Copyright 2002,
Ball State University
Muncie, IN 47306.
All rights reserved.

Equal Opportunity Information.

For more information:
University Communications
Phone: (765) 285-1560
Fax: (765) 285-5442
ucomm@bsu.edu

New journalism graphics lab on campus Electronic field trip at Burris School Millions of school children have had the chance to dig up dinosaurs, swim with sea turtles, and take part in a space mission thanks to an innovative program produced by Ball State’s Teachers College and Teleplex. The electronic field trip program provides K-12 students throughout the United States with unique learning experiences through interactive television broadcasts and online curriculum activities. Classroom and Web-based materials help them comprehend complex scientific ideas, explore new learning concepts, and consider expanded career opportunities. Now in its fifth year, this model for interactive learning has broadcast from locations including the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, remote dinosaur digs in the western United States, and the coast of Florida to track the migratory patterns of sea turtles. Participation has steadily increased. About 8 million students viewed the sea turtle broadcast in September 2000, and an estimated 15 million students took part in a recent field trip to the International Space Station. Ball State is the only university in the nation to provide the electronic field trips, which won first-and second-place honors at the 2001 Worldmediafestival Global Competition for Modern Media in Germany. The program is supported by Best Buy Company Inc., the nation’s largest consumer electronics retailer.

What if they could explore the cutting edge in digital entertainment, or collaborate with a professional journalist in Philadelphia to design the front page of a major newspaper digitally?

These dream projects and many others are poised to become reality at Ball State through a bold technology project called “iCommunication: The Media Design Initiative.”

Supported by the largest gift in the university’s history, a $20 million grant from Indiana-based Lilly Endowment Inc., the endeavor will make the university an international leader in educating students for the digital media revolution.

The initiative also could upgrade the state’s economy by making Indiana a potential site for high-tech entertainment and information companies.

“The world of entertainment is rebooting,” says Scott Olson, dean of Ball State’s College of Communication, Information, and Media. “We need to get ready for Hollywood 2.0. It will be a Hollywood that isn’t in California, but is everywhere that highly trained and motivated professionals have the tools and expertise to create.”

Through the iCommunication project, students will gain new opportunities to prepare for creative high-technology careers in the digital communication media industry. Ball State has a national reputation in the communication, entertainment production, and media technology areas and in the use of technology in the classroom.

“This new initiative will encourage a strategic alignment of several significant assets at Ball State, which should in turn solidify the university’s position as a national player in communications technology and education,” says N. Clay Robbins, president of Lilly Endowment.

Ball State’s program is uniquely comprehensive in addressing the professional, global, and learning aspects of the new digital media.

The iCommunication components include the Center for Media Design, a research, development, and teaching program linking state-of-the-art design technology to media and communications fields. The center will include three-dimensional animation technology and digitally produced entertainment and news. It also will provide courses to students in media-related fields as well as research and industry partnerships.

Another component, the Global Media Network, will create distance-learning opportunities and provide a location for international professionals, scholars, and students to study and create international networks for learning. The Media Studies Program will help all Ball State students to be both media and technology literate.

New electronic media businesses will be created through an incubator program, and seed money will be awarded to faculty-conceived projects such as developing content for electronic textbooks or digitizing the student-produced television nature series Indiana Outdoors so it can go to schools throughout the state.

Music Engineering Technology Studios

Right now, interdisciplinary campus teams are working with noted professionals to develop new design labs, an intensive undergraduate curriculum, a graduate program unlike any in the Midwest, and workshops and courses open to all students.

Classes, labs, production space, and research facilities will be in the Ball Communication Building and the new “wireless” Art and Journalism Building, which will dedicate more space to media technology than almost any other campus in the Midwest. Other supporting resources will include the Visualization, Imaging, and Animation (VIA) Lab, the Teleplex, and the Center for Teaching Technology.

The iCommunication initiative will benefit students, faculty members, and academic programs across the campus.

“We plan to have the space, labs, faculty, curriculum, and funding all in place so this robust, exciting program can be fully operational by August 2002,” Olson says.

Continue: Relationships Beyond the Campus