At the risk of making you want to transfer to University of Maryland or Abilene Christian University in Texas, you might as well know that several higher ed institutions are giving iPhones or iPod touch mobile devices to students this fall. While the “wow” factor is certainly one part of the equation, the other reasons cited are; online research, instant polling of students, and safety (students on the network can be instantly notified if an emergency arises).
In 2004 Duke University gave 20GB iPods, equipped with Belkin voice recorders, to 1,650 freshmen and encouraged the students to use them to record lectures. The iPods were preloaded with orientation information, a calendar of events, and, of course, the Duke fight song. They even envisioned a daily audio editorial to be downloaded from the campus newspaper. According to Duke University the experiment was a success on several fronts–one of which was the publicity generated for “Duke’s institutional commitment to technology.” The positive effect on learning was more difficult to measure.
Which leads us to the question: is mobile communication technology a help or hindrance when it comes to the enterprise of higher education? Clearly there are benefits to having internet and intranet resources at your fingertips when studying. And the online collaboration afforded by portable media devices cannot be denied. But what about when communication technology in the classroom competes with the professor for the attention of the student? According to the NY Times, one professor said he would ban the use of iPhones in class because it would detract from their opportunity to develop a, “wide range of complex reasoning abilities.” On the flip side one student speculated that professors might work harder to make classes interesting if they were competing with iPhones. What do you think?
