Council approves development proposal change

The Chapel Hill Town Council on Dec. 4 approved the development plan modification for the main campus that University officials had submitted last summer.

Council, however, deferred action on a proposed expansion of the Carolina Inn that had been added to the modification request. The council also approved a special-use permit for the park-and-ride lot at the Chapel Hill Bible Church. The lot will reserve 241 badly needed spaces in eastern Chapel Hill for UNC users.

The plan will add 1.2 million square feet of building space beyond the previously approved 6 million square feet.

The development plan, which is based on the campus master plan, is the planning instrument by which the town oversees campus construction. The plan operates under a special zoning classification that the University sought in tandem from the town.

Since the development plan was approved in 2001, such modifications have also been endorsed in summer 2003 and in March 2004.

The latest modification includes several parking projects, including a three-level addition to the existing Craige deck on Manning Drive that will shift 890 spaces and the 710-space Bell Tower parking deck. Three new research buildings for genome sciences will surround the Bell Tower deck. A pedestrian bridge across South Road will also be a part of the Bell Tower development. A new two-level parking deck on Skipper Bowles Drive also was approved that will add 230 parking spaces and feature tennis courts on the top level connected to the new Rams Village apartments for students.

Other projects include:

 A new 180,000 square-foot medical office building on North Medical Drive.

 A new 200,000 square-foot building for the School of Dentistry.

 A new building for the Department of Psychology.

 A new 125,000 square-foot building for the School of Information and Library Sciences.

 UNC Imaging Center building connected to the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

 A three-building office and storage complex for the Grounds Department.

 An 8,804-seat addition and improvements at Kenan Stadium.

 Renovation of Boshamer Stadium.

 A 12,000 square-foot addition to the George Watts Hill Alumni Center.

When the University seeks a modification to the plan, it asks the town to approve in one fell swoop the general characteristics of a list of new projects before they are designed. Funding is pending for many of the newly approved projects. The General Assembly appropriated planning funds for the genome sciences building last year.

Carolina North LAC debates future open space

Perpetuity. It’s a word that’s been tossed back and forth a lot lately by members of the Carolina North Leadership Advisory Committee.

Some in the group want the University to commit to keeping 75 percent of the land at Carolina North in its natural state in perpetuity — or forever. Some repeated that desire at the most recent meeting on Nov. 30.

Click here for a link to the written record and minutes of the Nov. 30 Carolina North LAC meeting.

University officials have declined to make such a commitment, bound by a word that sounds strikingly similar to perpetuity but means something starkly different.

Posterity.

Future generations will live with the consequences of the decisions that will be made today about the future of Carolina North.

One thing University Trustee Roger Perry said he and other trustees refuse to do today is to tie the hands of future leaders 50 years from now.

University trustees have argued that it is not possible legally to bind future boards to such a commitment, and even it they could, it would not be wise to do so.

Fifty years is the span of time that University planners say it will take to complete five phases envisioned in a previous draft concept plan. Within those 50 years, Perry said, University officials might accept making a commitment to restricting development on the 250-acre footprint already identified.

Perry identified four types of land within the roughly 1,000-acre site located about a mile north of main campus on the western edge of Martin Luther King Boulevard.

There is the footprint of 250 acres on which development could take place, in phases, over the next 50 years.

There is environmentally sensitive land within watersheds and elsewhere that everyone agrees must be preserved indefinitely.

The third subset of land is buffer zones at the edge of Carolina North designed to protect adjoining neighborhoods. This land, too, should remain untouched forever.

The fourth category is the rest of the land outside of the other three.

“There is never, ever going to be a willingness on the part of the University to put that land in perpetual open space,” Perry said.

On the other hand, he added, it did not seem out of the question for the University to agree to a conservation easement of 50 or 60 years.

Perry’s comment drew this appreciative response from Chapel Hill Town Council Member Cam Hill: “For the purpose of most of the people in this room, 60 years is in perpetuity.”

