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iTunesU @ the NYU College of Dentistry

Elise Eisenberg

This past fall, NYU’s College of Dentistry (NYUCD) debuted its iTunesU interface. Capturing lectures for later reference is not a new practice, and universities have distributed such recordings on videocassette and via video conferencing for years. However, with the rise in popularity of small audio recording devices and mp3 players, lecture capture has become a commonplace practice.

At NYUCD, many of our students were already recording lectures on their own devices to provide a means of reviewing the information later, outside of the classroom. An early pilot study indicated that students wanted a more coordinated approach that would ensure that the lecture material was available to all. In September 2006, our first-, second-, and third-year classes in the predoctoral program were given iPods and adaptors that could be connected to the AV systems in our lecture halls and large classrooms. Students had control of the recording process — they began and ended the recordings, compressed and converted them to mp3 files, and uploaded the files to class websites.

iTunesU @ NYUCD

In early 2008, Apple Computer, Inc., introduced updated server software, which included Apple’s Podcast Producer program, allowing for a more automatic process and direct upload to iTunesU. In August 2008, Apple Mac mini computers were installed in eight of the largest classrooms and lecture halls at NYUCD and were connected to the network and to the AV systems in these rooms.

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Apple Mac mini computers installed in eight NYUCD classrooms and lecture halls are connected to the network and to these rooms’ AV systems.

 

Three students in each class are responsible for starting and stopping the recordings using a customized web page created by the NYUCD Office of Informatics. The recording process workflow has several steps.

  • First, students begin recording the lecture in the room they're in.
  • The recording is then stored on the Mac mini.
  • At the conclusion of the lecture, students specify the course in which the lecture was given and the title of the lecture.
  • Finally, the recording is transferred to the Mac OS X server, processed, and uploaded directly to iTunesU.

Audio files are available for download within 30 to 60 minutes. Each begins with a copyright notice identifying the recording as property of NYUCD and for the use of only students and faculty of NYUCD as part of its educational program.

Between September 28, 2008, and March 1, 2009, there were more than 121,000 audio track downloads of lectures recorded and stored as part of iTunesU @ NYUCD. In addition to audio files, faculty can supplement the recordings by uploading files in a variety of formats. NYUCD has updated its system to capture PowerPoint slides as video recordings. These recordings are available 60 to 90 minutes after lectures are completed.

Connecting to iTunesU

iTunesUDental1

The course page for one of the NYUCD courses in iTunesU.

 

Students are given access to iTunesU through an NYU learning management system (LMS) called ALEX (Advanced Learning Exchange). ALEX provides functionality similar to that of NYU’s more widely used LMS, Blackboard, but is developed by Sakai (sakaiproject.org), an open-source community of developers primarily from higher education institutions.

Students log in to ALEX with their NYU accounts. They then select from a course menu, which opens the course material within iTunesU. Each course page in iTunesU contains all the recordings for the course.

Students can download recordings one at a time, or they can "subscribe" to courses and receive the latest podcasts for each course to which they are subscribed, automatically, when they open iTunes.

itunesu

Dr. Eisenberg speaking on the NYUCD iTunesU deployment, this past March 26 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in one of the sessions of AcademiX 2009 — Beyond the LMS: Innovations in Higher Ed Teaching & Scholarship (maclearning.org/2009/03/mit2.html). Photo: Nelson Chin

Supplementing In-Class Lectures

In addition to their coursework, students at the College of Dentistry serve in a variety of settings outside of NYUCD as well as participating in outreach programs. With iTunesU, students can review any lecture they might miss.

iTunesU allows us to interact more with our students during lectures. By providing lecture material ahead of time, we can use the lecture time to cover material in a more applied and interactive format and to review clinical cases and advanced concepts.

Also in this issue: Podcasting & iTunesU at NYU School of Medicine

A Brief History of iTunesU

iTunesU is an environment within iTunes that allows students at participating universities to retrieve mp3 podcasts of class lectures. Apple launched iTunesU in August 2004, around the same time that Duke University began to distribute iPods to all incoming freshmen.

In the fall of 2005, Stanford University became the first institution of higher learning with a public iTunesU site. Apple added a link to iTunesU from within iTunes in the summer of 2007. At that time, 16 universities were listed on the site with more than 12,000 audio and video files.

By November 2008, there were 600 active iTunesU sites, both public and private, spanning 18 countries. There are now more than 250 iTunesU public sites and more than 125,000 free audio tracks. iTunesU also contains a section called “Beyond Campus,” which offers links to non-University websites, including those of libraries and museums.

Author Biography

Dr. Eisenberg is the Director of Informatics & Digital Support Services and Clinical Professor of Epidemiology & Health Promotion at the NYU College of Dentistry.