Hi John, AMSI/ICE-EM (http://www.ice-em.org.au/AGR/) have government funding to assist with the establishment of Access grid rooms in mathematics departments throughout Australia. I think the funding covers about 16 rooms, of which 3 (La Trobe, Wollongong and Uni. South Australia) have been up and running from the second half of last year. Another 5-6 rooms should be running by the second semester this year.
The plan is that departments will share an honours year subject or 2 over the grid each semester and students from any of the universities will be able to sit in on them. A list of current offerings can be seen here: http://www.ice-em.org.au/AGR/subjects_and_courses.html La Trobe has put on a couple of subjects so far, and we've had a few students from Wollongong sit in on them. The feedback has been very positive (except for one local student who saw the technology as a distraction from the "real beauty of the mathematics"). Since the numbers involved have been low to this point, we have not bothered with the funding side of things although this may change in the future. La Trobe hosted a "workshop" in December last year where academic representatives from the various universities got together and discussed funding models, subject prerequisites, misconduct, complaint procedures etc. It seems no conclusion was drawn on the funding side of things, but some of the other policies that were decided can be view at http://www.ice-em.org.au/AGR/assets/Documentation/AGR_Teaching_Pol.pdf I think the academics have seen teaching over the grid and a little extra marking as quite minor inconveniences when compared to the gains for our students. We have the same problem mentioned by your staff in that the enrolments at honours year are quite low, and we don't have the resources to teach a large variety of subjects at that level. With the roll out of these AG rooms, our students may eventually have 20+ subjects to choose from, instead of the 4-5 they currently get. Another initiative (unrelated to the AG) put in place by ICE-EM/AMSI is a summer school (http://www.ice-em.org.au/students.html#summer). This is hosted at different locations around the country each year, and honours/postgraduate students can give up part of their holidays to do a subject compressed into the month before our actual teaching semester starts. From what I hear, this has been a huge success. The students attend all the lectures in 2 weeks and then get 2-4 weeks to work on assignments etc. While it is hard work for both the students and lecturers there are plenty of rewards. The staff get to teach to a much larger class than they traditionally would, and the students enjoy learning from new lecturers and meeting students from other universities. They also all get to lessen their workload during the normal semester. I tend to think that a lot of this would not be possible without an organization external to the universities driving it all and obtaining government funding. Faculty staff simply don't have the time or energy required. Given that the funding side of things is still being "wrestled" with here, we would also like to hear any recommendations/success stories. Regards, Darren. Darren Condon Department of Mathematics and Statistics La Trobe University, Victoria 3086, Australia. Phone: +613 9479 1459 _____ From: owner-ag-t...@mcs.anl.gov [mailto:owner-ag-t...@mcs.anl.gov] On Behalf Of john langkals Sent: Thursday, 3 May 2007 12:08 AM To: 'ag-tech' Subject: [AG-TECH] Distant Education Funding Models I am looking for any input from the Access Grid community concerning distant education funding models. **It's a little late, but I would like to suggest a broader topic as motivation for the Access Grid Retreat: AG Distant Education Funding Models. The interest has been generated at other universities to have their students possibly 'take' some of our advanced courses, IF we can come up with a funding model that works. We have the technology and expertise in house to do this, but don't know how to handle the funding mechanics. Within various departments, faculty complains of not enough grad students to justify teaching their favorite seminars. It's suggested that they investigate spreading the opportunity around by investigating whether we could 'share' students among a number of universities, with instruction shared among the faculty. What do you do at your respective institutions? Are there any success stories to share? Thank you, John John Langkals Systems Manager Ohio Center for Technology and Science Columbus, Ohio 43210 614.292.6957 Office 614.327.3732 Cell 614.292.7557 FAX www.octs.osu.edu
