Fall 2014 Report
Happy February! With Spring 2015 underway, we thought it would be a good time to reflect back on the Fall semester that was. To this end, Media Commons presents our Fall 2014 semester report and infographic.
During the Fall, Media Commons provided support for nearly 9,000 people in-class and in our dedicated spaces. A primary theme identified in the analysis of these interactions is that of increasingly diversified learning goals, needs and challenges. Media Commons has had to explore novel approaches to supporting all of our clients across the Commonwealth more so than ever at the start of the 2014-2015 academic year, a trend we expect to continue to inform our direction in the Spring and future semesters.
As is usually the case, Liberal Arts continued to be the #1 source of projects, resulting in 29 for Fall. Strong campus involvement with the Information Science & Technology program contributed to its taking of the #2 spot with 11 projects. And Earth & Mineral Sciences rounded out the top 3 with its 10 projects, aided entirely by our strategic partnership with the college. Other notable sources of projects in Fall 2014 were the Agricultural Science & Industries (9) and the College of Education (7).
A specific example of addressing unique needs stems from the University Park pilot usage of our interactive training modules with English 015. With 50 sections of ENGL 15, representing approximately 1,200 students, requesting Media Commons instruction, we knew we needed to think about how we could scale our support options to meet this additional need. With limited room available in our workshop classroom, we utilized the interactive online video modules to construct a workshop-quality instruction set in collaboration with the ENGL 15 coordinators. This partnership proved very successful and will grow in coming semesters.
The One Button Studio saw a surge of new usage across the Commonwealth this past semester. With 12 total locations associated with a Media Commons – 3 of which opened their doors for Fall 2014 – the automated video production facility logged over 10 straight days of video recordings. This accounted for 5,541 total videos produced for class projects, instructional modules and more.
The Media Commons website continued proving a popular resource both inside and outside the University. Nearly 31,000 visitors made use of our tutorials, training materials and other media production support content. Over 10,000 of these visits came from international locations and more than 23,000 visitors arrived via searches for “media commons” + specific project related topics.
Current and past pilot projects provided highly notable interactions with Commonwealth courses. At Harrisburg, students participating in the Collaborative Video Pilot through a freshman Education course used WeVideo to work around busy schedules on diversity lessons which helped teach their classmates. And, at Abington, iPads were used as an extension of work started in the Mobile Media Pilot when students created video essays on nature’s meaning to them for a Sustainability course.
The annual Media Commons Tailgate was wildly successful in this installment, welcoming 88 attendees to join in celebrating successful media projects and to engage in a dialogue about the future of educational technology as it pertains to multimedia in the classroom. Guests from University Park and Commonwealth campuses as well as World Campus participated in presentations from MediaCore and WeVideo co-founders as well as 8 breakout sessions with faculty and staff colleagues.
The One Button Studio locations at University Park played host to puppet shows in Fall 2014! Early Childhood Education 451 featured students utilizing the One Button Studios to film elaborate puppet shows in front of the green screen. Geared for children, these assignments proved to be a fun, hilarious, and creative experience for education students. We had a lot of fun helping them with their projects, too!
To get all the details about these Fall 2014 highlights and even more, download our full report: