BACK TO SCHOOL
Students hold future in palm of their hand
September 10, 2009
Louise Brown
EDUCATION REPORTER
Say Adam Carlucci can't find the room he's looking for on the Ryerson campus. It happens to him at least once a year.
This fall, he won't need to ask directions. (He is a guy.)
He'll open his iPod Touch, call up the new Ryerson apps (or applications – shortcuts to special software) and flip to the campus map.
Same if he wants a professor's email address. The 21-year-old student will use the app for the staff contact list.
Another app brings up his timetable. Yet another shows if the book he wants is in the library.
"Between classes, I can check the app for computer availability – it shows which scanners aren't being used at a given moment," said the fourth-year "new media" major.
Carlucci is one of a team of Wi-Fi whizzes who this summer designed Ryerson's apps, among the first developed on a Canadian campus. The University of Toronto at Mississauga and the University of Saskatchewan are launching theirs this week. Universities around the world have been jumping on the digital bandwagon with online lectures and text-message alerts sent to students' cellphones.
But in the world of wireless wizardry, apps are hot. The little programs for your smartphone take you straight to your favourite websites, be it hockey scores or dream analysis, without having to wade through a mess of links.
They're taking Ryerson a step closer to president Sheldon Levy's vision of turning the university and its downtown neighbourhood into Canada's next Silicon Valley.
This hand-held technology is the future, he said.
"In a few years, desktop computers will be as outdated as the rotary phone – we'll see computer furniture for sale on Craigslist," said Levy, noting that one in five Ryerson undergrads already has a smartphone, and 39 per cent say they plan to get one within a year.
Ryerson also is designing a special high-tech think tank, a 6,000-square-foot lounge overlooking Yonge-Dundas Square where students with digital dreams can brainstorm ways to bring them to life.
"Companies will come where the brainpower is," said Levy, "and if we don't create an environment where young people can find careers in Canada rather than the United States, we'll lose them to the U.S. the way we lost our best animation students to Disney, Pixar and Industrial Light and Magic."
Once a student finds a way to turn their invention into reality, they will have to leave the digital "playground" to make room for another dreamer, said Levy.
"I want to foster 100 millionaires in this room – I want the buzz of energy 24/7 – and help industry stay in Canada."
At the U of T's Mississauga campus, students will be able to use smartphone apps this fall to check their timetable and exam schedule, browse through course descriptions, note important dates and contact numbers, as well as consult a campus map.
Does this mean less face-to-face contact with university staff?
"No. Letting students do these tedious business tasks from home frees up more time for us to do things like one-on-one academic advising," said registrar Diane Crocker. "We actually have more time to help students with what they've really come here for – to learn.
"We want to keep kids online, not in line."
It's not just students who will be checking their apps this fall, said Crocker.
"To be honest, faculty members also call us to find out where they're supposed to be teaching their class."
One in a series on hot topics in education
Toronto Star