Goodbye IST, Hello Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence
I was going to do this in an email, then I realized putting together the recipient list might take the better part of the morning, and I still would probably forget to include people I’ve worked with over the last ten years. Starting tomorrow, 11/17/09, I’ll be working for the Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence (SITE) at Penn State. I’m very excited to start working with Undergraduate Education across the Penn State system to better the student learning experiences around the State. Also, the position is an academic appointment, primarily research-focused, so I will be able to put the Ph.D. degree to use immediately.
My 10+ years in IST has been a fantastic experience, and I wanted to thank everyone that I have worked with during this time. I’m going to avoid listing all the names (again, I’m sure I would forget people and that list would be LONG), but instead the areas I worked:
IST Solutions Institute - What a great experience. Working with a small team of highly innovative and skilled people, doing great things in the online learning space since October of 1999! I’m not sure I will ever experience such a unique culture and work environment as we had in SI. Thank you to everyone I worked with as a member of the Institute, I learned a great deal from everyone and had a fantastic time.
IST Instructor - From the PA Governor’s School for Information Technology, to IST undergraduate courses to guest lecturing in graduate courses around campus…I never realized I had a passion for teaching until given the opportunity to get in the classroom. Teaching can be equal parts fun and frustrating, but for me it has been a great learning experience and incredibly fun. Even with SITE, I am looking to continue my teaching experience at least once a year moving forward.
IST Research - I have been lucky to be part of many interesting and engaging research projects over the last three or four years. Looking at virtual worlds for learning and simulation, games as data analysis and design making environments to supporting several faculty in Second Life…I feel I have learned a great deal about grants and scholarly writing from all the colleagues I have worked with in this area.
Education Technology Services - My work with ETS grew from my work in the gaming and virtual world space with IST. Getting the educational gaming commons up and running was a monumental challenge, but extremely rewarding. I hope the EGC continues to do great things and I plan on staying involved as an affiliate.
Office of Learning Initiatives - my time with OLI was short, but still a good experience. Good luck to everyone working on the new online learning initiatives, you have a large task at hand that will be very challenging to meet, but I’m sure you will exceed expectations.
Back to your normally scheduled game and virtual worlds posts in the near future!
Am just discovering your blog. First off, congratulations on your appointment at Penn State. Second, you have a lot of intriguing posts here, thank you. Your post about your work on Wikis had me wondering if you’ve had an opportunity to try out Google Wave, the new collaboration tool. I had occasion to be at Google HQs in Silicon Valley a few weeks ago and got a primer on Wave from one of the developers. Looks really cool and I’m going to try to find ways to put it to use myself. This unsanctioned 2-minute video does an entertaining job of summarizing Wave’s capes, http://www.sottoxvoce.com/?p=754 Just fyi - I have no connection to the project. Then, with your passion and interest for games and learning, also thought you might be interested in the work of a colleague who just opened an experimental school in NYC that is based totally on game theory. The Economist just wrote about the school, Quest to Learn, http://www.economist.com/sciencetechnology/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14350149 Again, just fyi. Again, best wishes as a Nittany Lion=)
Hi Jeff,
I’ll be sure to keep an eye on that in the future to see what sort of wild curriculum they put in place.
Thanks for the comment, I have looked into the Google wave videos and talked with some colleagues that are now playing around with the Wave beta. At some point I hope to get a beta invite and begin experimenting as well. I have heard of the game-based school in NYC, I didn’t realize they finally gave it a name
Hey Bart! Congratulations on the new position. Take it from someone who left the College to take a position at the center of the University, your perspectives will be changed forever. Having to take an Institutional level view on things is so much different … and in many ways so much more of a challenge and so much more rewarding. I know you’ll continue to do great things and will grow into your position nicely.