Interactive Telecommunication In Iowa(Teleconference)

hello everyone and welcome I'm Roger Brown I'm coming to you live from the campus of Iowa State University in Ames Iowa today we'll participate together in a very full and I hope valuable 90-minute video conference let me quickly preview what we're going to do using our ITI 3d logo let's take the tea first telecommunications we'll talk about television satellites microwave systems fiber optics will help you understand the value of these and other technologies in your educational programs next the three DS the first is for definition instructional designer mike albright will be defining a lot of space-age terms used when people talk about distance learning today the second D is for demonstration we've prepared short videos on innovative telecommunication programs at several community colleges and public school sites and will investigate the developing statewide telecommunications system the third D stands for discussion the representatives of each of these programs are with us to explain how their systems function the last I stands for Iowa but we know that many you are viewing from all across the country and we welcome your participation anyone who's watching any of you can call us on an 800 line here's our number one eight hundred seven four seven five five oh five that's one eight hundred seven four seven five five zero five call us anytime during the program and we'll take well the last few minutes to answer as many calls as we can finally that first I may be the most exciting concept of all interactive telecommunications its telecommunication between many learners and teachers over distance to demonstrate we're going to say hello to our studio audience they're in the Iowa Public Television Studios in Johnston they come to us via a microwave link our host is Tim berry good morning Tim gratings Roger we're happy to be here we're here at studio three the beautiful theater at Iowa Public Television located in Johnston Iowa for our friends outside of the state of Iowa that's just a little bit above Des Moines andy warhol says that everybody's got an opportunity to be famous for about 15 minutes in their life we're going to come back here later on and see who gets the opportunity to be famous with some questions and answers here we're happy to be on the program and glad you folks are with us back to you Roger Tim thanks very much and we're glad to have you one of our presenters today is in Las Cruces New Mexico we're having a little difficulty with a satellite feed but we hope to be able to have that a little bit later in the program and we'll be interacting with dr. Tom Sears so what's began first we'd like to bring some comments from one of many people you'll be hearing from during the program who's vitally interested in interactive telecommunications in Iowa the state of Iowa is proud of its long tradition as a leader in educational innovation Iowans expect high quality from their schools and they support new ideas that contribute to excellence the use of interactive telecommunications offers a more diversified curriculum to the children of the state and access to higher quality courses and enrichment programs the Iowa plan for telecommunications is the official process by which the schools of the state will be linked together I urge you to use this plan and develop procedures for the effective use of this new form of educational technology your input during this teleconference will help identify how interactive television can allow iowa to remain at the forefront of the nation's educational systems you know exciting things are happening in Iowa and the way of educational telecommunications in just a few minutes we'll be talking with representatives of five of the most interesting delivery systems around the state since some of you may have had limited exposure to some of these technologies we thought it might be appropriate as part of this teleconference to bring you a short description of each of these delivery systems here to provide that overview is Mike Albright he's coordinator for instructional development in the media resources center at Iowa State University Mike Thank You Roger before I begin I'd like to emphasize that we know that what we're going to talk about here is old stuff to many of you but since our audience today certainly consists of folks with different levels of knowledge about telecommunications technologies we thought that a short introduction might be helpful for some of our viewers who might not be too sure about some of these terms the first one that we need to cover is this idea of educational telecommunications in the first place telecommunications means different things to different people and it's true that the term includes a wide range of activities from long distance telephone services to data communications works too teleconferencing via a satellite based distribution system to the delivery of instructional services by television or computer to heaven knows what else if you look at the word telecommunications it simply means to communicate over a distance and although I suppose that could include the postal service or carrier pigeon or smoke signals the term normally implies that some kind of electronic technology is involved such as television or telephone or computers and so when we put the adjective educational in front of the noun telecommunications we're simply describing that subcategory of telecommunications in which instruction related information is provided via some electronic means to learners who are geographically separated from the source of the transmission whether across the campus or across the country so let's start out by looking at the three technologies that will form the primary delivery system for the Iowa educational telecommunications network these are fiber optics microwave and instructional television fixed service or ITF s now the term fiber optics has been around for about thirty years but fiber has only recently become a viable option in the telecommunications industry and now it's widely used for long-distance telephone services and many other kinds of applications our old coaxial cable or coax used copper wire and transmitted electronic signals but fiber optic cable is made from glass and it transmits optical or light energy and this gives us some very important advantages now for one thing the quality of the transmission is vastly improved somebody once calculated that if our eyesight could pass through ocean water as clearly as an optical signal passes through glass fiber we'd be able to see the bottom of the ocean from any point on the ocean surface and I think if you think that that's pretty impressive another advantage of fiber is that the signal can be transmitted a much greater distance before it needs to be amplified and since fiber transmits optical energy the signal can't be affected by any type of electromagnetic interference and so it's easy to see why they primary trunk lines in the Iowa educational telecommunications network are going to be fiber now in just a few minutes we're going to hear about another exciting application of fiber optic technology by Des Moines area public schools Iowa Public Television is going to be the hub of the IET n network and fiber optic lines will be used to provide two-way transmission between the Iowa Public Television facilities at Johnston and the 14 communities that have been designated as Network switching locations now when the system is completed the technologies that will be used to expand the system down to the county level will be microwave and instructional television fixed service and we'll be hearing a lot more about this from Linda shots in just a few minutes microwave and IT FS are similar in a number of ways first of all they both transmit audio and video signals over-the-air without the need for any type of cable interconnection between transmit and receive sites they both use frequencies that require special receiving equipment so they can't be picked up on your TV set at home and they both can provide two-way communications if the receive sites are also equipped with transmit capability as they will be in about a hundred and twenty local communities around Iowa now other locations will receive one-way audio and video and then use telephone lines for the return audio now I might add that it's very important to have this return audio capability so that we can have the same degree of interactivity among students and instructors that we'd have in a normal face-to-face classroom now the most important difference between Mike wavin ITF s other than the frequency they use is that microwave is a point-to-point system while ITF s is a point-to-multipoint now what that means is that a microwave transmitter focuses on a specific reception site and the signal cannot be received clearly at locations outside the direct line of the microwave transmission now ITF s on the other hand broadcasts its signal just like a television station and anyone with the proper receiving equipment within the coverage area and pick up the transmissions and this is why ITF s is a preferable distribution medium in locations with multiple receiving sites located within about a 20-mile radius of the transmitter another technology that has seen dramatic growth in the past four or five years is the use of communication