Top Honors at 2009 IITAP Showcase Awarded to Quest Learning Assessment System
At the 12th annual IITAP Showcase on April 28, four awards were presented in recognition of innovative approaches to teaching using emerging instructional technology.
K. Sata Sathasivan and his development team received the Gold Award for the Quest Learning and Assessment System that allows instructors to build assignments and to automate grading and feedback. The award included a prize of $5000.
Making withdrawals from a knowledge bank of 60,000 questions and answers covering biology, chemistry, computer science, mathematics, and physics, 15,000 students at UT Austin and 30,000 students in Texas high schools look to the database resource for content and explanations crafted by some of the university's top science educators. The system has responded to 14 million student queries in the past year, freeing up tens of thousands of instructor hours that would have been spent on grading and bookkeeping.
Sathasivan is a senior lecturer in the Molecular,
Cell, and Developmental Biology section of the School
of Biological Sciences. He supervises
undergraduate researchers in areas including plant genetic engineering,
genome analysis, and biofuel development. He has received several teaching
awards, including the Texas Exes Teaching Excellence Award and
the Dads’ Association Centennial Teaching Fellowship. He
is the coordinator for biology for the Web-based resources Homework
Service and Biology Digital Online Content, the latter a clearinghouse
for rich-media teaching material. He treated visitors to Explore UT
in March to a session titled Genetic Engineering: Boon or Bane?
The development team contributed expertise in several areas:
- John Gilbert, Professor, Mathematics (Lead Project Director, Math Coordinator and Content Developer)
- Paul McCord, Lecturer, Chemistry (Chemistry Coordinator and Content Developer)
- John Markert, Professor of Physics and Physics Coordinator
- Gerald Shane Lewis, Senior Systems Analyst, College of Natural Sciences (Project Management and Coordination)
- Steven G Szyszko, Project Manager, College of Natural Sciences (Major Software Developer)
- Patsy A McDonald, Project Coordinator, College of Natural Sciences (Administrative Service, Faculty and Student Help, Student Staff Management)
- Rhonda Hostetler, Ex-System Analyst, College of Natural Sciences (User Interface Developer and Designer)
IITAP, administered by DIIA, is an initiative of the provost to encourage, support, and reward innovation in using instructional technology to promote students’ knowledge and skills by making learning more engaging, relevant, and active.
Dean Judy Ashcroft, Division of Continuing and Innovative Education, suggested that the IITAP showcase provided an appropriate moment to reflect on where the use of instructional technology is headed in the quest to put into practice UT Austin’s core values of learning, discovery, freedom, leadership, opportunity, and responsibility. She affirmed DIIA’s mission is to promote a 21st century approach to teaching by helping students see the connection between learning and schooling.
Provost Steven Leslie applauded the entrants for their leadership, their vision, and their commitment to teaching and learning excellence, reflective of the charge of the Commission of 125 that UT Austin strive to be the best public university in the nation. He credited faculty members for putting teaching challenges foremost in their thinking, and then daring to seek out creative solutions through technology.
Two projects received Silver Awards, with a prize of $2500 and an iPod Touch for each.
Franky Ramont was recognized for ASL Online, an interactive, Web-based, multimedia-learning tool to help students in first-semester classes in American Sign Language complete group projects outside of class. Ramont is a senior lecturer in linguistics in the College of Liberal Arts. Annie Marks of Liberal Arts Instructional Technology Services assisted in the development of the project.
Bjorn Sletto was recognized for the East Austin Environmental Justice Project: Facilitating Environment Justice Pedagogy with Digital Technologies, which provides a model for environmental justice pedagogy using experiential learning, critical pedagogy, and creative applications of digital technologies. Sletto is an assistant professor in the Department of Community and Regional Planning of the School of Architecture.
Hans Boas and his development team in the Department of Germanic Studies received Honorable Mention for the Texas German Dialect Archive. The award included an iPod Touch. The archive, created with the participation of students, provides a central data source addressing the language, culture, and history of a dwindling population of Texas German speakers.
IITAP entries originate in many ways: as DIIA ~FAST Tex projects, as initiatives funded by Liberal Arts ITS grants, as Fine Arts pilot programs, as collaborations of University Libraries. Whatever their origin, IITAP entries conceived to address class-specific challenges live on as university-wide enhancements for teaching and learning.