(Via Gardner Campbell) So why go to class any more? At Purdue, you can have the class come to your iPod.

BoilerCast uses current digital audio delivery technology to deliver classroom audio recordings to the students at their request. These recordings are often used as review of the day’s material for use on homework assignments and review before exams. BoilerCast is a service available to all credit courses held on the West Lafayette campus and is capable of recording lectures from over 70 classrooms on campus with no lead time, and any other campus classroom with sufficient notice.

The real benefit of BoilerCast is that the instructor orders the service at the beginning of the semester and everything else is automatically handled. Instructors do not need to worry about recording a class or posting in on their website as this is all handled for them as part of the service. Instructors using Purdue’s central course management system, Vista, can integrate the service into their course materials by simply creating a link to the course audio website set up for them.

All served up via podcast if you want it…

More. Content. Online.
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If you really want to get your brain around the sheer enormity of what’s happening in New Orleans, here’s something that spurred me to donate a few more dollars to the relief fund. These are lists being kept by MSNBC where people are posting requests for information about loved ones that are missing. The sheer number listed already is mind-numbing, but the messages are just gut-wrenching. I can’t even imagine what it must be like to be without any way of communicating with loved ones, to be separated from my newborn without any way of tracking where she’s going, to just being totally and literally in the dark.

Amazing.