satellites for delivering educational programming now at the k-12 level for example ty n is a private satellite network that provides over a hundred and forty hours of instructional programming per week to more than 300 schools in 28 states including 13 receive sites here in the state of Iowa a similar service is provided by Oklahoma State University's Arts and Sciences teleconferencing service the IT excuse me the 80 let's try again AST s and now the federal government has funded almost twenty million dollars for the Star Schools program to provide high school level courses by satellite to rural school districts all over the country star schools has four pilot projects going this fiscal year at the post-secondary level we know that over 40 colleges and universities have offered their own courses by satellite to off-campus students for academic credit at both graduate and undergraduate levels really if you think about it satellite based instruction is a fairly simple concept a satellite is nothing more than a relay station in space and whatever programming we want to send out to the target audience whether video audio data or some combination thereof is sent to the satellite by a special transmitter called an uplink and the satellite itself carries a set of mechanisms called transponders each of which has the capability of receiving the signal from the uplink amplifying it converting it to a different frequency so that it doesn't interfere with the incoming signal and then transmitting it back to earth the signal is then received by the ubiquitous dishes that we call downlink and routed by fibre or coaxial cable to the audience's TV sets now I might add that there are two satellite frequency bands that are used by the educational and business communities see band and the K U band and you might hear these terms from time to time now the satellites that we use are located over the equator at an altitude of about 22,000 miles in an orbit that is synchronous with the rotation of the earth and so they appear as you look at them to be stationary in the sky the advantage of using a geosynchronous satellite is that from that altitude satellite can see about 42 percent of the Earth's surface and depending upon the configuration of the transponders transmitter we have the potential of reaching a very large audience spread out over a huge geographical area for example most of the audience for our program today is located here in Iowa but we know that we have viewers in Texas New Mexico Virginia Massachusetts California Florida and please forgive me if I've missed somebody anyway the main disadvantage of satellites is that it costs between 300 and a thousand dollars per hour to transmit programming by satellite and that does not include production expenses so you can see that it's very expensive to deliver an ongoing program such as a college or high school course via satellite and you have to have a large number of receiving sites sharing the costs to make the program economic viable I just want to mention one other technology and that is the use of community cable television systems quite often educational channels are included in cable franchise agreements and schools and colleges can use these to deliver instruction and other types of programming throughout their local communities for example one of the heritage cable vision channels in Des Moines is shared by Drake University Grandview college and the Des Moines area community college and Morningside College actively programs a channel on a Siouxland cable system in Sioux City well what we'd like to do right now is to give you a little demonstration of how some of these technologies that we've talked about this morning can be linked together so I'll turn it back over to Roger thanks very much Mike one of the things that happens in interactive video and telecommunications and satellites is that there are glitches and you when you get involved with something like that you'll find that out one of our glitches is that one of our presenters today dr. Tom Sears in New Mexico is not with us yet we're still hoping to have him with either on satellite or by telephone and we'll go to him when we do meanwhile we have a very very exciting group of folks with us our panel I'd like to introduce them if I could first of all dr. Bob Hardman Bob is director of the educational Media Center and professor of instructional technology at the University of Northern Iowa and Cedar Falls bob has pioneered the development of training workshops for traditional classroom teachers to become accomplished teachers on TV by the way as I introduce folks you'll have a chance to see in just a minute there the work that they're doing at on their sites gary veteran is director of the television Center for Iowa Iowa Lakes Community College and Esther ville the Iowa Lakes Program of interactive television serves a five-county area and Gary brings to our panel an excellent model of cooperation between the public schools the area Education Agency and the college gary kathleen Steinhardt is manager of credit programs for the College of continuing education he Iowa State University and Ames Cathleen is an articulate spokesperson for ISU is glowing involvement in all manner of interactive telecommunications Dave bunting is associate dean of educational services at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids the Kirkwood program features seven microwave length sites equipped for two-way interactive audio and video and represents Iowa's most extensive experience in this technology Dave and the Kirkwood telecommunication staff are currently programming over 30 high school and college interactive courses Judy Richardson is where this doctor - Richard sin is supervisor of vocational education and coordinator of technology for the Des Moines Public Schools the district has recently installed an interactive fiber-optic system linking all five Des Moines high schools and the Urbandale High School with a central campus and administrative headquarters in downtown Des Moines and again she'll be describing that to our help against describe that in just a couple of moments and Linda Schatz is whether it's Linda is director of narrowcasting services for Iowa Public Television she's identified with the Iowa educational telecommunications plan about which we've heard so much this spring and for which the Iowa Legislature has recently appropriated some 12 million dollars now that I've introduced everyone and we are almost ready to take a look at what's happening at each of those sites I think we are able to talk with with dr. Tom Sears and let's find out if we can we're doing it by telephone I think dr. Sears are you hearing us in Las Cruces go ahead please yeah so dr. cirrus are you hearing us they're in Las Cruces okay I think we'll I think we'll have him stand by for a minute and let's take some time to look at one of our very exciting videos if we may and I'll tell our director that we'll do that and our first video today is brought to us by Iowa Public Television Linda Schatz is with us Linda this is an exciting concept in something that's it we're looking forward to seeing and learning for looking forward to learning a lot more about in the next few years this is really something that's a it's coming in and tell me a little bit about what you'd like to show us and it also includes a look at the system design okay let's take a look if we made them at that videotape and take a look at the Iowa system what will the future of education be like and how will the ever-changing educational needs of Iowans we met our computers the answer satellite communications when we'd be able to ingest our knowledge with our breakfast in the morning or maybe even electronically transmit it directly into the brain what conditions force us to let machines teach our children in a future that is cold impersonal and dehumanizing hello I'm Morgan halgren the fact is some of those items mentioned do represent extreme answers to many of the problems faced by education today particularly limited resources both financial and in the area of facilities problems that have resulted in a disparity in the types and varieties of educational services offered to Iowa communities and please note that when we say communities we mean just that a rapidly changing world has forced us to realize that learning never ends retraining or continuing education for adults is already a simple fact of life and yet much of Iowa's population is prohibited or at least discouraged from improving their lives merely because the location of educational resources is too far away and responsibilities to job and family make it impossible to go away to school so what's the answer when the experts and people like you concerned about the future of Education began to look at some technological ways to improve the variety and accessibility of educational resources in Iowa they realized that some form of telecommunications would have to be employed and they further realized that whatever system they designed it would have to be interactive students and instructors would have to be able to communicate with each other in real-time that is talk with one another just as if they were right there in the same classroom but with such a system actually work the answer was already at hand community colleges in Iowa are mandated by law to