Panel Discusses Role of Technology in Education

On Thursday, Feb. 28, Core and Change in the Liberal Arts, a committee formed by the office of Academic Affairs, hosted a panel discussion titled “Technology & The Liberal Arts.” The discussion was meant to explore how new technologies can be used to advance the College’s mission.

The panel was moderated by Special Assistant to Academic Affairs Sarah McGowen and panelists included, Manager of Web and Interactive Digital Media Technologies Joe Antonioli, Associate Professor of History Louisa Burnham, Christian A. Johnson Professor of Music Peter Hamlin and Assistant Professor of Computer Science David Kauchak.

Each of the panel members were asked to respond to the following question: “How can we use emerging technologies to support Middlebury’s mission to cultivate the intellectual, creative, physical, ethical and social qualities essential for leadership in a rapidly changing global community?”

Taking the podium first, Antonioli began by defining the term “emerging technologies” as more durable and flexible technologies, or in other cases, the convergence of already existing technologies. He also laid out some of the challenges that arise from the abundance of all of the new technologies available.

“We need to investigate each technology as it comes, and technology is being developed at a very fast pace now,” he said. “So we need to come up with a way to look at these technologies and decide which ones are worth investing our time and money in, and which ones are going to be most useful to us.”

Antonioli pointed out that one way to go about this process is to think about how a new technology would affect the activities at Middlebury. In other words, is it just taking an activity that already exists and making it digital, or is it creating a new learning opportunity?

Hamlin spoke next and began by describing his own personal philosophy about technology, specifically as it relates to music.

“Of course the pace of change [regarding technology] is really sudden, but I don’t really believe that there is something fundamentally different [about music] and that’s how I go about my teaching,” he said.

Hamlin did, however, decide to offer a new class involving electronic music, for which technology is necessary.

Burnham presented a slightly different perspective, as she has come to heavily integrate technology into her teaching. Her tests are now online, her grading is all done on her iPad, and she has also started having her students discuss readings on online forums before doing so in discussion sections.

“My idea is to use the technology to make simpler the things that can be made simple for me, and also to exploit the possibilities of the technologies outside the classroom to enhance the experience of students and me in the classroom,” she said.

Kauchak then turned the discussion toward online learning, and how the College might benefit in the long term by a shift toward the new technology. Describing the employment of the new tools by a Stanford professor, he described how the California-based faculty member is recording himself teaching every lesson plan and putting it online for his students to watch the night before they have class. Kauckak then described that the lessons are also accompanied by problems, and the professor is able to use the responses to tailor his teaching to the sections of the material that are giving students the hardest time. While Kauchak hasn’t yet implemented this online teaching in his class, he explained that he has considered it and encouraged others to explore its potential as well.

McGowen then opened the discussion to a question-and-answer session, which prompted discussion on topics ranging from the challenges faced by new learning styles of students, to the interaction between newer, more electric music and older, more classical music.

L. Douglas and Laura J. Meredith Dean of Library Information Services and Chief Information Officer Michael D. Roy felt this was an especially productive part of the panel discussion.

“In general I was happy with it the panel, but I didn’t feel as if the presentations directly confronted the question that was posed,” he said. “I think in the discussion, however, we started to get closer to engaging those questions.”

Will Hanley ’15 enjoyed the panel discussion. “It was very interesting to hear about how teachers are constantly finding new ways of changing their curriculum, and how other people are influencing them around the world,” he said.

Over the coming months Core and Change in the Liberal Arts will continue to explore the role of technology in the liberal arts experience.