Digital Partnerships
for Engaged Learning
"Digital Partnerships for Engaged Learning" is an evolving portfolio of projects managed by the Technology Resource Center (TRC), a collaboration of Wayne State University's Office for Teaching and Learning (OTL), Computing and Information Technology, and the Digital Projects Initiative of the Wayne State University Library System (WSULS). Partnerships foster purposeful integration of digital media in teaching and learning by bridging faculty and TRC expertise, building faculty learning communities, and collaborating with other institutions in the community. Three major projects illustrate the current variety of innovative activities on campus: the Digital Humanities Collaboratory, the Luna Project, and the Digital Learning and Development Sandbox.
The LUNA Project
The LUNA Project is an outgrowth of the 2006 Innovative Technology Grants sponsored by the Office of the Provost and supported by the OTL and TRC. The Wayne State Art History Department teamed with WSULS staff to purchase image databases and assist with metadata. LUNA replaces the static analog system of slide carousels with digital access to images, audio, video, and text files. The content includes thousands of images of art, architecture, and historical maps. Users can search multiple collections, integrate institutional content with Flickr contents, create media groups and presentations, export contents, and embed content within the University's Blackboard course management system. The project's model for using metadata and controlled vocabulary makes the tool more widely usable by the university community at large. OTL staff are currently designing training workshops for faculty. For further information, view a video of LUNA or contact Jonathan McGlone (bb8011@wayne.edu).
The Digital Humanities Collaboratory
The Digital Humanities Collaboratory is the current phase of an evolving initiative to foster greater use of new technologies in teaching and learning, overseen by the OTL and the TRC. This initiative began in February 2006, when the TRC co-hosted a local conference on "Digital Partnerships in Humanities" (part of the national HASTAC 2006-2007 InFormation Year series). The conference website includes a link to the New Media Consortium write-up of the Second Life virtual reality event, under Conference Recap. The experience gained from that event enabled the TRC to support a November 2007 symposium on Virtual Citizenship, a joint effort of the Center for the Study of Citizenship, the OTL, the Honors Program, and the DeRoy Lecture series. Located on-campus and in Second Life, the symposium launched a broader research, teaching, and service project aimed at understanding how students, staff, and faculty across campus can work at the intersections of new communication and information technologies in the interests of citizenship, social justice, and civic engagement. OTL staff subsequently designed a faculty workshop on Starting Your Second Life.
The OTL launched the WSU-HASTAC Digital Humanities Collaboratory (DHC) in September 2008. It is a faculty learning community devoted to teaching and research in digital humanities. The aim is to foster greater visibility, networking, and mutual learning across campus. Monthly face-to-face meetings feature presentations of innovative uses of technology, and the DHC website is a parallel online space with presentation materials and links to national resources. For further information contact Julie Thompson Klein (ad5820@wayne.edu).
The Digital Learning and Development Sandbox
The Digital Learning and Development Sandbox (DLDS) is a research and development project aimed at fostering greater use of the Digital Library Collections* of the WSULS. The DLDS is a website providing access to images from the Virtual Motor City and the Digital Dress (example) collections. Portfolios of images and their metadata can be downloaded into templates for creating digital learning objects for presentations and research papers, and a teaching and learning archive provides links to local and national resources. The DLDS is supported by a Digital Humanities II Start-Up Grant from the National Endowment for Humanities. For further information, see a preview of the Sandbox site, and an update on public release of the site contact Dina Mein (dina.mein@wayne.edu).
*The Digital Library Collections are part of over thirty initiatives managed by Wayne State's department of New Media and Information Technology. They feature collections of the Wayne State University Library System (WSULS), the Walter P. Reuther Library, various University departments, and other library and museum partners, including the Detroit Public Library, the Detroit Historical Museum, The Henry Ford, the Detroit Institute of Arts, and Michigan State University, The collections focus on the cultural history of Detroit and Michigan. They were funded in large part through grants from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the Library of Michigan, and Sun Microsystems. For further information, contact Jonathan McGlone (bb8011@wayne.edu).