serve the region they are located in not just their hometown in the beginning they did this by acquiring classroom space in outlying communities and having their instructors Drive there from campus it wasn't long before interactive telecommunications was identified as a common-sense alternative Kirkwood Community College was the first regional interactive tell munication system in Iowa construction of the Kirkwood system began in the late 70s and over the years other regional systems have developed around the state today in addition to the Kirkwood system there are several other telecommunication systems in place and still growing during the time these systems have been in place interactive tell alerting has been accepted by both educators and students as a viable and valuable alternative that can be used in a constantly growing variety of ways based upon this experience and a lot of investigative study the Iowa Legislature passed a bill in 1987 making Iowa Public Television the coordinating body for a proposed telecommunications system called the Iowa educational telecommunications network a system that would link together all of the local and regional systems into one statewide network this network could then be linked to national and international telecommunications facilities this coordination would be carried out by Iowa Public Television with the advice and input of the narrowcast advisory committee a committee made up of system users that would actually be responsible for the operation of the IET end system it's important to stress that Iowa Public televisions role is truly that of coordinator in other words coordinating the interconnection of those systems around the state that already exists and any new construction as well as helping those regions to meet their educational needs through telecommunications decisions regarding actual system use will remain in the hands of the various communities who will be using the Iowa educational telecommunications network now let's take a quick look at the IET n system as it has been proposed the network begins with regional systems placed strategically around the state these systems would be composed of duplex links established between each Regional Center and a number of nearby communities basically duplex means two-way transmission and would involve the use of such technologies as microwave or fiber optics as mentioned earlier some of these regional systems are already in place as represented by the solid lines proposed additional duplex links are by the dotted lines an important segment of each regional system involves what is called I TFS or instructional television fixed service miss makes statewide coverage possible the I TFS is symbolized by the colored circles appearing on the map these are simply television broadcast transmitters that are limited to a range of approximately twenty miles in radius this system would allow video and audio distribution from the origination site with audio response from the receive sites the backbone links represented here by the solid blue lines connect the 15 regional areas of the state as well as the three Regent universities with fiber optics capable of carrying multiple live interactive communications simultaneously the hub of this system would be located north of Des Moines at the Iowa Public Television Network Center as you can see the entire state will have equal access to telecommunications resources once the system is completed and then it becomes a relatively simple matter to link any part of Iowa to national and international telecommunications facilities through Iowa's three educational up links at Iowa State University the University of Iowa and Iowa Public Television at the same time vast resources of information can be received at the more than 80 downlink sites at Iowa State University's extension locations as well as other downlink sites in the state the information received via satellite at the regional centers can also be distributed to other communities over the IE TN system perhaps we should say a word about what is meant by telecommunications even though we've been stressing the educational merits of this system the fact is that the Iowa educational telecommunications network will have a variety of potential uses and while all of the uses have an educational or informational element some of them might be quite different from the traditional courses offered via telecommunications this system could be used for teachers meetings data transmission continuing education and Retraining for business and industry and even town meetings conceivably all happening simultaneously and it needs to be pointed out that in fact it's almost certain that there will be an infinite number of other uses that haven't even been thought of yet and that's just fine because the IET end system is more than capable of expanding right along with Iowa's growing educational telecommunications needs before we move on perhaps it would be helpful to give you a hypothetical example of how the system might be used imagine there's a small engineering firm in the southwest Iowa town of Sidney whose employees would greatly benefit from a computer science course taught by a professor at the University of Iowa video and audio signals from the professor's classroom in Iowa City travel via fiber optics to the IET n control center near Des Moines and then on to Council Bluffs from there signals are sent to a specially equipped classroom in Sidney if the employees have a question for the professor the process is reversed but keep in mind that the links between Iowa City and Sidney are occurring simultaneously similar to a telephone conversation with the added benefit of the parties being able to see as well as hear one another let's take this a little further and say that a group of teachers in Hampton Iowa having just heard about an exciting teaching strategy recommended by an education professor at the University of Northern Iowa has arranged an interactive session with this professor scheduled to occur at the same time as the U of I computer science course once again a link is created through the system between Cedar Falls and Hampton because of the system design simultaneous uses of the backbone can occur the two courses in Hampton and Sidney wouldn't even be aware of one another let's imagine further that teachers in some of the communities around Hampton become aware of the course being set from uni and they decide they might benefit from it as well it's very easy at this point to have the course broadcast on Hamptons I TFS transmitter that means that towns within range about a 20 mile radius around Hampton would pick up the course through video and audio connections from uni with audio response to the Uni origination site in fact the IET end system is being designed to accommodate a large number of simultaneous uses in addition to those two courses occurring on our hypothetical day there would almost certainly be a number of other educational interactive programs around the state and within individual regions don't be concerned if portions of our explanation have thus far seemed a bit bewildering although the types of technologies and the method of their operation are important all the participants in this project agree that the technology should be as transparent and unobtrusive as possible and must never be allowed to disrupt the primary goal to provide an effective and efficient telecommunications system that meets the educational needs of Iowa's citizens it's important to remember that while the entire state will be linked to the world when the IET end system is completed the way the system is used will be up to the states local districts in this way the IET end system becomes just one more tool for educating Iowans the intent of the system is to complement and supplement a job that Iowa has always done very well since the days of the one-room schoolhouse Iowa's government and her people have dedicated themselves to providing the best of educational opportunities Iowa Public Television is proud to take part in continuing that tradition through the Iowa educational telecommunications network I'm Morgan Halpern thanks for watching and Thank You Morgan remember when Mike Albright was with us he mentioned a little demonstration of interaction where were fortunate to be able to do that now as we talk live with dr. Tom Sears he's in Las Cruces New Mexico are you receiving us okay there tom yes welcome to the New Mexico State University teleclass room in Las Cruces New Mexico our weather is 80 degrees and we'll be pushing 100 before the day is over very good Tom you can keep the hundred degrees down there in Las Cruces we'll take what we've got up here in Iowa which is a nice cool morning we experienced a little bit of delay between our signals Tom and if you would take just a moment to explain why that is sure Roger I've prepared a little graphic that will explain the number of hops that our signal must take to reach you an aim state if you bring up the graphic please I'm broadcasting from the New Mexico State University tell a classroom through hardwire to a public television station approximately 220 miles to the University of New Mexico where it's set up to weststar for and back to your downlink dish at Iowa State University a distance of about 22,000 miles very good time you're in a classroom