TAC Archive - Building of Visions for Computing at Reed, 11/94

The Building of Visions for Computing at Reed:

An Ongoing Process

11/8/94

1984 - Laying the Foundation

Computers appeared at Reed College in the early 1960s. However, the College made a decisive commitment to computing in 1984, when it articulated its Technology Master Plan.

It is felt that our shared devotion to excellence at Reed should be echoed in a planned effort to support curriculum and teaching with advanced technological tools, and that this must be done in a unified way to benefit all. ... The primary goal of education at Reed is rigorous and clear thought. We aim to give students strong intellectual roots and to build for the long term, for an intellectual lifetime. ... The principles of rigor, strong historical grounding, and close contact between students and faculty are the bases of our success. To maintain that success, they must be preserved. Thus, innovations must be measured against our traditional values. If new intellectual and technical developments will sustain and strengthen the growth of clear and rigorous thought in the areas of real intellectual substance, they are welcome.

The significance of these guiding principles for computing is that they focus on Reed's educational mission, not on technology as an end in itself. Reed recognized that many other colleges and universities were plunging headlong into the use of technology without fully defining the instructional and research goals the technology was intended to support. By keeping its traditional curricular agenda at the forefront of its planning, Reed attempted to insure that technology would be used to enhance, rather than to dilute, its instructional mission.

There were several other principles articulated in the 1984 plan as well.

Х Computers should promote communication, not isolation

Х The integration of computer technology should be planned and controlled, rather than haphazard or fragmented

Х Computer resources should be deployed in a unified way with benefit for all, regardless of discipline

Х Reed should take advantage of its small size and its ability to effect global change campus wide, to assume a leadership role in computing

Х Cooperation between Reed and the corporate sector is critical to the success of computing

With these principles in mind, the College identified a number of fundamental goals for disseminating computing technology throughout the Reed community. With assistance from the Fred Meyer Charitable Trust, the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust, the National Science Foundation, and many corporations, organizations and individuals, the College has been able to fulfill нн and in most cases to surpass нн the goals that were identified in 1984. For example:

Goal: Make computing resources readily available to the community

Status:

Х 850 college-owned microcomputers

Х 450 privately-owned microcomputers through campus resale program

Х 53 Unix platforms

Х 9 departmental servers

Х 2 centralized Information Resource Centers (IRCs)

Х 24 Macintoshes in a student loaner pool

Х A centralized computer classroom and 4 portable projection systems

Х 10 departmental computerized classrooms and teaching labs

Artificial Life Lab

Computer Graphics Studio

Computer Music Lab

Computational Chemistry Lab

Physics/Biology Lab

Psychology Human Experimentation Lab

Psychology Animal Experimentation Lab

Public Policy Workshop

Social Science Research Center

Writing Center

Goal: Develop a campus-wide network

Status:

Х High-speed data network to all academic and administrative offices, classrooms, laboratories, public work areas, and the Library

Х Networking to 50% of the dormitories; completion of all dorms by fall 1996

Х Nearly 1,000 computers on the campus network

Х Access to the Internet, PORTALS, and other resources from anywhere on campus

Goal: Establish campus-wide computer support infrastructure

Status:

Х Development of Computing & Information Services

Х Computer User Services for faculty and student software assistance

Х Software Development Lab for curriculum related programming work

Х Administrative Computing Services for staff software assistance

Х Computer Hardware Services for all microcomputer resale and service

Х Networking & Technical Services for all data/telephone networking and UNIX system management

Goal: Support curricular applications of computing

Status:

Х Dozens of courseware packages produced by the Software Development Lab

Х 99% of faculty use computers

Х 44% of faculty require computer usage in their courses

Х 100% of student theses produced on computer

Х 78% of faculty use electronic mail

Х Implementation of Campus Wide Information System (CWIS)

The vision for computing in 1984, to disseminate technology broadly through the community and to promote its use as a means of enhancing the curriculum, has been fully realized. Today, access to computing is universal and nearly all faculty and students use computers, the campus network, and resources, such as the automated library catalogue, on a daily basis. More than two thirds of the faculty use computers in their homes as well as in their offices.

1994 - Building on the Foundation

Reed's successful implementation of its 1984 Technology Master Plan captured the imagination of colleges throughout the United States. The fiber optic campus network, the universal deployment of microcomputers, the incorporation of computing in all areas of the curriculum, and the creation of a campus-wide technology support organization became goals for hundreds of other institutions. Today, Reed is acknowledged to be one of the nation's most technologically advanced liberal arts colleges and is frequently consulted by other colleges involved in planning their own technology strategies.

Given the rapid evolution of technology, however, the only way to maintain a leadership role is to periodically reassess one's resources, progress, and priorities. To this end, in 1993 the Academic Computing Committee asked Computing & Information Services (CIS) to conduct a comprehensive study of current and future uses of computing at the College and to identify a set of goals for the next five years.

