Me. William Allen. I teach art history
in Arkansas State University's Department of Art. Our department is a strong
studio department. Art history
is mostly a service area for the studio program. We are badly
under-funded. But, we do a good job. We are part of what makes the studio program strong.
Like a lot of other art history units in similar academic structures, we've built up a
teaching collection of 35mm slides. Some of these we've bought. Mostly we've had student
help shoot pictures from books and journals. Our slide collection is a mixed bag: some
good stuff, some stuff that should have been tossed fifteen years ago.
Interestingly, some of the stuff we should have tossed can now be rehabilitated
digitally.
Early in 1997 I began collecting digital images. Since then I've taught my classes
using only digital images. This is a trend that I expect will continue. Until
the past few years I depended mostly on images I could get from others; now the department has
begun digitizing the slide collection.
Since 1997 I've directed ASU's Center for Learning Technologies, an initiative to assist faculty who want to integrate new technologies
into their teaching. To date we've emphasized teaching technical skills with a
highlight on our now-famous "In Two Hours We Can Teach You to Make a Web Page"
course. Most of the ASU faculty now have web pages--some are active, some are
pretty static. But a critical mass of tech-savvy faculty has emerged. Now
common are web components for our classes. Each year we have more and more
courses taught entirely online.
Helping in the effort to move my colleagues to a different viewpoint
about technology has been rewarding. Interestingly, I now find myself more and
more wanting to return to teaching "real" students--with lots of that
over the Internet.