setting there that's that's obvious and you've got some beautiful graphics to go with that tell us a little bit about your your classroom facility there how is that working how'd you get it set up well our teleclass room in milton hall and our main campus is a traditional teleclass room we have a overhead camera that will pick up anything that I write or any graphics that I might use our control booth is approximately 300 feet away from where I'm sitting now and all of our materials are remotely control all right audio signals are picked up in the ceiling and I'm sitting in a special desk that has a television set as well as our audio console that's fantastic Tom what a terrific facility that you have what are you using it for what sorts of instruction instructional situations do you use it in well we have three major uses Roger we are primarily broadcasting our signal via fiber optic line and microwave to the University of Mexico for shared courses we're also sending our signal to the military bases at Kirtland Air Force Base Cannon Air Force Base Holloman Air Force Base the Air Force weapons lab where they not only receive a live interactive signal but they're also receiving videotapes for packets courses very good understand you're going to be involved in Iowa this summer I think it's on the 17th of July and they're going to be involved in some classes here tell us a little bit about to your participation well we hope to be out there in the 17th for several days to work with your faculty and people throughout the state to deal with techniques of teaching on a typical tell a classroom very good I want to ask our folks here in the studio here very quickly Tom at one point we thought we might see if we could get a question from the folks in Des Moines for you let me look at our control booth and see if we can yes we can okay we're gonna do a little switching back and forth here and let's see if if Tim berry is there Tim we've got a question all ready to go for you Roger okay very good Tim you asked I think you're gonna ask directly that question to tom Sears dr. CEA's this is Al Kent from Iowa State University I'd like to know whether the state of Mexico has a telecommunications network or if you don't does it plan to establish one L during this past year the state of New Mexico has studied a statewide system similar to that you're proposing in Iowa it went to our legislature it was recommended to set up a commission to study the problem because of fiscal restraints our governor saw fit to veto this but we've been encouraged to resubmit to the legislature this January and hopefully in the next several years we'll see a back bone system similar to yours we thank you for being involved Tom thanks very much for being with us thank you Roger Tom Sears who's been coming to us live via satellite from Las Cruces New Mexico now we are going to return to our panel and I think our next presenter is Bob Hartman who's with us this morning well tell us a little bit about - what we are going to see Roger had a long history of strong programs both undergraduate and graduate programs in teacher education and so beginning last summer in partnership with Kirkwood Community College we offered our first course or workshop preparing teachers to teach using interactive instructional television very good Bob let's take a look if we can at that system well I think that like any technology I think that we need to look at what the need happens to be and based upon the need we select the technology which best meets that need so to imagine that all of our classes are going to be taught that way in the future I just don't think it's realistic at all I think we use the technology when it serves that we might have in the case of education we're talking about not only the teacher being able to present to the students but the students also being able to interact with the teacher well that's done in really one or two ways either it is done with two-way video and two-way audio where the teacher can see the students at a various sites or in various classrooms certainly the students can also see the teacher but then we also have two-way audio the second type of system is a one-way video the students see the teacher but two-way audio and the teacher can hear the students but cannot see the students it's teaching students in a single class but at multiple sites that it is the easy technology to use and we're trying to give them hands-on experience and teaching over over a simulated system we very much believe that the heart and soul of what we're about as teachers and students and that interaction and the goal is not to replace teachers in fact we have found with our system that we've had more need for more teachers because of increased demand for some of the courses that we've offered we don't even videotape our classes because again we feel that the strength is that live interaction there's something the way our system is designed that we want to keep that that attention central between teacher and student and that's a live interactive experience but we still need at the very beginning to help them understand both the benefits and the trade-offs are the disadvantages we think that's important we don't just go in there and say well it's just gonna be like any old class you've ever had but we do think that with a very positive attitude by the teacher and a real caring attitude by the teacher if that's conveyed to those students and they know the advantages and disadvantages they can very easily adapt and learn and everything that we've done as far as a research indicates that the learning outcomes in other words how students do is equal to the traditional classroom you talk about cost or one has to consider the type of technology that you're using in other words the type of technology that will deliver the signal from our origination site to our distant site currently we're talking about not only the various technologies that we're talking about would include direct copper wire cable certainly microwave that's a common technology that is used ITF s television or instructional television fixed service and certainly one of the latest technologies that we're talking about using that is a very very effective and efficient technology for delivery of electronic signals as fiber optics now there is one additional system which is rather costly and that satellite telecommunications now we in Iowa see satellite telecommunications primarily for communications outside the state of Iowa as opposed to internal communication within the state it is an alternative delivery system it gives them options and there's certainly something very attractive about not having to travel or fly and waste that time but you could use it more productively here on campus so I think that the technology will be used when we have a need to use when we have a need that can best be met by that particular technology thanks very much Bob we're about to lose our satellite feed from New Mexico with Tom Cirrus Tom we just like to take a moment to thank you again and for being with us Roger we wish you a way of suerte good luck from the land of enchantment in the completion of your statewide television project thanks very much Tom and we'll see you on the 17th of July now Dave punting from Kirkwood is with us and Dave you are part of that uni system we saw a little bit of you in that but you have your own video tell us quickly what that's about well when I think of interactive television and I think of various types of Technology I think about the the people that we serve and this videotape is going to show the many people who are a part of our system and how they're benefited by interactive television in the next few minutes we are going to take you on a journey to show you what the Kirkwood telecommunication system is all about Kirkwood is a comprehensive Community College we serve people in seven counties that goes a hundred miles from north to south and about 80 miles from east to west in the mid 1970s we realized that many of our students who wanted to take classes with us could not because of the barrier of time and distance that's why the Kirkwood telecommunication system or kts was implemented we began in 1980 by building our first phase of this interactive television system today our system comprises a variety of delivery systems within the KT s concept and a variety of programs and services are delivered over 70 hours a week so let's meet some of these important people who make this whole system work I enjoyed the classes over the system I always felt like the teachers were always available for my help if I needed them and it was a very convenient way for me to get my education as a mother and a homemaker I could not make it to Cedar Rapids for classes and it was very convenient for me to be able to come to Waynesburg and get the same classes and the same in attention and the same instructor as the people in Cedar Rapids were getting there I could not find time to take classes for a four-year degree my goal was to be able to teach preschool students and to be able to work with them I didn't feel that a four-year degree was necessary and I did not have time or the money or basically the energy to do a four-year program the instruction and the instructors are as personable to the people on the on the system as if you were sitting in the