One Student One Blog

Sometimes you have to go out and find whatever it is you’re looking for; this can be a difficult lesson. Especially when the doors you need to knock on are hard to find or lead you through empty cavernous hallways made of concrete. UMASS seems to have infinite ways to offer this lesson time and again. Today was no exception.

I have gotten it into my mind that it would be totally awesome to have some studio space in which to explore technology, art and education. So, I was scurrying about, up to the OIT Academic Computing Office to find out about using the video conferencing classroom which is now located over in Herter Annex 19-F.

I got to Herter, swiftly splashing through the puddles, bent on my mission, sidetracked by the Art Gallery. Rubber boots squeaking, I asked the guy sitting at the desk if he knew where 19-F is as I followed Jeremy Boyle’s self portrait around it’s 360 degree rotation (it’s a video installation of his head and shoulders turning full circle both in the video and the actual small t.v. monitor it’s viewed on).

“Nope.” he replied.

I went into the other room noting the Art Department’s presence, connecting professors names with their work, glad to take this gallery break. Then I asked the guy if there was a way to get downstairs, after I saw the gallery door numbered 100 something.

“I dunno,” he replied. He kind of motioned to the doors and said, “I think there’s a stairway out there.”

Herter Annex 19-F, where was it?

Downstairs was a surprise, dim and desolate, an empty corridor. I can’t remember how I got there now, whether I turned right or left. But somewhere in the recesses is lodged the self-supporting UMASS Translation Center (http://www.umasstranslation.com).Who knew?

I’d found it. The video conferencing classroom, once so full of promise for innovative education. It had been established in 2000 on a $50k grant through Five Colleges, INC, forming a link between all the five colleges. The promise was, is, could be again:

“…not to create a traditional “distance learning” program, but rather to investigate how these rooms can improve teaching and learning in a residential, liberal arts setting. Whether the classrooms are used to expand access to less commonly taught classes, share distinguished lectures, or enhance team teaching and research, it is expected that they will enable the five campuses to share resources more easily. Pairs or teams of faculty interested in conducting a joint pilot project are encouraged to sign up for a training session.”

This promise captures my attention.

This promise, I want to be true.