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The
real strength of BELLE is in its partners. Each participating
institution contributes a specific area of expertise to create
a team that includes some of the most committed, innovative
thinkers in the field of education today.
BELLE
PARTNERS
Banff
Centre for the Arts
Through
the BELLE Project, the Banff Centre for the Arts is digitizing
its extensive archives of visual, video and multimedia
artwork, and making them available through the BELLE broadband
portal. |
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McGill
University
McGill's
Faculty of Medicine is involved in the BELLE Project in
two ways. First, McGill is sharing its digitized undergraduate
curriculum, and creating links among the basic sciences
and clinical practice using multimedia technology. Secondly,
McGill is using a Client Learning Environment to connect
with the University of Calgary's Faculty of Medicine to
collaboratively share digitized images, clinical guidelines
and consultations through Internet Protocol videoconferencing
and videoserving. |
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Northern
Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT)
The
Client Learning Environment installed at this site is
assisting in the development of an institute-wide curriculum
management system, based on a database that links educational
multimedia materials to various learning outcomes. These
include standard text references, three-dimensional interactive
models, streamed media instruction, student collaborative
activities and more. These are to be made available to
educators through the BELLE portal. |
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Seneca@York
Using
a Client Learning Environment and a Content Repurposing
Facility, Seneca's School of Communication Arts is embarking
on a project to merge actors in one location with a virtual
set created in another location to create real-time virtual
performances. This innovative work is to be shared with
students and educators at other BELLE sites via the broadband
network. |
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Sheridan
College
Sheridan
College is installing a Content Repurposing Centre in
its new SCAET facility (Sheridan Centre for Animation
and Emerging Technologies). Working with researchers and
educators at this facility, Sheridan is testing new ideas
in digital media that focus on turning the potential of
convergent technologies into practical applications and
products. |
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University
of Alberta
The
University of Alberta is a key partner in BELLE and is
contributing to the project in three ways. First, the
Academic Technologies for Learning (ATL) department is
lending managerial expertise in the evaluation of the
project. It is also playing a leadership role in an associated
project aimed at defining classification standards for
educational objects. Finally, the University of Alberta
is making digital video clips illustrating methods of
teaching with technology in the classroom available to
educators through a searchable database via the BELLE
portal. |
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University
of British Columbia
The
University of British Columbia has a twofold interest
in the BELLE Project. The university's primary goal is
to enhance the creative process of producing learning
materials through the formation of a database of digital
learning objects. An existing document repository, currently
housed in ITServices, is to be augmented by a large quantity
of materials produced by Distance Education and other
campus departments, and made available through the BELLE
portal. Secondly, the university is involved in BELLE's
video conferencing trials to investigate and solve potential
network problems, and to address barriers that currently
prevent its extended use in the academic environment. |
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University
of Calgary, Learning Commons
The
Learning Commons is another organization closely involved
with the management of the BELLE Project. Through a
variety of associated projects, the Learning Commons
aims to define methods to classify and apply standards
to online learning, and to develop new methods for reviewing,
gathering, describing and digitizing objects and educational
models for university-level courses. Additionally, the
Client Learning Environments are being prototyped in
the Learning Commons, which also provides the home for
the BELLE server farm.
University
of Calgary, Faculty of Medicine
Within
the Health Telematics Unit, Faculty of Medicine, the
BELLE Client Learning Environment is being made available
to physicians, residents, medical students, departments
and multidisciplinary research groups, who share digitized
images, case discussions, clinical practice guidelines
and research with each other and with McGill Faculty
of Medicine. The same groups also link clinicians, specialists
and researchers to share expertise and clinical/research
work or methodologies, and assess and implement technologies
such as video conferencing, video streaming, shared
databases and interoperability devices.
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University
of Lethbridge
The
University of Lethbridge's involvement with BELLE involves
two aspects: the first is the use of a Content Repurposing
Facility to digitize the university's extensive collections
of electron microscopy; create a digital tour of ancient
Ephesus using photographs, maps and text; and repurpose
the GIS (Geographical Imaging System) learning objects
to support learning in a variety of fields. These projects
are then brought online and made available to educators
and students through the BELLE Client Learning Environment. |
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Vancouver
Film School
The
Vancouver Film School is taking advantage of a Client
Learning Environment and a Content Repurposing Facility
to digitize, describe and catalogue its extensive collection
of student film projects, which are then made available
to other BELLE institutions via advanced networks. |
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ASSOCIATED
PROJECTS
BELLE
is working with other Learning Program projects to share resources
and expertise. In particular, BELLE has aligned itself with
the POOL (Portal for Online Objects in Learning) and LearnCanada
to cooperate in areas such as metadata and infrastructure.
Portal
for Online Objects in Learning is a project to develop a prototype
national repository and portal for learning objects, particularly
for post-secondary, workplace training and continuing education
markets, using a web-based approach. Project
leader: TeleLearning Network Inc., Vancouver, BC.
LearnCanada
is a project dedicated to developing K-12 teacher professional
development within a portal/repository environment, making
extensive use of CA*net3. Project leader: STEM~Net, St. John's,
NF.
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