classroom with them right in front of you interactive television learning expands the possibilities for the institution for the student and for the instructor the institution is broadened because it reaches more students people who can take advantage of its services and also because it broadens its services when it comes in contact with students who have other needs the student of course gains an education has opportunities to take classes that they would not normally have because of difficulties with commuting time and scheduling childcare working around job schedules the instructor benefits because the more students you can reach and the more diverse those students are the greater your own perspectives are and the the better teacher you become as a Washington County coordinator part of my position is working with adults returning back to school and the telecommunication system has become a very important part of that option with the telecommunication systems we in Washington County 60 miles from Kirkwood Community College campus had the availability of college credit courses with quality teachers from 7:30 in the morning till 9:30 at night I think one of the highlights of the telecommunication system is the fact that it makes available to the students right here in Iowa County a chance to be connected with Kirk with college campus the educational system that I chose Kirkwood made going to school much more convenient for me and less expensive teaching by television is an important medium today there are a lot of classes that otherwise would not be taught a lot of subjects that would not be learned if we do not have this means it might be thought to be an impersonal method of teaching but with the dual audio television teaching it is not impersonal it's a different learning experience than having a teacher right in front of you you have to pay more attention by taking it over the interface you have to Canton State kept up in your work if you want to have a good grade and be able to learn and also you get the experience of meeting other students and other schools when we have that opportunity over at Kirkwood district and we could not obviously afford to have hired teacher to teach the 15 or 20 students that have taken those courses over the years but by having the instructional TV network available our district we've been able to provide this opportunity for our students interactive television provides an opportunity for teachers to stay current within their own professional areas teaching on an interactive system is primarily teaching the hardware is not in the way at all I think it makes you a better teacher thanks very much I'd like to remind you to call in your questions for our panelists we'll be answering questions in the last part of the program another 15 minutes or so again that number is 1-877-443-6276 system which would allow us to connect with fibre the central campus our resource center to our five comprehensive high schools after we examined our options we made an agreement with us West and for the past two years we've been doing some experimentation with the system this fall we began to offer for the first time direct instruction on the system we have a class in Japanese which we teach to a neighboring district Urbandale and we have a class that we share between two other high schools in beginning Latin we've been working this year to develop better equipment on our end we've been working with the US West to improve their into the technology and it's been a very exciting and sometimes frustrating but profitable two years it's not the lecture style class if I teach just by telling them what to do or just keep talking one hour they will probably get bored of it because there is no human contact involved in it but like this if the language class is by nature communication so for the language class like mine it's working very much very well teachers have been telling us that it's not the best educational environment to combine classes putting two or three levels of a foreign language in one class the system allows us to group those students into classes that will allow them to be getting 50 minutes of instruction at the level where they should be getting it they've had to do so much of it on their own they've probably had to work harder then the students would have over here it's probably just as effective it's just not nearly as efficient if I wanted Latin I would have had to went to I think Lincoln or central campus and the only reason I would want to go to Central Campus was for Latin and I didn't want to have to leave Roosevelt so they said that if we took Latin we'd have the choice of taking it on this or they'd been allowed and so I decided this was worth the try I think that obviously it has the potential to make us a better school because it expands the offerings that we can give our young people I think the true test of an outstanding high school is a school that can provide a broad base group of courses that youngsters may opt to become familiar with and the fact that we would not be able to offer some of the foreign languages is to our advantage obviously that's been the area of concentration currently is in the foreign languages but I think it can be expanded in other areas as we become familiar with this yeah it's an effective class and because it gives me a chance to work on my own more than I would if a teacher was in the room okay it's interesting first of all being able to see and I feel like keeps you on task because you have actually two teachers that are watching you it's more like having a student teacher because there's always somebody to watch you keep you on task whether it's the teacher on the other side of the city or if it's the teacher that's in the room because I could see where it would be very easy for the students to go off in their own tangent and not stay on task because it would be very difficult to control those students from the other end of the broadcast I don't see it as eliminating jobs I see it as enabling me as a teacher to reach students who would not otherwise have an opportunity to take this class some students learn very well under the direction of a teacher under their direct supervision and other students learn better on their own and if we can just figure out a way to blend a student's learning style with the instructional tile we'll be successful if we're going to use this kind of technology in schools it must benefit primarily the instructional program improve the curriculum expand the curriculum and enhance it it's an expensive proposition and even though there are a lot of other things you can do with it in terms of telecommunications and communications between buildings and schools the primary benefit must be to the students and the teachers so that's the the main payoff that we're looking for in experimenting with this system we can make the technology transparent so that a good teacher can teach students using the technology and not know it's there and we're looking forward to great things from that des moines system again in its second year of of testing and it'll be up and running full-time very soon Jerry fed Ernest with us Gary of this director of the television Center for Iowa Lakes Community College and Gary give us a little preview if you would have the iowa lakes five-county program basically what we're attempting to do is serve a rural population and to take care about the sea we would just like to share with you some of the student opinions and faculty opinions of our system very good and let's take a look at that now if we may take a look at what's happening a system of Iowa serves the rural population that is in our five County area we wanted to bring classes and educational opportunities to those small communities like Lake Park and Harris Lake Park schools north coast Sioux County Schools in sway city and the like that normally would not have an opportunity for courses such as high school French high school algebra high school calculus college courses for high school and the people out in the community the greatest accomplishment of the television system I think is to do what we're supposed to do in the first place this is a community college and we serve a community which is a very large sense of five or more counties and we can reach those people that we wouldn't have been able to reach before I'm taking a French 2tb course and I really like it because it gives me an advantage to take a foreign language that wouldn't have been available to me if it wasn't for the TV classes I believe the system is trying to accomplish bringing a variety of classes to students that ordinarily would not be able to have these classes or situations in their own own school I get experience because it's different than being in a regular classroom you have to be on your toes more and be ready for everything more so it helps the interactive TV system here is trying to bring rich and varied educational experience to students who up until this point have not had the opportunity to expand their horizons I try to do several things when I teach on television first of all I want to give the students a survival level knowledge speaking knowledge of the French language second of all I want to communicate caring I want to be able to expand the physical distance with professional caring and third of all I want to be