A Next Step In Distance Delivery

Alfred Tech, Jamestown Community College, Brookhaven Lab and Corning have recently been funded by the NSF to pursue a unique arrangement to create an accessible, self-perpetuating, ‘real-world’ capstone experience for students in isolated, rural two-year colleges. The four institutions are developing lead teams composed of student and faculty collaborators via summer internships at Brookhaven. The teams work on problems selected by staff members at both Corning and Brookhaven that span the gamut of the sciences and engineering technology, and which take advantage of capabilities unique to Brookhaven or Corning: e.g. scientific visualization facilities, advanced scientific instruments, cutting edge material science and world-class staffs. Following internship, the lead teams are responsible for transporting key pieces of these projects back to their home campus, and involve other faculty and students. This program, which represents a next step in distance education, creates an extended learning community that emphasizes campus-based, real-time interactions between participants at different sites. The earliest projects involve construction of scientific visualization facilities at the two campuses, and mastery of selected measurement techniques resident at BNL. Later projects will focus on problems for which a combination of measurement capabilities and visualization technology are uniquely helpful. The incorporation of immersive stereographic visualization techniques, in particular, makes possible the delivery of learning experiences not now in the domain of distance education. Virtual laboratory experiences such as the remote control of instrumentation, navigation through apparatus, and computer-aided fabrication and analysis are introduced in a realistic, attention grabbing way despite the span of miles. Thus the work environment and teaming concepts introduced during the summer at Brookhaven are largely continued at the home campuses.