The International Learning Center provides a variety of resources contributing to our mission, broadly divided into equipment, assistance, and instruction.
The Center offers 36 public workstations connected to a Tandberg audio and video delivery system where students can work independently or in larger groups with audio and video in several formats. Of these workstations, 26 are provided with Power PCs running the Macintosh Operating System and networked via Ethernet to the ILC's file server and the campus network. The ILC maintains a library of instructional software either installed or available on disk or CD-ROM for use by individuals or classes, as well as a library of instructional audio and video materials. The ILC is also equipped with a satellite receiver and regularly delivers programming such as news in various languages and the NASA channel.
In addition to equipment available to the public, the Center maintains a development station for faculty, offering a Dell PentiumPro 200 and a Macintosh 9600/200, each with large monitors (17" and 20"), and a long list of peripherals including a flatbed scanner, slide scanner, two digital cameras, image capture and manipulation software, an Iomega Jaz drive, CD-ROM burner, color printer, laser disc player, audio mixer, video and audio capture, manipulation, and compression software, and many other resources for the development of electronic teaching materials.
The Center is staffed during all operating hours and staff members answer questions and offer assistance to individuals and classes in the use of the Center's hardware, software, and other materials. In addition we are building a documentation library so that patrons may help themselves. Student assistants on staff are also being encouraged to develop their particular interests with regard to technology and education so that we will have a number of "local experts" in various areas such as graphic design, foreign language computing, and publishing for the web.
The Center provides instruction in theoretical and practical matters of the implementation of instructional technology both through individual consultation and in formal contexts. The Director is available to promote and engage in dialog on these issues, as well as to instruct in the material realization of pedagogical goals from the conception of a project through its development, use, evaluation, and refinement. The Center also offers a series of workshops in the development of multimedia teaching tools.