tapes of clinical examples into usable classroom material. SITAs helped take selections of the tapes and converted them into custom-designed DVDs that allowed the material to be accessed more quickly and effectively. Both instructors were left with a variety of solutions for continuing the conversions on their own. This partly involved training to use iLife video tools and Adobe Premiere Elements 3.0.
Communication Studies (Summer 2007)
The Communication Studies department required SITA assistance with developing a specialized ICON site that would provide serve as an introduction to the department for incoming Freshmen. SITAS worked with Kristine Fitch to design the site with modules in the content section that cover departmental topics like advising and honors requirements. Each module concluded with a quiz over the material to check for comprehension. These modules and quizzes will be integrated into the Core Concepts course, which is the main prerequisite course in Communication that every student must take before they can take other Communication courses.
Hancher Project (Summer 2007)
Every summer Hancher hosts two performers that will visit local towns and perform for children, adults, and minorities. The annual grant review requires that these performances be documented for evaluation purposes. In conjunction with Digital Media Services, the SITA program assisted in capturing video off of two HD video camera and edited clips together to create five-minute movies of what each performer achieved.
Music (Summer 2007)
SITAs are involved in providing training the music department and making custom widgets for their Recital Attendance course. Steve Bowers, from Instructional Services, is constructing an online database to streamline the attendance taking procedure and is working with SITAs to make the database accessible through customized ICON widgets.
Spring 2007
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Art/Art History (Spring 2007)
The SITA program made resources available to the Art/Art History Department to support their transition from a homegrown departmental Course Management System to Iowa Courses Online (ICON).
Additionally, training to integrate technology into the classroom was made available. Some of those projects included training for Julie Hochstrasser to import video she shot on location in Dutch colonies around the world into iMovie. She learned how to manipulate the video and select and compile her footage into clips that could be integrated as a teaching tool in her art history courses.
Brenda Longfellow, from Art History, received training on using Dreamweaver to make websites for her courses.
Mathematics (Spring 2007)
The Mathematics department was awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant for the Vertical Integration of Research and Education (VIGRE) project. In light of the new grant, math professor Jonathan Simon requested SITA assistance to update the project's webpage. The website was made-over and given a cleaner design and dynamic features such as a web application form that can be linked to a database.
Health/Sport Studies (Spring 2007)
The SITA program assisted professor Michael Lomax with several technology projects over the spring semester this year. He requested training for launching an audio podcast of his Race and Ethnicity in U.S. Sports course to be made available to his students via iTunes. This was the first undergraduate podcast project that Campus Technology Service has made available. In addition to providing basic ICON training and customizable widgets for professor Lomax, SITAs worked on converting VHS tapes of sports documentaries into DVDs for easier accessibility to students.
Geo-Science (Spring 2007)
Nancy Budd requested help with providing video content to her students through her ICON site. SITAs worked with her to find the video application that fit her needs best. In the end, QuickTime proved to be the best format and SITAs helped get the video embedded in her ICON site and also trained her to be able to repeat the procedure for future classes.
Social Work (Spring 2007)
The Social Work department had several media projects that SITAs were involved with in Spring of 2007. Alison Oliver had DV tapes of student generated content that she want to make accessible to her class. She received SITA training on how to capture video from the DV tapes, how to edit the video with iMovie, and how to convert the video into streaming flash video. After all of the conversions were done, the links were posted to her website where students could watch the streaming video and critique each other's work.
Mercedes Bern-Klug also received SITA assistance to learn how to convert VHS tapes to streaming video. She also was trained to manage her ICON course and set up email filter through her Outlook email client.
Political Science (Spring 2007)
Tom Rice sought SITA help to make custom widgets in his ICON course. The widgets linked to the Iowa Legislature website and also pulled in RSS feeds to keep students updated on current related news. State legislators were registered with guest accounts to the site so they could interact with the students enrolled in the course. The students researched subjects that the legislators will be discussing in the spring session. The legislators will incorporate this research into the sessions when introducing bills.
Also in Political Science, Vicki Hesli was interested in custom designing her ICON site for Intro to Politics in the Muslim World. With SITA assistance she was able to manipulate the appearance of the course to give it a more personalized effect. In another ICON course site for Ethnic and Religious Conflict in the Muslim World, professor Hesli used SITA help to show her how to include RSS feeds and custom widgets to make her site more dynamic.
Language Media Center (Spring/ Summer 2007)
During the Spring and Summer of 2007 the SITA program made regular resources available to the language media center. A SITA was assigned to assist professors and instructors with their technology needs on a daily basis. This assistance ranged from training on the newly released Windows Vista to creating websites and editing audio and video material. Some examples of specific needs in the department include converting recordings of Dante's Divina Comedia from records to mp3s for Deborah Contrada. The recordings in mp3 format were more accessible to students and could easily be played through her ICON site. Sue Otto also had a collection of records in Spanish that were converted into mp3s.
Fall 2004
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Year of the Arts and Humanities
In conjunction with the University-wide emphasis on the YAH (Academic Year 2004-05), the SITA program worked with the Division of Performing Arts including the departments of music, theater and dance. Performing arts instructors were assisted in the creation of ICON/WebCT sites as well as other web-design projects and trained in digitial audio/video software and applications.
Spring 2004
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The TWIST transition
In Spring 2004 the TWIST program, a website-development and hosting service provided by the Main Library, ended. The SITA program assisted TWIST instructors transition to ITS-supported websites. About 80 faculty members were using TWIST sites at the time of transition. About 40% of these faculty are from the department of English, and about 60% are from other departments (primarily from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences).
Fall 2003
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Department of History
In Fall 2003 the History department was selected as the first recipient of SITA services. AT staff led an introductory meeting introducing History faculty to the service, after which twelve faculty self-selected to use the SITA program. The SITAs worked with the faculty members throughout the semester on a one-on-one basis, either at the faculty member’s office or at Studio 107, as per the faculty member’s preference.
