By Jamie Oberdick
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A visitor to Cole Camplese's office at Rider Building II will notice two things—a lot of enthusiasm about technology in education, and music.
Camplese started November 1, 2005 as the director of Education Technology Services (ETS), a part of the Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT) unit within Information Technology Services (ITS). The new director loves music almost as much as he loves technology, so he often has his favorite songs playing while he works. Consider it a soundtrack for a person with a goal of making Penn State a leader in teaching and learning with technology.
As far as prospects for reaching such heights, Camplese is optimistic because of the staff he deals with every day. "It has been a very pleasant experience these first few months working with ETS people, because they really impress me with how smart they are," he said. "Not just ETS, but TLT and Information Technology Services (ITS) people in general are very capable and impressive employees."
Camplese comes to ETS with a strong background in both technology and education. He also brings a high level of energy common to entrepreneurial types. In fact, he has been a part of what he considers two startup ventures: Cogent Media, an Internet company, and Penn State's IST Solutions Institute, an applied research and development institute of the College of Information Sciences and Technology. "How many people can get the opportunity to be a part of two startups?" Camplese said. "At the Solutions Institute, I was employee number one. I helped to build it from the ground up, including its strategic direction."
Along with his technology experience, Camplese also has extensive experience as a consultant, instructional designer, instructional technologist, and multimedia developer. He is a published author who has presented at regional and national conferences. He also has a masters degree in instructional technology from Bloomsburg University.
Camplese said that his expertise and experience opened his eyes to the wide range of exciting possibilities technology brings to education. He sees technology in education as continuously evolving. "The Internet, for example, constantly changes. The Web eighteen months ago is not the same one we have today," he said. "The focus of the Web has become communication and collaboration, and the 'killer apps' that makes it possible. And this has big implications for the future of technology in education."
Two examples of "killer apps" that Camplese is especially enthusiastic about are podcasting and blogs. Podcasting is recording an audio event, then digitizing it into a computer file and uploading it onto a Web site for users to download and listen at their convenience. Because of its portability and growing popularity among students, Camplese notes podcasting is a great new tool that faculty should be taking advantage of by creating podcasts of lectures, broadcasts, and other audio events that students can listen to on portable devices such as MP3 players.
Blogs are what Camplese refers to as "citizen media." A blog is an online journal that can include daily updates, views on issues, a forum for new ideas, links to other sites or articles, and often comments from people viewing the blog. "Blogs enable instant publishing, and I see more and more students creating them," he said.
Camplese said that the advantages of blogs in education include free exchange of ideas, stimulation of debate, and a great way for students and faculty to keep an electronic record of their development. "I don't know of many people who still have all their notebooks from college, and even storage methods such as floppy disks have their limitations because many new computers don't have floppy disk drives," he said. "Blogs can be stored on a server and since they are searchable, this information would always be available and easy to find. Ideas can easily be revisited."
Camplese has several blogs, including "Cole Camplese—Learning and Innovation," which can be viewed at http://www.camplesegroup.com/blog/.
Camplese stresses that students are very technology oriented and want new technology such as podcasing and blogs to be part of their education. "We need to get student input and act on it," he said. "Students are positively excited about technology, and they want podcasts, blogs, and everything else new."
Camplese also sees challenges to bringing technology to the classroom. "Faculty engagement is a challenge," he said. "The trend in education is more and more digital, so how do we make faculty aware of this and how do we motivate them to use new technologies?"
"I believe that TLT and ETS have a fantastic set of resources, such as the Faculty Multimedia Center (FMC), that can help faculty implement new technologies, and they should take advantage of this," Camplese added.
Camplese sees the endorsement of peers as one way to educate faculty about what ETS and TLT have to offer. "Generally, people will listen to their peers before others," he said. "For example, a student will listen to other students, faculty to other faculty. We need to encourage our current users to spread the word."
Even with a busy schedule as ETS director, Camplese teaches a class at Penn State on emerging technologies such as podcasting. "I think it is important to stay in the classroom," he said. "I look at my class as a living lab to find out how to better use podcasting and blogs for higher learning. It's also good to have direct interaction with students."