The issue surfaced again during a discussion about building heights and the general consensus that had emerged that taller buildings, especially in the interior of the property away from surrounding neighborhoods, would put more square footage of buildings on fewer acres to preserve more open space.

Perry, a successful Chapel Hill developer, said taller buildings may be the answer for research and academic buildings, but questioned whether people would want to live in high-rises.

Right now, Perry said, there simply are not many folks who would choose to live in them.

The University long has pursued plans for mixed-use development at Carolina North that would include academic, research, housing, retail and open spaces.

The committee, which has been meeting since last March, is on track to conclude its work earlier than expected, helped in part by a marathon six-hour meeting set for Dec. 16. If all goes as planned, the final meeting will take place on Jan. 18, more than a month ahead of the deadline that Chancellor James Moeser set when he appointed the group earlier this year.

Among the issues yet to be explored are a set of principles related to public schools, fiscal equity and a joint report on housing that is being prepared by Carolina North Executive Director Jack Evans and Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton.

Get-a-Passport

Graduate student Andy Pennock (right) has his picture taken at the Get-a-Passport Drive, held Nov. 15 and 16 during International Education Week. State Department officials were on campus with passport applications, and passport photos were taken as a one-stop shopping service to apply for or renew passports.

Among other events that week, Carol Bellamy, former director of UNICEF, spoke on “Global Poverty: Reflections on Millennium Development Goals,” and the University Center for International Studies staged its sixth annual international photography contest and exhibit.

Cabinets to kiosks: Woodworkers’ artistry adorns campus venues

The University has exclusive access to a skilled group of craftsmen. ‘Craftsmen’ actually might not adequately describe these workers; they are accomplished artisans — and artists — whose work is displayed in buildings throughout the campus, including the homes of the UNC president and Carolina’s chancellor.

Cabinetmaker Terry Tripp uses a planer to smooth a piece of wood in the Carpentry Shop.

Bobby Jones, Alan Moran and Terry Tripp are cabinetmakers from Facilities Services’ Carpentry Shop who build the highest quality woodwork for the entire Carolina community. While ‘cabinetmaker’ might be their working job title and their expertise can be seen in the cabinets they build, their work is not limited to cabinets. They are skilled in designing and constructing desks, furniture, cubicles, vanities, display cases, furnishings for entire lobbies and reception areas, benches, windows, shutters, kiosks — even bridges — and much more. In short, if a project involves wood, they can handle it, whether it requires a table saw, jig saw or a chainsaw.

One of the most impressive skills displayed by this group is the ability to replicate existing works. They can build exact matches to furnishings and woodwork, oftentimes just by looking at a photograph. There is a rich history at Carolina that can be seen in the architecture of the campus’ buildings, and these artisans can capture and duplicate these detailed, intricate historic and antique designs in works such as doors, decorative moldings and antique furniture. How they actually produce this woodwork is a history lesson as well. None of the equipment they use is computerized; they work with their hands, using both modern and old fashioned tools that require a great deal of skill and manual dexterity which can only be gained through years of experience. It may not be as simple as hitting ‘enter’ on a keyboard, but the time and care they put into their work shows in the quality of their final product.

The Carpentry Shop also takes on smaller projects that an outside contractor would never even consider, such as making picture frames, plaques, recycling bins and easels. They also repair office furnishings that have been obtained from surplus. They are able to provide the finished product much quicker — and cheaper — than outside contractors as well; they’re frequently called upon in an emergency when a department needs quality work fast. The lead-time for contractors can be up to two to three months.

When it comes to quality, there is no comparison between their furnishings and the mass-produced, pre-fabricated office furniture from commercial stores. There’s also no comparison in the quality of overall service they provide to their customers. Often, UNC employees will make do with the equipment and furniture that they inherit in their office. Jones, Moran and Tripp, however, make sure Carolina employees don’t just have furnishings that “will work,” they make sure their customers have exactly what is needed to do their jobs. They are dedicated to their customers and will meet with them one-on-one, talking and listening, sketching out designs and working collaboratively to ensure employees are completely satisfied. Academic departments call on them for podiums, lecterns and media centers for their classrooms while researchers rely on them to provide a place to safely store years of notes, findings and life-saving research.

