The Faculty Center

Professors At Work on the Web An essential support organization for the profession is the Web of Asynchronous Learning Networks. This site should be among your first stops in a cyberspace tour of on-line teaching resources. The Web of Asynchronous Learning Networks offers valuable on-line discussions on distance learning topics through their ALNTalk service. Want to find out how to become a virtual professor in a virtual classroom? Dr. Roxanne Hiltz, Distinguished Professor of Computer and Information Sciences at NJIT can help you get there. Dr. Hiltz's extensive web site offers a variety of tips, tools of the trade, and examples. More valuable links to other important sites will be hard to find. The Epiphany Project at George Mason University, funded by Annenberg/PCB, poses this essential question: "What do teachers need to help them take advantage of pedagogical opportunities offered by emerging technologies?" Note the issue of the faculty development challenge to create a new pedagogy, not to merely recast the status quo. Georgetown's Randy Bass offers cutting-edge web-enhanced courses which transcend the simplistic cookbook approach which canned commercial products encourage. He has also put together the superb resources for American Studies, Crossroads. Administrators take note: These sites carry the imprimatur of the American Association of Higher Education, a bastion of good practice not to be ignored. Bread & butter, meat & potatoes is the style of the prolific Professor Bob Jensen of Trinity College in Austin, Texas. His road-show, Technologies in Higher Education, has been presented at over 200 colleges and universities, and has been featured in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Check it out. Want to provide services for your college or university's community? Learn how by visiting the Atlantic County Technical Training Center located at Richard Stockton State College of New Jersey. The Center uses technology to enhance the education available to the children of Atlantic County, New Jersey. Professors David Benyon, Debbie Stone, and Mark Woodroffe write about their experience in Experience with developing multimedia courseware for the World Wide Web: the need for better tools and clearer pedagogy. Michael L. Hall of the University of Maryland offers teachers doing web-work a great place to start, Teaching With Electronic Technology. Diana Laurillard's method of instructional technology provides a very thoughtful view of how teaching and learning paradigms shift in the age of WWW. Laurillard defines the distinction between text and hypertext. No simple matter this. Back to top

Academic Clearinghouses A cutting-edge instructional technology resource is Educause: "The mission of EDUCAUSE is to help shape and enable transformational change in higher education through the introduction, use, and management of information resources and technologies in teaching, learning, scholarship, research, and institutional management." The American Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education provides support for "the advancement of the knowledge, theory, and quality of learning and teaching at all levels with information technology." The Distance Education Clearinghouse of the University of Wisconsin provides a current and voluminous set of links to resources to support distance learning. A site which offers a similar list is provided by St. John's University. Classics scholars, rejoice! Tufts University offers a vast and growing digital library of the ancient world. A superb academic clearinghouse has been collected by the Ellis Library at Arkansas State University. University of Houston has an excellent collection of resources for scholars. Teachers of writing composition might check out a mixed bag of resources available on the Internet. University of Pennsylvania arrays its helpful materials by discipline. An alphabetical listing of resources is provided by W3, the parent of the WWW. Thinking interdiscipline? Cornell has put together a wonderful site for city and regional planners. Penn has done the same for environmental studies. Back to top

Research Materials Need reference sources, such as Encyclopedia Britannica? Dictionaries and translators are available. Try a reference hub, the Internet Public Library. Vice-President Albert Gore will personally welcome you to the Access America web site, putting you in touch with federal government resources, such as regional breakdowns of government statistics. Fighting parochialism? Seeking newspapers from around the world? Or USA newspapers? Or The New York Times on-line? An in-depth coverage of current events, even listed by issue? How about The Economist? Public policy round-up? Need to know how to properly cite research gathered on the Internet? Classroom Connect provides guidelines to follow. Know a newbie in need of a basic glossary of web-oriented computer babble? Take a CyberCourse! Become a Knowbie! Back to top