Digital Technology and Culture
A blog for students and friends of Washington State University Vancouver's Digital Technology and Culture Program
Name: Dr. Dene Grigar
This blog is maintained by Dr. Dene Grigar, WSUVancouver. Contact me at grigar@vancouver.wsu.edu
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Need FA 332 to graduate? Want to take DTC 477 to further hone your understanding of multimedia authoring? Like to take more photography courses? Want to take that cool Visual Culture course?
Wellllllllllllll, unless you get advised and have the hold released on your registration, you may not be able to get into these courses. And as many of you veterans know, studio and lab-based courses fill up fast since there are a finite number of seats.
In case you do not know, here is the process:
1. You sign up for an advising time by going by your advisor’s office. If you do not know whom your advisor is, then you can write Teresa Phimister @ phimiste@vancouver.wsu.edu or me (grigar@vancouver.wsu.edu) for this information. Only Harrison Higgs, John Barber, and I are advising this semester.
2. You plan out your schedule for the semester you plan to attend school. Right now, you can be advised for both summer and fall.
3. You come to advising with your plan, and you get advised.
4. After your advising session, your advisor walks down the hallway and gives Teresa your updated folder; she studies the folder to make sure the plan is in order and, then, releases the hold on your registration.
5. You register beginning April 9th or so. To get an exact time, visit MYWSU.
Remember, you cannot register unless you get advised and the hold on your registration released.
Even if you are graduating, you need to make an appointment to see your advisor. With all of the changes in personnel this year, it would behoove graduates to make contact with new faculty. The DTC is sponsoring a party for graduating seniors, so at the very least come by and get information about this event from me.
Just a reminder that the DTC Club is sponsoring a gathering in the MOVE Lab on Wednesday, March 28, from 6-8 pm. The lab is located in VCL 3.
Yes, they have been talking about putting their curricula online for a few years now. It caused quite a stir when the announcement was first made. Questions about intellectual property emerged as one of the biggest issues people were concerned about.
Personally, I see it as a bold statement suggesting that information faculty share in the classroom with students means little without the faculty's expertise to teach that information. This is a notion that runs counter to the canned education we see at diploma mills.
<a href="http://www.iwr.co.uk/information-world-review/news/2184062/mit-puts-entire-curriculum" target="_blank">' Nuff said check the link.</a>
Things May Seem To Be Quiet in the Halls of VMMC, But That Was Merely a Ruse . . .
1. Mac News
Leslie Wykoff of VIT has announced that she will convert VMMC 111 into a Mac Lab. The Macs will be the iMac Duos that run on both the Mac and PC platforms. That way the DTC can use the lab for multimedia design and other departments can use it for their purposes.
This is terrific news for us, as you can imagine.
This brings me to the Mac Required Buy Program. Although your support for the program was high, I was concerned (as were some of you) about how to make the program work for students who 1) did not have financial aid, 2) already owned laptops, 3) were not in the Media Authoring concentration, and 4) did not want to participate in the program. I was struggling to resolve these issues when I finally called Leslie and spoke with her. That was when she said that because the new Macs can and do run Windows and other PC software seamlessly with the help of Parallel and BootCamp software programs, she was amenable to converting a lab that we can use.
So, the upshot? We will have a Mac Lab in place for the fall 2007. We will not follow through on the Mac Required Buy for the fall 2007. If after the program develops there is a groundswell of support, then we may pursue it then--because I am concerned about access issues. But in the meantime, I am excited about having the lab in place for you all in the Media Authoring Concentration.
2. Clark College Summit Meeting
Last Friday, Harrison, John and I met with the technology folks at Clark College to discuss potential future partnerships. Three came out of the meeting and are currently under study. But one in particular may be of immediate interest to folks in the Informatics Concentration. The DTC is talking to Clark about a process for getting Sysco and Microsoft certification for Informatics students. I hope to have more specific news in the next couple of weeks about how this will happen for you. But it is good news indeed for those of you interested in this kind of professional training.
3. DTC 338 Special Topics in Digital Technology and Culture
This course passed the university curriculum committees and all of the other committees and subcommittees that courses have to pass through in order to become legitimate. The good news is that you can take the course twice for credit. I am working to make it 3 times, but in the meantime this means that beginning fall 2007, we can officially offer DTC 338, a course you can take two times. John's Visual Culture course will be the first one offered under this number. And in the spring I am offering Electronic Lit/Net Art, which will coincide with the conference of net artists I am bringing to WSUV and Vancouver.
4. Video Production
Remember that Video Production is being offered this summer in Summer 1. It is suppressed in the schedule, so this means you have to ask directly for it and get permission to register for it. As of today I have 5 students who are on the list to take it. There are spots for 24. So, please let your advisors know if you want to take the class.
I have Dr. Andy Opel, who is a faculty member at Florida State specializing in video, in town to teach the course. Students who take this course and do well in it are eligible to intern with the Portland Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA) in the fall 2007. The DTC has been negotating with them to take interns for their fall Time Based Media Festival as members of the Press Corps. This position will allow students to attend all events associated with the festival and videotape it for PICA.
5. Spring and Summer Advising
Advising for spring and summer starts March 26. Please make sure you see your advisor. And when you do, arrive organized. Don't make us choose your courses for you. Come with a plan. Tell us what you want. Ask advice, yes, but come with an idea about your future.
The other thing I want to say about advising is that it should be more than you guys showing up once a semester to get a schedule for a particular semester. What I would rather see is that advising becomes a mechanism for mentoring, which you all need in order to move forward with your careers. This means that if you come to advising prepared with a proposed schedule that merely needs fine tuning with your advisor's help, then there is time to talk about your future, your career needs, and your dreams. Keep in mind that when you graduate, you will need letters of recommendation for jobs or grad school. Your advisor should be the main person you can rely on to do this for you. It is also the person who may be able to suggest potential employers or help you with your entrance essay for grad school. So, what I am trying to say is that I have a goal to change advising to make it meatier and more meaningful for you and us.
6. Graduation Reception--Save the Dates
Teresa has identified potentially 11 students who may graduate this spring. As promised, beginning this semester (now that I have gotten settled in the position and have a better sense of what the DTC needs) the DTC is going to honor our graduates each semester with a gathering. So, we are looking at April 26 or 27 as the date of this event. I would love to have student volunteers (no graduates since they are the ones being honored and so should not have to work on their own party) to help John and me to put on the event. Let me know if you are interested.
See, we *have* been busy:)
I thought you may like to see an image from last week's artist talk at Nrothbank Gallery. I have posted links to two others below. A special thank you to Brandon Thorstenson who took the photos.
http://www.vancouver.wsu.edu/programs/dtc/graphics/nb_crowd.JPG
http://www.vancouver.wsu.edu/programs/dtc/graphics/nb_outside.JPG
--Dene