All this may seem like a large order for three employees, but they have pride in and a passion for their work, not to mention nearly 100 years of experience among them. In fact, they have earned such a reputation for excellence that others not associated with UNC have sought out their services. They were recently contacted by Duke University about providing their woodworking expertise, but as employees of a state university, they can only ply their craft for state government agencies.

As work spaces get more and more cluttered, remember that quality cabinetry and craftsmanship is at your disposal; and Facilities Services’ Carpentry Shop is only a call or a click away.

Scope of out-of-state tuition hikes uncertain among BOT

Out-of-state undergraduate tuition now stands at $19,681, about $4,000 below the average for other top public universities.

Under a “bold stroke” proposal that Chancellor James Moeser floated before University trustees last month, that $4,000 gap would be closed in one fell swoop with incoming freshmen next year — who would pay the increase with the guarantee they would not face another campus-based increase provided they graduate in four years.

“Our students are asking for predictability,” Moeser said. “This provides that.”

In regard to his proposal, Moeser told trustees, “I want you to think about it. That’s all I’m asking you to do today because it’s an intriguing idea.”

Moeser offered the idea in the midst of a Nov. 16 discussion about possible tuition increases that will resume next month when the University Board of Trustees will likely decide on its own proposal to forward to the UNC Board of Governors for consideration.

Along with Moeser’s trial balloon proposal, trustees will weigh Moeser’s official recommendation that mirrors that of the Tuition and Fee Advisory Task Forced co-chaired by Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Bernadette Gray-Little and Student Body President James Allred.

The option favored by most task force members — and the one Moeser endorsed by recommending it to trustees before their meeting, calls for tuition increases of $250 for resident undergraduates and $500 for all other students on campus. Further, it calls for requiring all students to pay the increase, including graduate and professional students subject to paying school-based increases as well.

Two task force members who did not agree are trustees Karol Mason and John Ellison who will cast their votes again when the board makes its final decision next month.

In January of 2004, trustees adopted a philosophy for tuition increases that set the goal of reaching the 75th percentile among national peer institutions for out-of-state undergraduate students, while keeping tuition for in-state undergraduates within the bottom quartile of national peers.

The trustees’ philosophy to keep in-state tuition low is consistent with the University’s historical stance and with a new system-wide policy the UNC Board of Governors approved this fall that sets a 6.5 percent cap for in-state undergraduate tuition and fee increases on its 16 campuses over the next four years.
At Carolina, the cap for next year comes out to $305. The task force recommendation falls slightly below it, with proposed increases of $250 in tuition and $50.48 in student fees subject to the restriction.

The other bedrock policy that has been in place since campus-based tuition increases have been allowed is to hold low-income students harmless by setting aside 35 percent to 40 percent of additional revenues for need-based aid.

For the current academic year, in-state undergraduate tuition rose by $250, while out-of-state undergraduates paid an additional $1,100.

Moeser, before making his $4,000 proposal, said he sensed that the consensus among trustees had a similar increase for out-of-state students in mind.

Moeser said he understood and supported the trustees’ push to reach the 75th percentile, yet he said he shared the concerns that Allred and students have expressed that out-of-state students not begin to feel as if they were here only to serve as cash cows. Out-of-state students come here to get a quality education, but their presence here enhances the quality of education for everybody, he said.

Everyone agrees on the goal, he said, which is to generate revenues needed to improve faculty salaries so that they are truly competitive with national peers. Moeser said the proposal was his attempt to offer “an alternative to get to the same point with a different path.”

That path has been a long and arduous one, with an end goal that is a moving target. As Carolina moves aggressively to raise its faculty salaries, competing institutions are not sitting still in the salaries they offer their faculties.

