For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.

February 27, 2004

http://chronicle.com/infotech Volume L, Number 25

A Lesson in Technology
In Central Michigan U.’s new $50-million classroom building,
the computer hardware alone cost $5-million.

Next-Generation Classroom
Professors and students in the health
professions program at Central Michigan
University are using state-of-the-art
technology in their recently completed
building to find new ways of teaching and
learning
Marvis J. Lary, dean of health professions, at Central Michigan U.
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.

The Next-Generation
Classroom
By SCOTT CARLSON

Anthony Dugal for the Chronicle

central michigan university

central michigan university
Central Michigan University’s new health-professions building, which opened for classes
in January, was designed by the SmithGroup, an architecture firm in Detroit, Mich. The
building, which encompasses 175,000 square feet of total space and cost $50-million,
features classrooms, laboratories, and a clinical wing for the departments of psychology and
communication disorders. The building was designed around what university officials call the
ethic of “body, mind, and spirit.” Stairways connecting the two levels are emphasized over
elevators. Communal spaces with comfortable couches and armchairs are scattered
throughout, offering students places to socialize or study in groups. The grounds feature two
“healing gardens” (bottom photograph), where people can gather.

Mount Pleasant, Mich. and he could expound on any part of hardware alone.

R
ichard Parr, a professor of
exercise physiology at Central
Michigan University, describes
himself as an “old school” instructor.
Until recently, he didn’t know much
about technology and avoided it in the
classroom. Just give him a stick of
chalk and a gaggle of students, he says,
the material he had taught for more
than 36 years.
His perspective changed when he con-
sidered the challenge of teaching in
Central Michigan’s new $50-million
classroom building, one of the most tech-
nologically advanced in the country.
About $5-million of its budget went to
There is no chalk in this building, the
Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow College
of Health Professions. Even whiteboards
take a back seat to enormous, super-
high-definition video screens.
Faced with the prospect of feeling out-
dated and out of place among tech-savvy
students in this swank new space, Mr.
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.
Anthony Dugal
Parr instead became an apostle of
change. In a wired classroom on a snowy
afternoon, he is giving a talk on obesity,
throwing PowerPoint slides, documents,
and videos up on the big screens. He’s
wearing a tiny wireless microphone,
clipped to his dress shirt. His lecture is
being recorded for a set of DVD’s he is
putting together. If he wanted to, he
could pull in a live video of an expert
from miles away, or stream his lecture
onto the Web.
Like other professors at Central
Michigan, Mr. Parr has found that teach-
ing in a wired environment requires
more preparation and planning, along
with old-fashioned teaching experience
at the rare times when the technology
breaks down. But the professors here
seem to have found new energy in their
work. Mr. Parr didn’t want to go into
retirement without taking advantage of
the new technology and teaching meth-
ods that are growing more prominent in
higher education. “I want my last three
years to be the most exciting,” he says. “I
want to go out on top of my game.”
Warren Arbogast, president of
ideaReserve, a consulting company that
helped design the building, says its tech-
nology is not a glitzy add-on, but is
meant to be integrated into the learning
process. Central Michigan officials
“wanted a building that could take
advantage of teachable moments,” he
says. “They are letting the academic goals
and the pedagogy drive the technology.
Everyone talks about doing that, but few
really do it.”
Health Tech
Richard J. Coluzzi, a higher-education-
technology consultant in Glen Burnie,
Md., says that over the past 15 years
many colleges have barely used the
expensive equipment they have installed
in classroom buildings. “People were put-
ting in technology just to say they had
technology,” he says. But in the past
three years, as instructional hardware
and software alike have improved, “col-
leges are really starting to embrace tech-
nology in teaching.”
Central Michigan’s building, which
opened last month, houses the public
university’s health-professions program.
Here the departments of communication
disorders, health sciences, physical educa-
tion, physical therapy, and psychology,
among others, hold classes, provide facul-
ty offices, and conduct research. Large
video screens in many classrooms can
project a computer display, a snippet of
video, or other media; cameras can cap-
ture lectures for later viewing; and
microphones and speakers can foster
interaction with guest lecturers far away.
All wires lead to Master Control. From
here, technicians can record a lecture in
any of the classrooms and burn it onto a
disk or stream it onto the Internet. The
control room can also transmit a video of
events in one room to a video screen in
another. And if a professor has trouble with
the hardware in a classroom, he or she can
push a button that alerts staff members in
this control room.
Professors can control much of the tech-
nology through a simple touch-screen
system on a podium. They can even use a
digital pen to enter comments over what-
ever is being projected on the video
screens, just like John Madden outlining
a play on Monday Night Football.
Other rooms include state-of-the-art
laboratories, outfitted with digital cam-
eras, along with observation rooms and
holding pens for animal experiments;
clinical wings for the communication-dis-
orders and psychology departments; and
a nearly completed virtual-reality room,
where professors can study body move-
ment and mechanics.
All of the rooms feed into the build-
ing’s technological nerve center, called
Master Control. From this room, techni-
cians can record lectures and save them
on tape, burn them onto disks, or send
them out over the Internet.
More Teachable Moments?
Marvis J. Lary, dean of the college,
plans to use the new building to raise the
visibility of her programs. She says pro-
fessors want to collaborate with col-
leagues at institutions in Italy and
France, sending videos of lectures over-
seas. She also hopes that the college’s
technological advances will help it win
government grants for homeland-securi-
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.

