Mapping the Changing Technological Landscape: Faculty and Student Surveys on Educational Technology Cara Lane, Research Scientist Catalyst Research and Development Karalee Woody, Director Catalyst Client Services

Presentation Outline Background Results  Demographics  Perspectives Implications Discussion

Background

University of Washington Overview  643 acres in sunny Seattle, WA  R1 institution  Campuses in Seattle, Tacoma, and Bothell  Ranked 1 st in US for research funds Population  Undergraduate students 30,000  Graduate & Professional 11,000  Faculty 4,100  Staff 20,000

Project Collaborators Office of Educational Partnerships and Learning Technologies Office of Undergraduate Education Computing & Communication UW Libraries Office of Educational Outreach Student Technology Fee Committee

Study Overview Faculty & student surveys  Technology expertise & use  Perceptions on educational technology Focus groups  Experiences with technology  Opinions about the future

Procedures - Respondents Faculty  Sample Size 4,390  Taught in the last academic year  Response rate 34.4% Students  Sample Size 3,500  Random sample of enrolled students  Response rate 28.2%

Focus Groups Faculty  Volunteers from faculty survey  40 participants Students  Volunteers from student survey & notice in computer lab  25 participants

Results

Faculty Demographics Respondents  884 Average Age  50 Gender  61% male  39% female

Student Demographics Respondents  648 Average Age  22 Gender  39% male  61% female

Faculty Perspective The UW should provide more opportunities to use educational technologies  72.9% agree How?  #1: Improve access to technology in classrooms

Faculty on Classrooms “Most lecture halls are equipped with the appropriate technology, but most smaller classrooms are not. If you invest the time to use technology in a 50-person class and don’t know if you are going to get the same classroom every year, the significant cost of transformation may not pay off in the event that you do not get an equipped classroom again.”

Classroom Infrastructure Desired technologies for seminar classrooms  Computer w/ projection  Overhead projector  TV with VCR Impact of computer with projection  87.2% of faculty say it enhances their instruction  85% of students agree

Use of Tech Classrooms 59% of faculty make use of multimedia capabilities 68% have requests for tech classrooms met

Laptops & Wireless Wireless will available across campus within three years

Laptops in Classrooms

Impact of Wireless Student: “The things that will make wireless really powerful will be new applications that begin to use that connectivity to do new things” Faculty: “It is partly because we don’t have wireless that we don’t have models for what to do with it”

Student Perspective The UW should require all courses to have a Web site  80% of students agree Desired online resources  Course syllabi  Lecture notes  Problem sets/exercises

Students on Web Sites “Something that would help support my learning would be having more information about a course online, especially requiring professors to put a syllabus on a Web site. It would be nice to look on the teacher’s Web site and see all the assignments. That would be fantastic.”

Online Resources by Group

Implications

For the U of Washington Classroom Infrastructure  Investigate what is needed & plan solutions Wireless  Expand pedagogical resources & laptop access Online Infrastructure  Simplify current web publishing system

Discussion What are you seeing at your institution? How have you solved some of these issues, i.e., access to tech in general classrooms?

Questions? Karalee Woody, Director Catalyst Client Services Cara Lane, Research Scientist Catalyst Research and Development