The proposal was simple. Brooklyn College would form a partnership with four local high schools. Each of the schools would be provided with a computer facility in their school thorough which they could run the Internet as well as the course software Brooklyn College provided. The schools would provide on-site instructors and input into the curriculums developed.
The first course offered to high school juniors was Information Literacy, a self-paced online course designed to provide an understanding of information literacy, develop computer literacy, and to introduce the use of both the library and the Internet for research. This course was created by Professor Beth Evans from Information Services at the Brooklyn College Library.
To gather statistics on usage, record the grades and number of times a student had taken an online quiz, database software was used. This works in conjunction with the custom software developed to allow the teacher access to student records so that they may assign grades, and for the student to access the lesson they are currently working on. Utilities like a calculator, a dictionary, and a basic word processor are available simply by clicking on the right icon.
In the Spring '99 semester, Brooklyn college offered four new courses. One is a web-based course for juniors: PreCore Writing, an electronic writing and critical thinking course that allows students to draw assignments from the course web page, post his or her essays to the web, and interact both electronically and in person with fellow students and the on-site instructor.
The
remaining three courses offered are Internet versions of Core 4 - The Shaping
of the Modern World; Core 8.1 - Science in Modern Life: Biology;
and English Composition 1, developed by Brooklyn College faculty.
These professors, respectively Paul Halsall, John Blamire, and Diane Berardi
and Valden Madsen, have been conferring with their students, providing
guidance and answering questions, through an exchange of e-mail and use
of Caucus during the semester.
If you would like to explore
some of TIIAP's course offerings then visit the links below.
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In addition to being introduced to the experience of participating in college level courses, the seniors are being prepared by staff from Brooklyn College's Dean of Undergraduate Studies office to take and pass the CUNY basic skills assessments tests. This is a valuable recruitment tool for not only Brooklyn College but all of CUNY. Students will realize that CUNY is interested in them and is working to provide cutting edge technology and skills to its students to make them competitive in the world outside academia.
Along
with the aid this project provides to the high schools and their students,
the uses for such courses for BC students, especially for the Core and
Introductory courses, are numerous. Interest in distance learning is growing.
The appeal of web-based courses, either as an alternative to traditional
classroom-based teaching or in conjunction with it for the many Brooklyn
College students who either attend BC part-time or have full-time jobs
is great.