able to see the students develop a sense of themselves yes I definitely think that learning is taking place we I can compare the scores of students in these remote areas with the students that are in my own classroom at this and they do very well in comparison my camera person is a very very important entity of the class I've been very fortunate to have two excellent camera persons the last two years but I think you need to build a bond between your camera person in yourself and by this time at this point in the year Jill knows when I'm going to be moving to the right or to the left she knows when to make the picture bigger window zero in on me and so forth so there's a communication of just maybe by a little hand gesture or a word that I can communicate with my camera person and that's that's very definitely an important factor well basically you know the I've heard that said that there's no difference between teaching live and on television and that's simply not true there are a few things you have to do different one is be prepared you have to prepare everything about a week in advance which is best like living in a little bit of a time warp thinking a week in advance because there's one thing you absolutely couldn't do on television and that is wing it you have to know what you're going to do and when you're gonna do it so I do have a leg up on perhaps other subjects teaching art appreciation being very visual the trick is to use them a lot visual aids because we're in a media that's real simple car Escalade but cars come on I think it's the same as if she was in the room except maybe even a little better because I can go at my own speed I can look back in the book and see what she just said and how you write it and it just gives me an advantage I think we want the teachers to believe as well as the students that learning is taking place we do that through constant communication between us and the TV Center the teachers and the students in a non classroom setting by getting them together as often as possible and through thorough tech testing we believe through in servicing our teachers and working very closely with their teachers that education does take place on distant learning systems thanks very much Gary we remind you that you still have time to call us with a question again our number as it appears is one eight hundred seven four seven five five over five we have operators waiting to take your call and write that question down and we'll be answering it in just a little bit lots of exciting uses of Technology all across the state of Iowa of course we like to think that much of that is happening here at Iowa State University dr. Kathleen Steinhardt is with us she's a manager of credit programs for the office of continuing education here in Iowa State University and Kathleen we're doing some some really exciting things in many areas including in my and the Cooperative Extension Service tell us a little bit about equipment actually Iowa State uses three forms of telecommunications around your audio teleconferencing video cassette in satellite television but we've chosen to focus this film clip on the university's use of satellite very good let's take a look at that right now if we may find out what happened what's happening at Iowa Iowa State University now has its statewide instructional satellite network up and running our uplink facility is located here in Ames on campus at the woi television headquarters and our downlink sites of which there are now over 80 are located in ISU Extension offices across the state we call this new system the Iowa State telecommunications network and we use it to deliver credit coursework continuing education programming and Cooperative Extension activities to a number of constituencies across Iowa and occasionally beyond the borders of Iowa now let's hear from the people involved in the programming as to how this all really works satellite is simply a delivery system that joins the teacher or the expert to the learner or the recipient the Iowa State University had started in the summer of 1985 when they constructed their c-band satellite uplink in January of 1986 Iowa State did their first co-op extension program over 40 programs and nearly $100 of programming have followed since then for coop extension program efforts in addition to teleconferences credit non-credit courses we've had a lot of other things like research that hasn't been overlooked either good educational use demands planning to make the learner interact with rather than remaining a passive viewer there's a limit to client distance information and the viewer must be highly motivated the program demands print support materials for later review and there must be an opportunity for some sort of interaction we usually provide that with telephone lines back to campus another alternative would be knowledgeable local facilitators at each downlink site to connect smaller educational programs focused on local concerns television can be a powerful up close emotional medium or it can be passive and boring the choice is up to you as the originator it's managing of conference services for the office of continuing education my role is to work with people who are interested in using the Iowa State telecommunications network to produce satellite video conferences when people have an idea to use the system we they contact me we schedule a meeting in essence when somebody walks through the door what my role is to assist them in building a budget to assist them in scheduling the sites using the Iowa State telecommunications network to assist them in the development of the publications they might want to use for that particular video conference and to assist them and whatever kinds of statewide or local publicity they have in mind essentially this is a real opportunity for people to take advantage of this kind of technology to reach large numbers of people inexpensively and I think it's one thing that we certainly would encourage more people to take advantage of knowing that Iowa State has become a leader in satellite technology College of Agriculture has been involved with TV satellite courses for the last four years we've had an excellent experience and I think it is the has great potential for the future actually we've had four credit courses offered throughout the state and one course is offered regionally and then we've also had an national symposium was for non-credit we've had 485 persons involved in off-campus credit courses through our television system more than that it's important that professors learned to teach with television and in this series of classes we've had 40 professors actually involved in teaching one or more classes we know that the satellite system has great potential for off-campus credit courses and we also know that it must be to a dispersed audience and to a large audience the College of Agriculture is fortunate in having audiences that are very receptive to television delivery systems we're still learning here at Iowa State about the best ways to use satellite communications we learn especially from our participants so after you've had the opportunity to participate in an Iowa State University telecommunications and network event like this conference today we'd like to hear from you and we'd like to tell you that we learn about doing teleconferences during teleconferences - each one is a new experience for us and it's an exciting way to be involved in distance learning we'd like to let the folks in Des Moines participate again at Iowa Public Television Tim berry or whoever is on site let's find out if there's a question there I'm still here Roger we're you've given us a half a dozen programs with which we could have talked for hours on all of those were as you said extremely interesting and exciting we have with us here Matt Mauer Matt and I were just chatting here and Matt give us just a little bit of rundown about what brought you to the conference today just so that we can kind of put a human face on who we're talking to here I work for communications data services here in Des Moines and I'm interested in how this network relates to the business community they are excellent question yeah Roger could we get somebody up there to talk about that for us yes we certainly can and I think we'll ask Linda to respond to that at least first I think that's who it's directly to some industry services customized training programs are typically being done by many of the educational institutions for specifically business and industry the University of Iowa for example currently has a link to Rockwell Collins and Cedar Rapids where they're offering a computer science class and we continue to believe that there will be more and more programs made available for business and industry through the educational institutions very good thanks very much Linda let's take just a brief moment now to hear from another representative of Iowa State University someone who's have been very important to us and he has some comments and some thoughts about what's happening in telecommunications teacher education in the College of Education at Iowa State University includes considerable experience for pre-service teachers in the effective use of the technologies of instruction including interactive television today's College of Education students will teach long into the 21st century