ATE Central: Delivering Greater Cyberlearning Impact through Coordination and Collaboration

University Of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison WI

Investigators

Abstract

ATE Central includes a large collection of curricula, learning objects, websites and media created by projects and centers funded by the Advanced Technological Education program. The resources are catalogued by librarians using standards and practices developed and implemented in the digital library field using cyberlearning knowledge, practices and software created by Internet Scout over many years. ATE Central is expanded to create an extensive archiving system for ATE (including providing a web presence for the products of projects that have ended), tracking impact across projects and amplifying outreach efforts. A variety of tools are developed to help faculty better utilize the resources and direct them to new efforts such as a key concept browsing interface, a bulletin service that alerts them when new material of interest is posted and videos of real world opportunities through features like ATE Success Stories. The site documents best practice to help educators build on existing work and advances the knowledge base about cyberlearning by acting as a test bed and clearinghouse to better understand the integration of the variety of Web 2.0 technologies and increase their use in the ATE program. Quantitative measures of success are measuring the use of the resources via diverse paths and measuring the activity related to the online presence of products of individual project and centers. A handbook is developed to guide users through the tools and resources available on ATE Central. Ongoing feedback and direction is provided by the evaluation and the use of advisors and focus groups.