CIT's Lynx project has students teaching faculty on technology

By Beth Goelzer Lyons

Students say it's a valuable addition to their classes. It helps them engage in discussion -- real discussion, not just whether something will be on the next prelim. It encourages them to explore beyond what they heard in class. It improves the accuracy of their work. It even helps them cope with Ithaca's weather.

Doug Markant '05, left, talks with Martijna Briggs, lecturer in German studies, and Scott Levine '04 in the Academic Technology Center in the Computing and Communications Center about the "Nederklanken" Web site designed for Briggs' class. Robert Barker/University Photography

What is this wondrous tool? Technology. Everything from e-mail to course Web sites to lectures enriched with video. But it's not technology itself that students (technophiles that they are) value. It's what their professors do with it.

Martijna Briggs, senior lecturer in German studies, is using Web video to help her students, or anyone, learn to speak Dutch. On her "Nederklanken" Web site, students can watch native speakers pronounce Dutch sounds. Close-up and profile views clarify how those sounds are being formed, and different speakers demonstrate the range of native accents.

Though Briggs had the idea, she didn't have the time or the knowledge to do the project alone. So she called "Lynx," a provost-funded initiative of Cornell Information Technologies' Academic Technology Center (ATC) that provides expertly trained students to faculty who want to use instructional technologies. The students have been trained using a comprehensive curriculum delivered by ATC staff in collaboration with other service providers, such as Cornell University Library.

"I was at the first meeting when Lynx was presented to the campus," said Briggs. "Lynx made every bit of difference: speed, quality but most of all empowerment on my part."

Faculty and teaching assistants can get 15 hours of help a semester through Lynx. There is no charge, and appointments can be at the faculty member's office, or in the Computing and Communications Center on the Ag Quad. Same-day appointments are available.

"Many professors want to use more technology in the classroom, but they don't have time to drop everything else and figure out how, or if they do try, they don't know all the tricks to make it most useful," said Nick Gerner '05, a Lynx consultant. "Even with CourseInfo there are so many ways to do the same thing. Some make sense to students, and some don't. Figuring that out takes time and experience, and Lynx consultants have both."

Students selected for Lynx undergo intensive training not only in instructional technologies but also in interacting effectively with faculty. They're poised to help with lectures, Web sites, conference presentations and online course components. They can do small-scale projects, consult on solutions to instructional challenges, and teach faculty or their administrative assistants how to use tools such as Dreamweaver and CourseInfo.

"One professor called Lynx when he was having trouble figuring out how to display student projects in an orderly manner that was easily accessible through the Web. When I arrived he was visibly frustrated. Together we were able to solve the major problems. After two more consults the professor's Web site was running as he had envisioned it," said Otmar Graf '05, a Lynx consultant.

"Having Lynx staffed with students is ideal, in part because of the student-faculty interaction," said Robert Ascher, professor emeritus in anthropology. "Because the students know more about computing, and the faculty know about the content of the work, an ideal of student-faculty interaction is realized. We learn from each other."

Lynx consultants helped Ascher make over a thousand pages of meticulously organized data on quipus -- ancient Peruvian knotted cords -- available via the Web. Quipus were used by the Inca to keep accounts and record events.

"The project would still be on the back burner without Lynx. They helped in the design of the site and did much of the tedious work of putting the data online," said Ascher. "Now students, scholars, indeed, any interested person, can turn to our data and have fun trying to make sense of quipus. The story they have to tell is still very far from solved."

Faculty interested in Lynx can call 255-9760 or visit http://www.Lynx.cornell.edu.