ty projects, in which it could send emer-

gency-medical response lessons to hospi-
tals and clinics in the rural areas sur-
rounding Central Michigan University.
The building itself can be an object of
study as well, she believes, as professors
test whether students learn better with
the use of technology in the classroom.
She has not found any studies confirming
that premise, she says: “That’s a study
we’re going to take on here.”
Mr. Parr, for instance, is tracking how
well students do on his exams, which he
has left unchanged since his days as a
chalkboard lecturer. So far he has found
that the technology has neither helped
nor hurt the students’ learning. He plans
to redesign the exams to find out if stu-
dents are now picking up information
that wasn’t tested in the past.
But his new teaching style has won
him better evaluations from students,
and he says the technology has helped
him better connect with them.
“Unanimously, they like what I’m The $500,000 Global Telepresence Facility is the building’s centerpiece.
doing,” he says. Large video screens can display a range of media simultaneously, whether live
Although the building’s hardware and or recorded video, the image from a computer screen, or papers in front of a document
software were designed to be simple camera. Cameras can transmit a lecture to another part of the building or to remote
locations. Each seat has an Internet-connection port and a microphone.
enough for even technology-averse pro-
fessors to use, Central Michigan created a
couple of programs to encourage instruc- walk into any of the enhanced classrooms, To spur more-creative approaches to
tors to pick up new skills. First, the college punch a few buttons on the podium’s its new technology, the college chose
set up a shared server on the campus net- touch screen, and bring up videos, pic- eight instructors as “champions” and
work, with five gigabytes of space for tures, lecture notes, or other media from encouraged them to create high-tech
every professor, enough to hold plenty of the online library to help illustrate an projects that could be used in the class-
lecture slides, PowerPoint presentations, answer. rooms. It worked. One participant creat-
and video clips. Professors can create “The goal is that no matter where ed a digitally animated guide to the
materials using their office computers, you are in the space, you should have inner ear; another helped make a com-
upload the materials to the server, and access to high-quality material, and it puter game to teach CPR; another cre-
instantly call them up in the classroom. If should be as easy as picking hot or cold ated a reverse-lookup dictionary of
a student catches a faculty member in the on a faucet,” says Mr. Arbogast, the American Sign Language.
hall with a question, the professor can consultant. For his project, Renny Tatchell, chair-
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.

man of the communication-disorders

department, created a database of
1,000 photographs of dissected human
heads, necks, and chests. The photos
were input from slides that he had shot
in laboratories over the years. In his
office or in the classroom, Mr. Tatchell
can at a moment’s notice bring up pic-
tures to show students the parts of the
body that might be affected by, say,
lung cancer.
“To have ready access to this data-
bank is an extraordinary tool for
teaching and learning,” he says. “There
is a secure feeling in having all of this
stuff at your fingertips. That’s not pos-
sible in other parts of the university.”

Anthony Dugal for the Chronicle
The technology in the building
was designed to be easy to use.
By pushing a few buttons on this
touch screen, an instructor can
control the displays on the large
video monitors, dim the lights,
pan the room’s cameras, or
operate a DVD player.
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.

Photographs by Anthony Dugal for the Chronicle

George Bottomley (above, center), director of the physician-assistant program, instructs students as they try to “revive”
SimMan, a simulated disaster victim. A camera records the scene and sends the images to the screen behind the students. It’s
difficult to get more than six people around the SimMan at one time, Dr. Bottomley says, but the camera can stream live video
of the goings-on to a classroom full of people, and beyond. “We have thought about having lectures here and having that
transmitted to hospitals and clinics in other areas,” he says.

