Learning Spaces

Open Forum May 2, 2006

This open meeting covered two topics:

We heard from the Denison team who participated in a national conference on learning spaces and technology.

We described the process through which classrooms are scheduled and listened to ideas to improve access to effective learning spaces.

Technology & Learning Spaces conference – Rhodes College – Feb. 2006
See http://www.pkal.org/activities/2006Rhodes.cfm

The Denison team reports:

A brainstorming session with designers and architects
The information common was a hot topic
Technology and pedagogy of the future are unpredictable, depends a lot on what is developed and what student trends are
Suggested more atrium spaces, more common spaces
Major theme: mobility, flexibility

Sometimes faculty have an aversion to this because once they get everything they way they want it, everything gets moved around

Academic plan and curriculum should drive your space projects, not the other way around
Do we have such a plan here at Denison?

Libraries traditionally thought of as "quiet" places, but the new thing is to have a variety of spaces available (including both quiet space and spaces where students can work in groups and can be "noisy")
We shouldn't focus on issues of equity so much as having different possibilities, different types of spaces as needed to meet curricular goals
Should we be more focused on structure or on pedagogical methods?

Communication- what type of space is available? Faculty should know what we have and what we could have, so they have a better idea of what options are available in their curricular planning

How We Schedule Our Learning Spaces

Many times faculty ask for e-classrooms and might only use it one day a week or at the end of the semester for presentations
Do departments ever talk to one another? Everybody wants to teach at the same time
Do we actually need more e-classrooms? If so, where?
What is the proper e-classroom size? With the 3/2 course load, e-classrooms that were designed to hold 18-22 students are now needing to accommodate 26
Faculty don't want to leave their floor, or their building, and most want to teach between 10 and 2
There is a difference between wanting to "own" small seminar spaces versus larger classrooms (and e-classrooms). The seminar spaces are often used for small, upper level courses, and departments want that space to reflect their discipline somehow, not just be a "generic" space
Maybe our (as-yet-designed) "plan" needs multiple models because not every idea will work with every department
Sciences and fine arts have perhaps less of a problem with scheduling (and being able to work cooperate) because they know what space(s) they have to work with and schedule

sciences often have their own building that they "own"
fine arts has a conglomeration of buildings that "belong" to them
social science and humanities don't really have that, they could be scattered anywhere on campus just as easily as anywhere else

What if all departments in a building could get together and discuss scheduling and what type of classroom teaching spaces they might want to use/share for their particular building?

The entire meeting was videotaped and so the Library archives will have a copy for viewing.