The task force recommendation that Moeser initially backed would generate about $6.5 million for faculty salaries, graduate stipends and need-based financial aid. But that calculation is based on requiring all students to pay the campus-based increase — a recommendation that a majority of trustees appear not to support.

Gray-Little, in making the case for a true campuswide increase, has argued that it was the original model used after UNC campuses were authorized to set campus-based hikes and use the revenue for campus priorities.

Since the 2000-01 academic year, campus-based tuition has generated more than
$24.6 million for targeted faculty salaries and compensation, including benefits.

Trustee Paul Fulton, who co-chairs the Carolina First steering committee, said the campaign expects to move past the $2 billion mark by March and that faculty support has been a major campaign priority.

Similarly, the state legislature awarded generous average increases of 6 percent to faculty members within the UNC system. The trustees, in turn, must be willing to do their part — even when what they have to do isn’t easy, he said.

“I don’t know how I in good faith can go to the legislature and donor base (for continued support) when we are not making tough decisions that are consistent with our state’s philosophy” of low in-state tuition, Fulton said.

Gomes, Aber named as 2007-08 Keohane chairs

The University welcomes two distinguished professors next year as part of an ongoing collaboration between Carolina and Duke University.

Harvard professor Peter Gomes, who delivered the 2005 commencement address at Carolina, and New York University professor J. Lawrence Aber, a child development specialist, will teach jointly at the universities as recipients of the Nannerl O. Keohane Distinguished Visiting Professorship.

Provosts at UNC and Duke selected Gomes and Aber in consultation with an advisory committee of faculty from each university. Recipients, who spend about six months at each university, receive up to $50,000 for travel, research and related expenses. They are responsible for contributing to the teaching mission and undergraduate curriculum at both universities, delivering at least one major public lecture and promoting collaboration and the enhancement of intellectual life.

Gomes will teach at UNC in spring 2008, Aber in Fall 2007. The yearlong professorship was created in 2004 to honor former Duke president Keohane’s contributions toward advancing collaboration between the two universities.

“It is wonderful to welcome Dr. Gomes back to Chapel Hill and to introduce Dr. Aber to the leading academic institutions in the Tar Heel state,” said Steve Allred, executive associate provost. “Both men have distinguished themselves in their fields, and they will be fine additions to the longstanding history of collaboration between Carolina
and Duke.”

Gomes has been Plummer professor of Christian morals and Pusey minister in the Memorial Church of Harvard University since 1974. He is recognized as one of the nation’s most distinguished preachers and has been profiled in CBS’ “60 Minutes” program and The New Yorker, among other national
media outlets.

Aber is professor of applied psychology and public policy at New York University. His research examines the influence of violence and poverty in families and communities as it relates to child development.

Half of the $3 million needed to create the professorship bearing Keohane’s name was pledged as a challenge by Carolina graduate Julian Robertson and his wife Josie of New York, who also funded the Robertson Scholars Program, a joint merit-based scholarship program at Carolina and Duke. The William R. Kenan Jr. Charitable Trust provided the remaining $1.5 million. The trust has been among Carolina’s most generous benefactors and also has supported the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke.

Near-record returns grow endowment

The UNC-Chapel Hill Foundation Investment Fund reached $1.48 billion in fiscal 2006, after recording a 19.2 percent net investment return, the third highest in the past 20 years.

Jon King, president and chief executive officer of UNC Management Co. Inc., which manages the fund, presented the investment results the November meeting of the University Board of Trustees.

“What this return means to UNC, and to the state, is that the University has a very solid foundation from which to support new and existing programs and to build for the future,” King said. The investment fund makes up a majority of UNC’s overall endowment.

According to an independent survey of 149 colleges and universities, UNC’s investment return rate was first among public universities and in the top 6 percent overall. Only returns in fiscal 2000 (27.3 percent) and 1999 (19.7 percent) outperformed this year’s, King said.

