Teaching and Learning with Technology

Technology Project Support Guidelines

We are committed to providing technology support for teaching and learning, even as we recognize the complexity of serving the wide variety of disciplines and technologies across campus. Competing demands for technology support require adequate advance planning and carefully coordinated use of space, support staff, and other resources. In order to facilitate successful projects, we have developed the following guidelines:

1. Faculty must request an educational technologies liaison appointment. Please contact Sondra Smith, Co-CIO for Information Technology and Director of Educational Technologies, or another member of the educational technologies team* for assistance in aligning available support services for the use of technology in teaching and learning. This meeting must occur by the end of the first full week of the semester. Ideally, this meeting would occur before the end of the previous semester. Before attending this meeting, faculty should consider the goal of the assignment or project, and how it fits in with the course as a whole.
   
2. A course support plan will evolve from that meeting, which will include a timeline and outline of expectations for support, as well as allocation of staffing, training, technology, and facilities resources required for the project. A copy of the assignment and assessment rubric must be included. The course support plan serves as the memo of understanding between faculty and professional staff involved in each project.
   
3. Peer technology support has proven to have a strong, positive effect on project success at St. Lawrence. We highly encourage faculty to identify two students per course who have demonstrated a higher level of technological skill and who can serve as the first tier of support for other students in the class. These students might be paid by the department as Teaching Assistants or earn credit for their work. Students report that this is a good way to gain technology expertise, a highly beneficial qualification when applying for many kinds of positions.

Sincerely,

Directors and Support Staff in the Service of Educational Technologies, Newell Center for Arts Technology and Language Resource Center at St. Lawrence University

* Faculty teaching in the Arts should contact Chris Watts, Director, Newell Center for Arts Technology; faculty teaching in the department of Modern Languages and Literatures should contact Jenna Torres, Director, Language Resource Center; otherwise, contact another member of the educational technologies team.