iCampus

Since 1999, MIT and Microsoft Research have pursued a partnership with a radical purpose: to revolutionize the practice of higher education with the tools of information technology.

Redefining MIT's philosophy of "hands-on learning" for a digital era, iCampus supports new projects—proposed and developed by MIT faculty and students—that make a significant, sustainable difference in how well and quickly students learn, how much they remember, and how fast they can shift from absorbing facts and concepts to creating new ideas and solutions themselves. Building on the strength of Microsoft technology, we also promote the development of Web services that provide practical ways for colleges and universities around the world to collaborate and pool their technological resources.

For years, the most one could claim for "educational technology" was that it had given students and educators more convenient, more expensive ways of doing exactly what they had always done. It had replaced the slide rule, the film strip, the typewriter and a trip to the library with the calculator, the video screen, word processing and an Internet search. Yet no one could argue it had actually made education more effective.

At MIT, iCampus has already transformed the way teachers teach and students learn, reshaping 96 courses across the curriculum—and dramatically improving the learning experience of more than 5,000 students. Each new initiative also includes a rigorous assessment of its educational results. Ultimately these innovations can be used to improve education worldwide. Projects spawned or supported by iCampus include:

• A radical replacement of MIT's largest lecture course, Electricity and Magnetism, by an active learning environment where small groups of students, working together, use simulation tools and perform experiments;
• A major transformation of MIT's introduction to Computer Science that incorporates on-line lectures and automatic homework checking;
• A fundamental conceptual overhaul of MIT's program in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering that integrates design throughout the entire curriculum;
• The replacement of MIT's lecture-based introduction to Mechanical Engineering with small-group engagements, supported by desk-top experiments and on-line study modules;
• A faculty-created infrastructure that allows Web-based access to real laboratories; in effect, "if you can't come to the lab, the lab will come to you";
• The development of video technology that lets students study Shakespeare's plays by creating multimedia essays;
• A new approach to professional education in Architecture, which complements face-to-face studio environments with robust online communities;
• Provocative new approaches to using electronic games and virtual environments in education;
• The creation of new resources, shared across the School of Engineering, for learning Fluid Mechanics; and
• The ongoing demonstration of how Web Service architectures can promote collaboration and sharing of educational computing infrastructure within and among universities.
• The support of student lead research projects with over a million dollars awarded directly to MIT undergraduate and graduate students.

Our next formal proposal cycle will be Winter-Spring 2004, but we are open to new ideas at any time. Please feel free to contact any member of the Joint Steering Committee to discuss possibilities.