UNC’s investment fund, a diversified portfolio, is positioned for growth and includes a significant allocation to non-traditional assets including international equity, private equity and private energy related investments. The allocation to these asset classes, combined with excellent performance generated by the fund’s investment managers, were key to the fund’s growth, King said. The fund outperformed its primary benchmark, the Strategic Investment Policy Portfolio (SIPP), which returned 14.1 percent for the year.

“We had the wind at our back,” said King, who began his role at UNC Management Co. Inc. in January 2005, after growing Dartmouth College’s endowment to almost $2.5 billion. “We were over-allocated to the asset classes that did well, under-allocated to the classes that didn’t do well, and our investment managers turned in very strong performances.

“UNC’s fund tends to do better in years when non-traditional asset classes outperform traditional U.S. stocks and bonds, as was the case in the most recent fiscal year,” he said.

The 2006 results set the three-year return — 16.9 percent — at its highest mark in 20 years. The five-year return hit 10.6 percent, placing the one-, three- and five-year returns above the SIPP benchmark for each of these periods. The growth also places UNC’s endowment in the top 15 percent of all colleges and universities for the past one-, three-, and five-year periods.

Increasing the University’s overall endowment is a major objective of the Carolina First Campaign, a multi-year private fund-raising effort with a goal of $2 billion by December 2007. The campaign has received gifts and pledges of more than $1.9 billion.

The campaign has nearly reached its $800 million target to support the endowment.

Researchers work with rural educators nationwide

School of Education researchers involved in federally funded collaborations with rural schools have learned that teachers there are the projects’ best friends.

Marnie Ginsberg performs a targeted reading intervention with Rachel Quade at FPG Child Development Institute.

The teachers’ understanding of their students’ families and communities has proven indispensable, say School of Education professors involved with the projects — all conducted by the National Research Center on Rural Education Support in the school.

“Many of our teachers are extremely experienced,” said Lynne Vernon-Feagans, William C. Friday distinguished professor of education and a center co-director. “They live in these areas. They know the families. You often don’t have that in an urban area.”

The U.S. Department of Education established the center in 2004 with a $10 million, five-year grant to the school. Researchers from UNC’s Center for Developmental Science, School of Social Work, Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute and psychology and sociology departments also are involved.

The grant funded three projects, on children’s transitions into kindergarten and first grade; use of distance learning in rural schools; and students’ transitions into early adolescence.

Since then, researchers have worked with rural educators nationwide to add more studies, said Tom Farmer, center director and a former UNC School of Education faculty member, who left recently for Pennsylvania State University.

The additional research looks at the following topics in rural schools: teacher retention and administrative turnover; special education needs and services; and the preparation of rural adolescents for transition from high school to adulthood. 

Center partners in these projects include the Rural Schools and Community Trust, the University of Oklahoma, Stephen F. Austin University, the Southwest Regional Educational Laboratory and Penn State.   

The researchers recognize that many rural school districts lack the resources of wealthy urban and suburban districts. The national research center aims to level the achievement playing field nationwide — starting from when students enter kindergarten.

Vernon-Feagans and her researchers began by asking teachers about the challenges they face. “They all have kids at the bottom of the class who don’t seem to be learning,” she said

Research shows that such children benefit most from individual attention, but how could teachers find the time? They all brainstormed. “We problem-solve with the teachers,” said Vernon-Feagans. “We don’t tell them what to do.”

Creating learning stations where the other children could work independently for a time and briefly turning classes over to teaching assistants were among the answers.

“If a teacher works one-on-one with a child for 15 minutes a day, four times a week, for two months or so, that child can make enormous progress,” Vernon-Feagans said. “Teachers come to like these children better through this process, and the children come to like them.”

 Her group and the teachers develop simple strategies and inexpensive materials for this tutoring, including free resources teachers can download from the Internet.

So far, the project is at work in just a few school districts, but the work is always hardest at first. Vernon-Feagans expects lessons learned in these districts will make for easier start-ups later, so that the project could be in as many as 20 states by 2009.