and we believe that the effective use of technology must be a competency possessed by them we also are committed to the need to evaluate and verify the effectiveness of interactive television one of several research agendas of our faculty and graduate students is the complete analysis of all components of television when this medium is used to deliver courses for credit we would hope your input during this teleconference will assist us in identifying concerns and problem areas that you feel require investigation before interactive television is widely used interactive television is a tool becoming increasingly more available to us we must use it effectively thank you very much sir and we'd like to spend the rest of our time answering questions I think we're going to try a live question off the telephone let's see if we have that question now yes Roger yes I can hear you County Extension offices here in humble we obtain a lot of good education programs all the time through our County Extension Office and that's wondering if you foresee in the future that we might have fiber optics Kathleen okay very good thanks very much a fiber optic system connecting the extension office's say with the Iowa system we'll let you answer and then perhaps that we can go to to Linda to talk a little bit more about that I think that's a very good question the question is probably going to be better than my answer anything's possibility and I think that may very well be something that we'll see in the future for for the immediate future I think Iowa State's going to focus on the existing downlink system and as Iowa Public televisions a system gets up and running we'll be looking at a number of options for interconnects okay very good I was talking just a bit about that with Linda Schatz just a little bit ago for if you have to reach a lot of people all over the state perhaps it's best to UM to do satellite uplinks for the individual lessons perhaps the the fiber link looks better all right the beauty of the aisle educational telecommunications network is that it uses multiple technologies for whatever the need might be in the case where you're going to many side satellite may still be the best technology to use if you're connecting to towns 20 miles apart with three students for example at each location the fiber system is probably the most effective system to use for that kind of activity okay Linda thanks very much I think we have another call on a live caller let's find out who it is yes and I was wondering whether the whether or not the Iowa Education television network is going to be used primarily for audio and visual or will there be a possibility okay I'll end it back to you again the system to be caller from Sioux Center wants to know the possibility of using the system for data transmission electronic mail that sort of thing again one of the beauties of using fiber optics for both a backbone and what we're calling the tunnel links those two-way video audio links at the outlying sites is that fiber makes it very easy for us to carry not only the video and The Associated audio but also voice and data signals as well so data transmissions either jointly with video programs or separately can all be used using the fiber optic system okay let's get a question that was called in earlier back in the late 60s instructional television almost disappeared disappeared too many TV teachers were perhaps uninspired and we really didn't use the unique capabilities of the video medium this for Dave bunting who's next to me here what are we doing better now how can we be sure that we don't repeat the mistakes we were making 20 years ago at the bender line maybe one word that would really make the difference it would be interaction and again from my background and experience the earlier forms of teaching by television it was pretty much one way and I think all the systems that you have experienced this morning really have underlined that word interaction we know that good teaching whether it be in a traditional classroom or over our system does demand a lot of interaction between those students their fellow students and also with that instructor so I think that's the key to it okay Dave thanks very much let's go to Des Moines for another question yes Roger I think we found out here as from watching today that we have much of the situations that we're dealing with is the balance between theory and application and I think we got a real nuts and bolts question here go right ahead well the question and this is Shauna burger I'm with the Des Moines Public Schools question has to do a fine it's been mentioned that the state of Iowa is going to put money into this but what is expected from the local school districts in terms of how much money do they have to provide in will there be any additional assistance from the school from the state okay thanks very much Linda lots of questions for you regarding the system and we've had several of those from the phone where is funding coming from what are the costs at participating districts that sort of thing currently we're looking for a total system cost from a request for proposal which will be again sent out shortly at that time we'll have specific costs in the meantime we're very pleased that the Iowa Legislature in this session did appropriate a standing limited appropriation over the next five years of 10 million dollars per year per year for the system that money is to be used for the backbone system and also on an 80/20 match for the local systems that bill was asking about okay very good a question for dr. Judy Richardson one of our callers says that it seems to me that high level administrative support is critical for an instructional telecommunications system to be successful on a continuing basis how did you obtain that commitment with your senior administrators and how did you how do you keep that support going that's a that's a very good question we entered the field test under the leadership of dr. William Anderson who was a very visionary leader as we began to get involved in the system many of the people in the district could see the potential of what was happening and so we continue to keep them informed and continue to keep the people who are involved in the field test excited about the system but it's very true without an identified need and without the support of your top level administration it's very difficult to get this kind of field test and this kind of commitment from the people that you're working with thanks very much you know be very interesting to see what this whole thing looks like in about two years things go so rapidly and things change so quickly and we got things in place and really up and running and we'll see what happens we have a caller on the phone and your name in question if you would please yes yes what is the question please very happily debated the appropriateness of using telecommunications with the state standards I'm curious as to what research is out there comparing two-way interactive telecommunication systems both audio and visual with those that are two-way audio thank you okay that relates really to say telecommunications on the fiber optic system versus satellite uplinks who would like to address that any thoughts on any research that's been done Gary if you have any thoughts on that that's far maybe that's a not fair to the difference between the two a two-way and yeah well there's research I'm sure we've been keeping records accurate records you know Kirkwood Community College has been keeping records we believe our system is to a video one way audio we believe that the contact is taking place the communications network is is being met with the student and the teacher and the research that we have been keeping shows that learning is taking place in the distant sites but right now there isn't a lot that I know of that's on two-way okay very good and I know that a number of states are involved in teleconferencing video conferencing by satellite there have been some answers I know as to whether it's effective or not but I think within the next year or so I think there'll be additional answers to that let's go to Des Moines for a couple of questions Tim yes Roger we all use the word a conferencing and telecommunications but I think everybody is aware that there's the public sector the government sector the economic educational sector your question sir I think relates to how that balances in yes I wanted to know how the private businesses would go about contracting for programs okay again a question about private businesses and let's see if we can answer that here in the studio Linda some of the issues that keep coming up as we move forward with this activity are issues that we need to take back to the narrowcast Advisory Committee which is that group of representative users so I'm not sure I can answer this question directly at this point in time but it is something that we will continue to consider as we move forward with all the details related to the system this is such a new situation that it'll just take a while to shake out let's go back to Des Moines for another question Tim yeah I'd like to maybe pose a question to dr. Judy Richardson who's up there on your panel I know Judy is involved in the delivery systems but I also know that she in answering that question is also actively involved in the