The 10th Annual Conference on Teaching, Learning, and Technology was a great success!

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Another spring semester draws to a close, and with it comes the annual University Conference on Teaching, Learning, and Technology. Now in it’s 10th year, the conference continues to grant UMass Boston faculty opportunities for sharing strategies and exploring issues that focus on inclusive teaching, learning, and curriculum and technology change in college classrooms.

Screen Shot 2016-05-27 at 2.30.22 PMFrom discussions of disciplinary and inter-disciplinary content to explorations and applications of it, social interactions help students discover the power of learning as participating andlearning to be.” In a recent Educause Review article, Minds on Fire, John Seely Brown and Richard Adler write about “the importance of social interaction to learning”:

 [I]nstead of starting from the Cartesian premise of “I think, therefore I am,” and from the assumption that knowledge is something that is transferred to the student via various pedagogical strategies, the social view of learning says, “We participate, therefore we are.”

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Faculty Award Winners with the Provost, from left to right. Jackie Lageson – Sociology [Community Engaged] Winston Langley – Provost Shoshanna Ehrlich – Women & Gender Studies – [Face-to-Face] Laura Hayden – Counseling and School Psychology – [Online] Andrew Perumal – Economics – [Face-to-Face]
Since 1994, the UMass Boston Center for Innovative Teaching has organized an annual conference on Teaching for Transformation. Beginning in 2011, CIT collaborated with IT/Educational Technology and Healey Library to host the conference collaboratively. The day-long conference included presentations and workshops on a variety of issues that are critical to teaching and learning in a diverse, public institution of higher education. The annual conferences provide opportunities for presenters across different educational institutions in the New England area to explore issues and share strategies that focus on inclusive teaching and curriculum change in college classrooms.

To read more about the day’s activities, visit the 2016 conference program.

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TechToberFest – The IT Department Presents a Series of Technology Workshops and Events

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TechToberFest– Free tech training activities all semester long!
 
 
★ EVENT: Machine Learning with MATLAB
Thursday, October 8, 2015. 1-3 | Integrated Sciences Complex, Room 1400
Machine learning is ubiquitous. Come to learn about several machine learning techniques available in MATLAB. Sign Up for Free »
 
★ EVENT: i>Clicker: Student Response System
Thursday, October 14, 2015. 11-12 & 1-2 | Integrated Sciences Complex, Room 2003
Learn how i>Clickers provide opportunities for interaction, collaboration, and peer instruction in your class. No registration required! See the Agenda »
 
 • Mobile Apps for Education
Learn how to use some great iPad apps to help with your courses. Prezi, Google Slides, Educreations, and more. See the Classes »
 
 • Graphic Design
Learn how to use professional design software like Photoshop, InDesign, Acrobat Pro, plus photography and photo editing. See the Classes »
 
  Microsoft Office
Learn the in’s and out’s of Microsoft PowerPoint, Excel, and Word. Give your documents a professional polish. See the Classes » 
 
  Library Research
Learn the tools to seek, gather, and manage your research information with Zotero, Mendeley and EasyBib. See the Classes »

  Research Computing
Learn about high performance computing resources and services, as well as classes on Linux and Bash shell scripting. See the Classes »
 
  Blackboard
Engage your students using Blackboard. Post course content, accept & grade assignments online, and use academic integrity tools. See the Classes »
 
 • Statistics
Learn the various tools for statistical analysis, included SPSS, SAS, R, using Excel for statistics, and more. See the Classes »
 
 • Cyber Security
There’s no delete button on the Internet. Is your digital identity secure? Learn how to keep yourself secure online. See the Classes »

 

There are plenty more topics offered by IT, as well as other departments across campus. See them all at The Training Portal

Want to teach a workshop about a subject you are passionate about? Send an email to ITC@umb.edu and lets talk about it!

Microsoft Security Patches – May

On May 10 th , 2016, Microsoft released security patches for:

  • Windows 10, 8.1, 7, Vista
  • Windows servers 2012, 2008, 2003
  • Microsoft Office 2016; 2013; 2010, 2007
We strongly encourage you to apply these patches to your PC as soon as possible. For information about these updates please visit: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms16- may.aspx
Click on the Windows logo located on the lower left hand corner of your computer screen, a menu will appear, click on “Control Panel”.
Once in the Control Panel, type the words “windows update” in the Search Control Panel field located in the upper right hand corner. As you do, the following screen will immediately appear.

Now, in the upper left handle corner, click the words “check for update”. This screen will appear

Click the “Check for updates” button to begin the checking. The following screen will appear after the checking is completed. All Important Updates must be installed. Click the “Install updates” button to begin the installation. You will need to reboot your computer to finish the installation later.

Alternatively, if you are using Internet Explorer you can click on Tools > and select Windows Update to install the latest security patches.
For questions please call the Service Desk at 617-287-5220 or via email at ITServiceDesk@umb.edu.

Wi-Fi will be down for scheduled upgrades May 24th 10:00 p.m. – 6:00 a.m.

A Wi-Fi service outage is planned Tuesday May 24th 10:00 p.m. until Wednesday May 25th 06:00 a.m.. Network Services will be upgrading code on network equipment which will cause a campus-wide wireless outage. This outage is necessary so that network engineers may introduce newer wireless access points to the campus.

The wired network service will NOT be affected during this outage window so there should not be any interruption in general internet use for the campus community, or in the use of the campus wired networks.

Please plan accordingly. We are sorry for any inconvenience this may cause and we do appreciate your patience.

Questions or concerns may be directed to ITSD Service Desk (617.287.5220, ITServiceDesk@umb.edu)

To get updates on this alert and
see the status of other systems, visit:
umb.edu/it/status