2002 Highlights

October 2002

A recent TAC project has received notice from around the country so we thought we'd feature it here too! Paula Petrik's "Microsoft Word to Web" TAC project in the Department of History and Art History provides simple instructions about how to create an HTML page from a Microsoft Word document. Her site which details these instructions has already received over 25,000 hits. Check it out: http://www.archiva.net/mstutorial3web.htm

August 2002

TAC holds an Orientation for 10 graduate students who serve as Technology Associates for the TAC program in 2002-2003. The agenda (.pdf version) for the all day Orientation lists the participants, who are given handouts explaining their reporting obligations for the year, their report schedule, and instructions for accessing the TAC-Graduate WebCT site and listserv. The graduate students fill in an interest survey and feedback form and, as part of their Orientation, attend 10 hours of Byte Week computer workshops offered by the IT-Unit.

June 2002

At the annual meeting of the Assessment Conference of the AAHE (American Association for Higher Education) (June 19-23), Anne Agee, Dee Ann Holisky, and Jamie Estock led an interactive presentation, "Collaborative Assessment of Student IT Skills." Through discussions of assessment scenarios, they helped the members of the audience identify key features of successful assessment and set them the task of designing their own technology program assessment. They described the multi-level TAC assessment plan and a tool for assessing students' behaviors and attitudes, stressing the collaborative process by which these were developed.

In June, Jennifer Leeman (Modern and Classical Languages) presented a paper on a TAC project at the "Teaching and Learning in the Real World" conference held at The Center for Educational Technology (CET) in Middlebury, Vermont. Her talk, Spanish in the U.S.: A Database for Discovery Learning, demonstrated the assignment using databases that she developed for her course Spanish in the U.S. Abstract>>>

May 2002

Agee and Holisky visit Claremont McKenna College to advise on their FITness (Fluency in Information Technology) program. After looking at a number of programs across the country and campus visits, the Claremont McKenna FITness Planning Committee decided that George Mason's TAC program was the best model for their initiative.

April 2002

Holisky presents an update on the TAC program at the last faculty meeting of the year of the College of Arts and Sciences, April 29, 2002.

Agee and Holisky present the Closing Plenary Address to MATTS, the Midatlantic Teaching Technology Support conference at George Washington University, April 22, 2002. Their talk was on Supporting Technology Across the Curriculum.

TAC displays many of the projects that graduate student-faculty teams are working on at the annual Innovations 2002 event. A showcase of innovative and creative student projects, Innovations is co-sponsored by DoIT, the Provost's Office, University Life, University Libraries, Student Services, the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Century Club of George Mason University.

George Mason's TAC initiative is featured prominently in the latest volume of the EDUCAUSE Leadership Strategies Series--IT Everywhere: A Campus Agenda for Educating and Managing Workers in the Digital Age, published in April 2002 by Jossey-Bass. Anne Agee (DoIT) and John Zenelis (University Libraries) wrote a chapter for the book on "Creating a Framework for Technology Across the Curriculum," drawing on George Mason's experience.

March 2002

TAC unveils the Technology Behavior & Attitude Survey, an assessment tool that allows faculty to survey the technology skills of students in their courses.

TAC and DoIT host a delegation of four Claremont McKenna College faculty and administrators who are setting up a program similar to TAC. Anne Agee (DoIT) visits North Carolina State University in Raleigh to meet with faculty and IT staff and discuss the processes George Mason has used to develop its Technology Across the Curriculum initiative.

February 2002

TAC issues the RFP for 2002-03. TAC and IRC sponsor workshops on databases and TAC and the Center for Teaching Excellence sponsor a TAC proposal writing workshop.

45 people attend the TAC Spring Meeting, including 13 Graduate Technology Associates and 23 faculty members, who report on 14 different TAC projects. Some common threads run through the meeting, including an emphasis on: spreadsheet use in Physics and Astronomy, Chemistry, and Environmental Science and Policy; web-based research and composition in English, History, Modern and Classical Languages, New Century College, and Chemistry; and the use of new technology and software developed at George Mason University and elsewhere for instructional use in Geography, Communications, and History.

January 2002

Anne Agee and Dee Ann Holisky are invited speakers at the annual conference of the National Learning Infrastructure Initiative (NLII) in San Diego, January 28 - 30. In their talk, "TAC: An IT/Academic Partnership," they focus on the collaborative process that has been a key in the success of the TAC program.