production of some of those programming's I know because she asked me to be on one of the programs for reading books to some of the kids I was wondering now Judy how much how difficult is it to produce some local television I don't think I caught the well we don't really consider ourself producing programs Tim we consider ourself delivering instruction and so we try to although there's a lot of planning involved we try to make the teacher feel that they're in a classroom teaching a class as opposed to being the talent and part of the production like I feel right now a little bit different okay it's sort of being the difference between the classroom and being really part of the show let's ask a question that came in earlier from one of our viewers this for dr. Steinhardt Kathleen someone once said that in order to make a silk purse from a sow's ear you have to start with a silk sow in order to be successful with the televised instruction should we be using the people who are our best teachers in the conventional classroom can we train another classroom teacher to be a TV teacher what should we be doing I think the answer to that is yes and start with your best teachers telecommunications will magnify any flaws in a person's communication or teaching style so start with your strongest people but that does not to eliminate any teacher from teaching well through telecommunications with some training in fact one of the best results we've seen with Iowa State faculty and using telecommunications is once they've been trained and worked in an instructional telecommunication setting their regular classroom instruction becomes better because it forces you to really fine-tune your techniques and the way you communicate with your students okay I'm going to ask Bob Hartman to interact with that a little bit too in situations at your shop do you see the need to to use your very best classroom instructors or again is there some training that can be done well we'd like to begin I think with our best teachers and then prepare them to use the technology I think Kathleen is absolutely right I think that it takes really very little training to to use the technology and what we're dealing with is classroom teaching and we're simply using the technology to deliver that classroom instruction and it's amazing how quickly good teachers learn how to use the technology it is not difficult and of course that's part of what's happening this summer at Iowa State University the beginning the 17th of July the course that you can could become involved in there is some information in your packet about that at your local viewing sites by the way take a look at that and and see if you would like to become involved with that now let's have some comments from someone else who's very concerned about telecommunications our educators have traditionally been leaders in the application and use of new instructional technologies recently a number of schools and colleges in Iowa have begun to use interactive television as a way to share courses and other learning experiences and the state has begun the development of a comprehensive telecommunication plan that will eventually link all schools in Iowa we in the Department of Education feel that interactive television technology if used properly has the potential to help Iowa educators continue the tradition of excellent educational opportunities for our children youth and adult learners naturally any new procedure for teaching including the technologies of distance education require a thoughtful analysis before widespread utilization we believe that the educators of Iowa can assist us in identifying the areas of greatest potential for interactive television your input during this teleconference will assist in the identification of procedures that will ensure that Iowa schools remain the best in the nation thank you we pre-taped some questions also for this program and we'd like to present one of those right now question I have related to technology is what effect do you think it has on the jobs that teachers will have in the future will it distract from jobs will we be eliminating teachers well we will be going to larger class size what effect will it have excellent question and I think Dave bunting first of all would like to respond to that Dave we just experienced a rather interesting phenomena at our institution with some of our high school classes and I think it is very fitting of that particular question about four years ago we had a drive for additional foreign language students so we started offering Spanish courses and like anybody will tell you with interactive television it begins with very very good teachers who want to teach by this delivery system the enrollments over these last four years have continued to grow so much this year three of the schools now have sufficient enrollments to hire teacher so to give you a very simple answer I think it does sometimes create jobs as opposed to eliminate them okay Dave thanks very much let's go to Tim berry in for another another question from the morning Tim Thank You Roger we're down here I'm always impressed with the way that instantaneous communication over landlines or telephones or satellites really moves us around before you get here let's put a human face on some of the folks who are down here tell us a little bit about who you are the organization that you're with ok I'm sandy Dixon and I work with the state library I which is part of state government Iowa state government we use an interactive audio only system to deliver a couple of library management classes and the comments we hear from students is I wish we could see the teacher and then the other comment we hear is I wish we didn't have to drive so far because there are only 22 sites in the state where they can go so I guess my question is for Linda Schatz how soon can we start using this statewide system I think tomorrow would be the good answer I think in terms of a realistic answer we're probably looking at someplace a couple of years down the road we know that most of the vendors responding to our request for information and proposals several months ago indicated at 24 to 28 month build cycle once the money was available for the bathroom IntelliLink so we're hoping maybe in two to three years that the system would be up and totally operational thanks very much Linda we'll take one more call live off the phone and let's see who is calling and where they're from I have two questions number one fit into the picture and the second question is regarding specific instructional techniques as a teacher how are such things as giving examinations distributing papers and other material how is that handled okay thanks very much for your question first of all Independent Colleges Linda can you answer that or can someone else how can independent colleges be involved in the system the independent colleges as well as all the educational sectors are very much a part of the system I think it's probably best if the people work with their community colleges in the area since they've been identified as the lead agencies we are currently identifying each of the sites that will be on the system and I would suggest that you talk to the local community college in your area and then what about giving tests so can anybody answer that Gary would you like to get eight out of ten times I'm yelled at it's by the faculty wondering where their tests are why they run back yet we interactive television requires one thing of a teacher and that's to plan ahead a lot of teachers get very nervous at that we require tests to be sent out approximately a week ahead of time so they have to plan very very far ahead they know when they're gonna give the test and then there they're administered through Proctor's etc and sent back so it is difficult in that respect it may take two or three days to get them back but I don't think it's really taken away from any classes that I'm aware of okay very good well distance learning is something that all of us who are involved in education what other organization or whatever level will be very very much involved if it looks like in the future we have one additional comment from another person who is very much involved with telecommunications Iowa State University has a long history of using television technology and education in the 1950s when Iowa State's woi TV began broadcasting one of its primary purposes was to provide high quality educational programming to the citizens of Iowa then as now Iowa State feels that the use of television to deliver courses and conferences throughout the state is a natural extension of our land-grant mission to serve our state's citizenry this newest technology interactive television provides tremendous opportunities for educators through teleconferences such as this Iowa State seeks your input as to how we can serve your needs more effectively and if you haven't been if you haven't been involved in distance learning up to now we hope that you can in the very new future we're out of time and we thank you very very much for being part of this and I'd like to thank our panel Hardman Gary veteran dr. Kathleen Steinhardt Dave bunting dr. Judy Richardson and Linda shots of course we are able to do this because you're there watching and we appreciate it very much thank you again I'm Roger brown from Iowa State University