The above video is from a brief overview that I gave to some of my colleagues at LaGuardia Community College. I was asked to talk about some of the work that I am doing in converting my lectures from a traditional classroom environment to an Online/hybrid setting. This Online/hybrid seminar is a year long group discussion sponsored by LaGuardia’s Center for Teaching and Learning to assist faculty into making the transition to online instruction.
Welcome back Windows
A few months back I built a new custom Windows 7 PC for little over a $1000 bucks. The new machine is a Quad Core i7 Intel system with 16GBs of ram and a 4TBs of internal storage. I switched back to Windows when the thought of purchasing a new similarly configured $5,000 Mac Pro desktop became unthinkable in these harsh economic times. Plus Windows 7 is now a viable Continue reading “Welcome back Windows”
Thoughts on Black History Month
Black History Month is here again and I find myself reflecting on how things have changed in just a few short years. For example, the story behind the above picture is that a little Black child visited the White House wanted to know if Obama’s hair “felt like his”, so the president obliged and let him see for himself. This brought to mind an exchange that my son and I had during the last primary season in 2008, before Obama was elected.
I took my son with me to vote, and as we were in the booth, he asked if he could grow up to become President one day. Now as a Black father this was one of those pivotal moments where you have to make a decision whether to tell him the truth about the world as you believe it, or allow them to remain innocent for awhile longer by painting them a picture of how the world should be. I try to always be truthful with my children, but in this moment I paused and decided to tell him how I hoped the future would look. “Yes, you can become the President one day”.
I just never thought it would happen in my lifetime.
HTML5 Cheat Sheets
Some of you might remember that I took an HTML5 and CSS3 training class at Noble Desktop a few months back. The class made me acutely aware of how important the newest version of HTML will be terms of web design, video streaming and mobile application development in the future. I came across the following HTML5 cheat sheets designed by InMotion Hosting and figured I would share these documents Continue reading “HTML5 Cheat Sheets”
Mobile App Training with AS3 and Adobe AIR
One of the areas in new media that is experiencing phenomenal growth is mobile app development. Students see a large audience using smartphones and tablets, and as developers and entrepreneurs they want in on the market. I can’t blame them. I want in as well. Truth The money is good and the future for mobile devises is very strong. Due to the pressure of meeting my academic commitments I have been putting off training in mobile app development for the past year. Part of the issue was finding a quality school that teaches the material I needed at a reasonable price. This was Continue reading “Mobile App Training with AS3 and Adobe AIR”
Happy Christmas dance
After finding out what we got for our Christmas presents, my daughter and I did a little happy dance in celebration. She got a Canon T2i Continue reading “Happy Christmas dance”
Presentation: Creating a CUNY-wide approach towards Digital Media Programs
The above video was from a presentation and panel discussion held at John Jay College’s 10th Annual City University of New York (CUNY) IT Conference. The emerging nature of Digital Media has challenged the ability of universities to adapt to a rapidly changing landscape. Due to the evolution of these new disciplines, and the speed in which cross-disciplinary technical innovations are implemented in programs with a digital media focus, very few universal standards are in place for instruction and assessment.
In order to set the stage for the panel discussion, my presentation focused on what I believe are some of the major issues facing digital media programs within CUNY. The panel group, assembled from my colleagues from various CUNY institutions, discussed specific strategies that the university could implement to prepare our digital media programs for the future.
Panel participants included:
Continue reading “Presentation: Creating a CUNY-wide approach towards Digital Media Programs”
Presentation: Motivating Students to Succeed
LaGuardia’s Center for Teaching and Learning is currently sponsoring a New Faculty Colloquium. The New Faculty Colloquium is a year-long seminar designed to acclimate new faculty to the institution and to acquaint them with various pedagogical approaches to teaching. I was asked to present some of my recently published findings on motivating Black and Hispanic students to a new cohort of LaGuardia faculty. While the research for my presentation Continue reading “Presentation: Motivating Students to Succeed”
LaGuardia Event: Ryan Charles speaks
Over the past few months I have been working with Janice Karlen, a colleague of mine from the LaGuardia Business and Technology Department, to arrange for a guest speaker to come in and speak to our students. Janice thought it would be a great idea to collaborate on a joint event since there is a natural synergy between the Business and Technology and the New Media Technology students. As a result of Janice’s connections we were lucky enough to secure Ryan Charles, the Co-Founder of Consmr.com and former head of mobile strategy at Zagat. Ryan was Continue reading “LaGuardia Event: Ryan Charles speaks”
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Launch
So last night I get in late from teaching an evening class and my son meets me at the door in damn near a panic. He tells me they are finalizing the pre-order sales for “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3