Renny Tatchell, chairman of the

communication-disorders
department, digitized 1,000
pictures of the human anatomy
and loaded them onto a server.
Now, by pressing a few buttons,
he can display the pictures in any
classroom at any time to add
graphic detail to a lecture. Here
he stands in one of the building’s
lesser-equipped classrooms,
which feature digital-video
projectors instead of high-
definition video screens. As in the
building’s more-advanced
classrooms, though, instructors in
this room have access to a range
of multimedia equipment through
a touch screen at the podium.
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.

Richard Parr, a professor of exercise physiology, went from what he calls an old-fashioned teaching style to lectures that incorporate
multimedia. Here he uses a digital pen to highlight details in the video presentation behind him. This classroom also has cameras, and some
professors train the devices on students in class, an inconspicuous way to keep an eye on those who have a tendency to goof around or nod
off. Professors can also push a “privacy” button, which blocks all video and audio feeds going out of the room.

Reprinted with permission from The Chronicle of Higher Education, Volume L, Number 25, February 27, 2004 by The Reprint Dept., 1-800-259-0470.
For subscription information go to http://chronicle.com/subscribe or call 1-800-728-2803.

New building features clinical,

instructional, and research wings First floor Second floor

The three major components of CMU’s

health professions programs – clinical,
instructional, and research – occupy
separate rectangular wings located on
either side of a single east-west Central
Atrium that runs through the Health
Professions Building. A pair of enclosed
Central Atrium Central Atrium
courtyards augments the rehabilitative
qualities of the university’s health
professions programs.

■ Faculty and Administrative Offices

■ Classrooms
■ Laboratories
■ Clinics
 For web posting only. Reproduction or distribution prohibited.
The CMU Health Professions Building
An advanced center for learning,
service, and research
Central Michigan University’s new Health
Professions Building brings together CMU’s
health professions, neuroscience, and clinical
psychology programs and many associated
research initiatives and outreach services
into one technologically advanced environ-
ment that promotes learning, patient care,
collaboration, and discovery.
Patient services and research initiatives
in the Health Professions Building touch
many lives.
• The Carls Center for Clinical Care and
Education brings together in one
multidisciplinary clinic CMU’s Speech,
Language, and Hearing Clinics; the
Psychological Training and Consultation
Center; and Physical Therapy Services.
• The Brain Research and Integrative
Neuroscience Center researches treatment
strategies, pharmacological interventions,
gene therapy, and stem cell transplantation
techniques for treatment of neuro-
degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s,
Parkinson’s, and Huntington’s.
• The Rural Telehealth and Community
Education Network (RTCEN) provides
health care information and services to
targeted underserved rural communities.
Health Professions Building
programs
Central Michigan University’s Health
Professions Building houses a variety of
undergraduate and graduate programs in five
broad discipline areas:
Communication Disorders
Audiology
Communication Disorders
Speech-Language Pathology
Psychology
Clinical Psychology
Neuroscience
Physical Education
Athletic Coaching
Athletic Training/Sports Medicine
Physical Education Teaching
Special Physical Education Teaching
Sport Administration
Sport Studies
Health Sciences
Exercise Science
Health Administration
Health Fitness in Prevention and
Rehabilitation Programs
Health Promotion and Program Management
Personal and Community Health
Public Health Education
and Health Promotion
School Health Education
Substance Abuse Education
Rehabilitation and Medical Sciences
Physical Therapy
Physician Assistant
Central Michigan University
Central Michigan University enrolls more
than 28,000 students and is ranked as the
43rd largest four-year public university in
the nation.
CMU offers more than 200 programs at the
bachelor’s, master’s, specialist’s, and
doctoral levels at the university’s main
campus in Mount Pleasant, Mich., and
through the College of Extended Learning,
which offers distance-learning programs
online and at more than 60 centers through-
out Michigan and across North America.
As a modern doctoral/research-intensive
university, CMU supports significant faculty
and student research, scholarship, and
creative work. The university’s more than
150,000 alumni include leaders in education,
the arts, government, the military, and the
private sector.
For information about CMU’s health
care programs contact:
(989) 774-1850
health.professions@cmich.edu
www.chp.cmich.edu