Wallace Hannum, UNC associate professor of educational psychology, directs the center’s project on distance learning for secondary education and professional development for teachers in rural schools.

Often, the schools cannot offer comprehensive curricula because of problems finding and retaining teachers for all subjects — especially advanced math and science, he said.

The School of Education’s LEARN North Carolina program offers more than 50 advanced placement and other courses online to all schools statewide. Now, LEARN collaborates with Hannum by offering courses to the schools he is studying.

 Last year, Hannum finished a national survey on distance learning in rural schools, with responses from 394 of a random sample of 415 districts. Among the findings: 68 percent use distance learning to offer courses they can’t offer otherwise. Next, Hannum will look at how to improve the effectiveness of such courses.

Kim Dadisman, co-director of intervention research at the UNC Center for Developmental Science, directs the national center’s project on transition to early adolescence. The project now operates in two areas of the country, with school districts nationwide to be added in the years to come, Dadisman said.

Before working with a district, researchers gather data on the community and its schools. Then, they work with teachers in grades five through seven.

The researchers ask teachers to describe the most important issues in their classes and communities. Then, researchers and teachers collaborate to develop training for teachers in managing these issues, using four focuses:

 Academic engagement, or ways to get students actively involved in learning;

 School social dynamics, or peer networks, how teachers can recognize them and use that awareness to develop positive behavior;

 Helping parents understand their children’s changing needs as they grow into adolescence; and

 Competence enhancement/behavior management.

Research findings figure in the training, conducted before school starts in the fall; some districts offer continuing education credits for participation. Researchers then consult throughout the school year with the teachers, in face-to-face meetings, videoconferences and online.

“This is a time developmentally when students are acquiring new skills, new peers and new social roles,” Dadisman said. “It is a prime time for teachers to guide these students as they are coming into new social roles.”

Library offers mapping services to interpret data

Everything happens somewhere.

For University Library employee Amanda Henley, that means everything can be placed onto maps.

Henley is the geographic information systems, or GIS, librarian at Davis Library. She provides training and consulting for use of the library’s four GIS-ready computers and three printers.

GIS is a way to make maps using computers. Custom maps are created from layers of spatial data (such as roads, rivers or county boundaries). Those features are paired with attributes, such as county names or population information. So, county boundaries could be combined with population data to make a map with populations by county. Or road maps could be paired with air pollution data.

“The location and attributes of map features are compared to perform complex analyses,” Henley said. “This would be very difficult using traditional methods.”

Henley, who received her master’s degree in geography from UNC, said students from a number of disciplines have used the library computers and her consulting services to complete projects.

Dilys Bowman, a doctoral student in the geography department, has used the GIS services provided by the library. Henley, she said, has been a helpful resource.

“She has gone to bat to make data easier to use, and also to ask for data when we don’t have it, and the need is potentially greater than one individual’s,” Bowman said.

A GIS map is only as good as the data that goes into making, Henley said, so she is constantly on the lookout for new or more comprehensive data sources.

Henley also collaborates with other campus groups that provide GIS services, including the Odum Institute for Research in Social Sciences and Information Technology Services.

“I think we’re very fortunate to have her,” Bowman said.

GIS is useful for a number of topics. Public health students might use maps to look for trends in diseases when combined with census data. Planning students can use the technology to analyze population sprawl and transportation trends. Environmental science students might look at land cover change over time, or the impact of urbanization on water quality.

The advantage of computer mapping over the more traditional paper method, Henley said, is the ability to make calculations and changes. Symbology can be altered, and databases can be added or updated.

In addition to providing consulting for GIS users at the library, Henley also has taught several short training classes at the Odum Institute, and designed web pages and online tutorials — complete with animated demonstrations and step-by-step instructions. Henley has also worked with ITS to facilitate access to commercial GIS courses available online to UNC students and employees.

Much of her time, she said, is spent helping people find and format data for accurate mapping.

Davis Library’s four GIS computers are available any time the library is open, and the printers are available any time the reference desk is staffed. A large format plotter, used solely for printing maps made using GIS, is available for use by appointment only.

