iTunes U is a platform within iTunes for universities to share educational content. It allows universities to structure content on their own "sites" and share public or private content. Some Australian universities' approaches to iTunes U include highlighting top downloads, featured content, links to university pages, and sample lectures. For UTS's approach, potential content sources include existing UTSpeaks events, campus life videos, and podcasts, as well as generating new content by enhancing audio/video facilities, training staff, and engaging students.
2. Overview What is iTunes U? What is being done there: Open University Stanford Australian Universities What might a UTS approach to iTunes U involve?
3. iTunes U Part of the iTunes music store Universities have their own “sites” where they can provide and structure content University sites can be private, public, or a combination of both
4. Open University OU Learn (faculties of sorts) Recently Released Recent Staff Favourites New Content Geology Exposed Featured content OU Links Top Downloads OU Power Search Links
5. Not limited to formal curriculum areas – you can gather course content the way students want to access it.
6. Stanford Categories What’s New Staff Favourites Stanford Courses The Stanford Challenge Featured Contributors Stanford Search Top Downloads Quick Links
10. ANU No marketing copy Links to Uni Pages Public lectures and events Courses ANU Press Campus Life
11. Griffith University Marketing copy Top downloads Links Featured content Digital arts showcase Our community Our study areas
12. LaTrobe Logo not very prominent Top Downloads Links Features News, Opinions and Events (all updated in the last week) Study Life at La Trobe
13. RMIT Of all the designs, theirs has the least prominent name Marketing copy in the top RHS Links to university web pages Three categories: Featured content Study Community
14. Swinburne Top downloads Links About Swinburne For students and staff Academia (there are hundreds of tracks here, but lots of graduation speeches pushing the numbers up. Good use of screencasts to teach computing lessons) Research Consistent Opening Video grab (“Swinburne Podcasts”) helps to establish brand across all media offerings
15. University of Melbourne Has some marketing copy at the top Top Downloads Links Featured News Featured series University community Media content was all “last modified” in the last 2 days Not a great deal of content evident from this page
16. University of Western Australia Topics Sample Lectures Links Featured Content Marketing copy is relegated to the “Welcome” page – a more fitting place for such text Appears that they don’t have much content: in reality, there are quite a few tracks buried within, and the sample lectures are mostly 45mins or longer. 13 minute long “welcome to UWA video” with high production values
17. UNSW Topics, UNSW TV Research Publications Courses Search Top Downloads Seems that it hasn’t been updated much since launch Where there *is* video content, it’s very high quality.
18. Lessons learned from these pages With too little content, it appears that the university has little to say. Sample lectures can give a taste for a subject. It’s reasonable to provide 45mins – 90mins long audio (or video) To illustrate the university, use a prominent logo and brand, but also show students, and some buildings It’s acceptable to have links back to your website Content about life at your particular university is commonplace The most interesting content to casual browsers is likely to be one-off lectures, not whole courses The marketing benefit comes from the quality of the content, not in explicit messages
19. Where to start Start with existing content: UTSpeaks Videos of campus life Podcasts / Vodcasts that have already been developed Begin recording events with a view to sharing them via iTunes U
20. Possible sources of content C3 – Centre for Climate Change CenSoc - Centre for the Study of Choice CIIC - Creative Industries Innovation Centre CRC - China Research Centre IBID - Institute for Biotechnology of Infectious Diseases ISF - Institute for Sustainable Futures Centre for Health Communications QCIS - Quantum Computation and Intelligent Systems Business 21C
21. Providing Sample Lectures Start out by choosing a handful of subjects that lend themselves toward audio/video recording with a minimum of reworking, for example: Bachelor of Sound and Music Masters of Animation Fashion Choose other subjects based on their appeal to the iTunes audience Technical subjects Design focussed subjects Humanities subjects
28. Back catalogue of UTSpeaks events(can include a PDF of the PowerPoint slides)
29. Lectures that have already been podcast for their studentsSources of Content
30. Create New Content Enhance the AVS facility so that audio/video of guest lectures, events, information evenings can be recorded with high production values Provide interested academic staff with training on content generation for podcast / iTunes U Add resources to the Newsroom so that multimedia content can be generated as stories are reported Engage students to generate content about University life Modify student assessment to include creation of iTunes U content
Editor's Notes
OU Learn (faculties of sorts)Recently ReleasedRecent Staff FavouritesNew ContentGeology ExposedFeatured contentOU LinksTop DownloadsOU Power SearchLinks
Not limited to formal curriculum areas – you can gather course content the way students want to access it.
