New Media Technology site launch

Media and Technolgy Website Logo

One of the reasons why I haven’t posted anything recently was because for the past month I have been working hard to finish all of the marketing and promotional materials for the new LaGuardia Media and Technology website. The New Media program had been without a web site since the college administration decided to relocate the New Media degree from the now dissolved Computer and Information Systems (CIS) department to the Humanities department. The relocation of the program offered me an opportunity to redesign the curriculum in a more effective way. However, all of the recent changes in the curriculum, as well as the physical relocation of the actual program had caused a bit of a confusion. The new website was merely one of the tools that we developed to minimize the pain of the transition.

More information on the LaGuardia Media and Technology programs can be found here:

http://www.laguardia.edu/mediatech

Mayor’s office: Futures in Film and New Media


Representatives from the Mayor’s Office of Film, Theater and Broadcasting came to speak to the students at LaGuardia. The event was sponsored by the LaGuardia Media Studies and New Media Technology programs. The visitors from Mayor Bloomberg’s office talked about training programs, diversity initiatives, and other opportunities for CUNY students Continue reading “Mayor’s office: Futures in Film and New Media”

Old students return

Earlier today a former LaGuardia New Media student, Miki Masuda, came in to speak to some of my capstone students about her experiences working in digital design, and transferring from LaGuardia to a senior college. Now just to give you some background, new media capstone students at LaGuardia are generally my most advanced designers. The have taken many of the required courses and are usually just a semester or so away from graduating. The capstone class, HUW 269 – New Media Project Lab, that I am teaching is designed to assist students in developing a final professional portfolio to facilitate transfer to a senior college or gain employment as a New Media designer.

Miki is an amazing designer. When I was looking for a guest speaker Continue reading “Old students return”

Mr. Richardson, we’re ready for your closeup.

James Interview

One of the benefits of being a professor is that you get to see how your students grow and develop over time. You are able to watch them start off as raw and untrained media enthusiasts and hopefully evolve into polished digital artists. Today was one of those days for me. I was honored to be interviewed by students in the Media and Technology programs for the upcoming Web TV channel being created at LaGuardia Community College.

The interview focused Continue reading “Mr. Richardson, we’re ready for your closeup.”

Just look at what the CAT dragged in!

In the fall of 2008, Peter Katopes Vice President of Academic Affairs at LaGuardia Community College) appointed me to the CUNY wide Committee for Academic Technology (CAT). I was asked to act as LaGuardia’s representative on all issues pertaining to the use of advanced technology in support of pedagogy. This assignment required me to attend monthly meetings and frequent sub-committee sessions to vote on issues of how technology should be adopted throughout CUNY. In addition to helping to support CUNY’s overall vision, I acted as LaGuardia’s liaison  to the CAT committee to insure that LaGuardia interests were fully represented. My involvement as a member of the CAT group required me to serve as a member on the CAT sub-committees for Blackboard and ePortfolio. I would like to believe that my participation was extremely valuable on these sub-committees due to my experience as LaGuardia’s initial Director of ePortfolio and my work with vendors like Concord and Blackboard to link disparate systems to support ePortfolio.

ePortfolio System Consulting

During the spring and summer of 2009, I served as a consultant to the LaGuardia Community College Center for Teaching and Learning in the area of ePortfolio Systems selection. I assisted the members of  LaGuardia’s Center for Teaching and Learning and IT department in choosing the new ePortfolio platform to accommodate growth and to replace the aging Concord system that I helped to select years ago when I served as LaGuardia’s first Director of ePortfolio. I was asked by Dean Bret Eynon to review the leading commercial and open source systems and help select three platforms to evaluate for final consideration. Because ePortfolio is a critical component in many of LaGuardia’s strategic goals, not the least of which is Institutional Assessment, helping to choose the correct platform was of vital importance to the college. Due to my extensive knowledge of technology, and my experience in selecting and negotiating the contract for the first system nearly seven years ago, I was asked to work with the current Director, Mercedes Del Rosario, and her staff to assist where needed. I provided the following assistance during this project:

  • Helped to select which systems we should investigate
  • Selected the hosting company to host the open source solutions
  • Evaluated all of the proprietary and open source solutions
  • Provided recommendations on software and hardware for the project
  • Served as a technical resource on all issues related to hosting, networking, programming, and coordinating a project of this magnitude

In the final analysis, LaGuardia decided upon the system from Digication as a the new platform to support the ongoing eportfolio objectives of the college.