A significant outcome of the study was the realization that Reed's vision for technology, expressed a decade earlier, has stood the test of time. The views of the community continue to focus on Reed's traditional commitment to intellectual growth and the contribution that technology can make to it, rather than on technology as an end in itself. A dominant theme that emerged during the study was that technology should be employed to promote Reed's "research model of undergraduate instruction."

Unlike many other colleges, Reed has always believed that the best way to educate students is to give them the tools to explore the worlds of science, social science, arts, and humanities directly, rather than translating those worlds into little chunks that are easy to memorize and digest. At Reed, the pedagogical objective is to instill methods of learning rather than simply to convey sets of facts.

With this goal in mind, the future role of technology is clear:

it should be used to empower students to directly explore primary sources of knowledge and experimentation in all disciplines. It should assist students to acquire and apply the same methods of inquiry that faculty use to explore the universe. And it should promote better contact and collaboration between faculty, students, and other members of the Reed community.

Specific objectives that CIS identified to pursue these goals include the following:

Virtual Labs - Although virtual laboratories do not replace real laboratories (or classroom interactions), they enable students to perform complex lab simulations, draw upon diverse local and remote information resources, and undertake exercises in scientific experimentation, symbolic logic, foreign language skills, and a host of other topics, without classrooms or instructor assistance. Virtual laboratories are already in use in some disciplines but, in principle, they can be extended to nearly all disciplines. In addition to promoting the type of individual learning practices traditionally espoused at Reed, the virtual lab concept offers a way to enhance the learning environment in an economical fashion.

Objective - We need to explore this concept further, define ways in which it can be used to supplement and enhance traditional teaching methods, and acquire the resources necessary to make it available to students in all disciplines.

Technology in Underrepresented Disciplines - At Reed, as at most liberal arts colleges, the area in which instructional technology has had the broadest impact is in the natural sciences. Computerization of data collection, experiment control, statistical analysis, process modeling, etc., have been extensively employed throughout the sciences and have spawned a growing interest in applications such as wet-lab simulations and data visualization. It is critical that we continue to expand computing resources in math and science in order to provide the best possible tools for learning.

Other areas of the curriculum, however, are now beginning to take advantage of technology as well. Across the country, art historians are exploring the use of digital imaging as a supplement to 35mm slide libraries; musicologists are using software packages to teach composition and ear training; humanities faculty are using multimedia tools and Internet resources to enhance classroom presentation and student research activities. Faculty in the arts and humanities, however, are still in the early stages of exploring the application of technology to undergraduate teaching.

Objective - In order to foster progress in the arts and humanities, Reed will need to provide new computing resources and create new opportunities to help faculty bridge the gap between pedagogical excellence and technical innovations.

Use of Multimedia and Other Technologies - While Reed's foundations in computing, networking, and related technologies are quite sophisticated, recent innovations in digital imaging, real-time and interactive video, multimedia, and other technologies have only begun to be incorporated into the research and instructional activities of the College. Many faculty members нн particularly those in the humanities нн have avoided the use of computer projection technology in the classroom because of poor quality, high expense, or cumbersome operation. New projection technologies, however, are less costly and easier to use.

Objective - Reed must find the means to explore new technologies and assess their potential for undergraduate instruction. Reed must stay current with such developments in order to insure that its students and faculty continue to have access to the best educational tools available.

Campus-Wide Information - Traditional divisions between academic computing and administrative computing have been eroding for several years. By the end of the decade, we should seek a seamless integration among all electronic resources, though security measures should be taken to insure that privacy and confidentiality are preserved. Information of general interest currently kept on the administrative database should be made available to all members of the college community via the campus network.

Objective - Wherever possible, a campus-wide information system (CWIS) should be used to reduce paper flow, cut college operating expenses, and improve communication among students, faculty, and staff.

Infrastructure Stability and Cost Containment - During the past fifteen years, the acquisition of computing resources has often been supported through donations or special capital allocations. It has now become clear that computing equipment needs to be upgraded, replaced, and augmented on a regular basis. The College must address this issue with a long-term strategy that will make sense in the context of its budget priorities and limitations. The same holds true for staff support. Unless there is sufficient expertise on campus to assist faculty with courseware development, technical questions, database maintenance, network management, and hardware repairs, a substantial portion of the investment in technology is bound to be wasted. In order to derive the greatest benefits from educational technology we must insure that the community has access to individuals with the necessary expertise.

Objective - In order to maintain a stable infrastructure for technology, Reed must define the appropriate level of spending as a percentage of the annual operating budget and find ways to continuously enhance its resources while remaining within those fiscal limits.

Cooperation with the Corporate Sector - In 1984, Reed committed to developing cooperative, mutually beneficial relationships with the corporate sector. The accomplishments of the last ten years, and their impact both on campus and across the nation, are in a significant way do to a variety of partnerships with information technology companies.

Objective - Reaffirm this commitment. Nurture existing relationships while establishing new ones based on a range of overlapping interests.

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