With myriad uses and modern capabilities, GIS offers students researching topics that interest them a way to put data into a tangible format. For Henley, the allure of GIS started with an interest in resource management and has grown to include the wide span of work she does today. “I really enjoy this job because there is so much variety,” she said. “I get to see bits and pieces of different kinds of projects all the time.”

For more information about the library’s GIS services, call Henley (962-1151) or e-mail ahenley@email.unc.edu or refer to www.lib.unc.edu/references/gis.

@yourlibrary highlights library services, collections, events and news of special interest to faculty and staff. Questions about this feature and requests for future topics may be sent to Judy Panitch (panitch@email.unc.edu), director of library communications. The website for the UNC-Chapel Hill Libraries is www.lib.unc.edu. This month’s column was written by Margaret Hair.

Davis is welcomed at UNC

 

The University introduced Butch Davis as the new football coach during a Nov. 27 news conference. Since arriving, Davis has been introducing himself to Carolina fans, appearing during halftime of recent men’s and women’s basketball games. Davis is a 32-year coaching veteran with stints at the University of Miami, where he turned around a program hit with NCAA sanctions, and the Cleveland Browns. UNC leaders have emphasized his commitment to graduating players and helping develop their character.

 

 

Students use wireless clickers to share feedback in classrooms

It’s not “Who Wants to be a Millionaire,” but it’s close. Response systems similar to ones used to poll studio audiences are now being used in classrooms at Carolina.

Michael Masterson uses his wireless response system on a quiz during Debra Murray’s class.

Commonly known as “clickers,” these hand-held wireless devices are used in academic settings to gauge students’ comprehension, provoke discussion and facilitate class participation and peer feedback.

Instructors using clickers are finding them to be a thoughtful and periodic way during a 50- or 75-minute class to keep students engaged. Even in very large classes, all students can participate equally.

Debbie Murray, a lecturer in the Department of Exercise and Sport Science, has been using the clickers for three semesters.

“I teach the course entitled ‘Personal Health,’ she said, “and because the course is designed around applying concepts of health and wellness to each individual’s personal lifestyle, there needs to be strong interaction between instructor and student. I teach classes with 70 to 85 students and the clickers really help students participate in a meaningful way.”

One of the biggest benefits is immediacy. According to Murray, clickers offer the option to poll and almost instantly display a graph of results. Those results often surprise students and foster discussion and class participation, especially since the clicker offers an anonymous mode.

“The opportunity to answer sensitive questions anonymously is very important because my class addresses topics such as being sexually responsible and the use and abuse of alcohol and drugs,” said Murray.

Murray also uses clickers for quizzes, test preparation and a daily class participation grade.

“The feedback I get from students is very positive,” she said.

According to sales figures provided by Student Stores, at least a dozen instructors ordered clickers last semester and more than 900 students purchased them. The devices are often marketed by textbook publishers, and, in addition to the cost of the device itself, some publishers also require additional fees for device registration.

In response to the growing use of these devices, Information Technology Services (ITS)Teaching and Learning is evaluating several response systems and plans to announce a recommended standard by Feb. 1 in time for textbook orders to be placed for the next summer and fall.

“The market is in flux at the moment with a number of available products,” said Bob Henshaw, project coordinator for academic outreach. “It’s really a pocketbook issue for the students. If we can recommend a standard, then it will help prevent students from having to purchase and keep up with multiple devices.”

A recommended standard provides leverage to negotiate favorable pricing for students and instructors and will facilitate technical and pedagogical support for instructors interested in using response systems, added Henshaw.

“Because these are wireless systems, Teaching and Learning is consulting with the Networking division to gauge each product’s compatibility with campus WiFi and other devices using radio-frequency transmission,” said Suzanne Cadwell, academic outreach consultant, who is also working on the project.

Cadwell and Henshaw are gathering information from instructors who use clicker systems for feedback on what features the instructors find important and how the systems are used in classes.