Nashville, July 2005 - (by Dr. Birgit Gaiser) The DIVERSE conference, which took place from 5 - 7 July, was the fifth international convention on videoconferencing and video in education. Developers, educators, and technologists gathered in Nashville, where the convention was hosted by Vanderbilt University's Dr. Lori Schnieders. It quickly emerged that the convention would measure up to its name: the conference schedule was really diverse and reflected the broad range of research questions addressed in the realm of video and videoconferencing for learning purposes.
The program also included a wide range of practical experience from the field.
-œTo have fun- or more prosaic motivational effects on the side of both the students and the lecturers were rated as perhaps the most crucial factor for the success of eLearning. The attendees agreed that moving images may provide advantages in this regard - especially in comparison to other media applied to support virtual learning scenarios. In addition the social impact or human touch of videoconferencing was highlighted in several talks and discussions.
Of course some videoconferences were integrated into the conference schedule. Some technical problems occurred, and the taking turns during the videoconferences was not always well coordinated. Though videoconferencing may not yet be rated as a fully developed technology, the improvements made over the last few years are obvious.
In his rather adventurous keynote, Wim Veen presented the homo zappiens - the generation born in the eighties that uses digital media like a duck in water. Moreover, they supposedly consume all these new media simultaneously. Whether what is known as -œdigital socialization- will really lead to a fundamental shift in the development of cognitive skills may well be questioned, but the presentation, which included a performance of Wim Veens' son - one of those digital kids - was very entertaining.
Besides the scientific exchange during the sessions, the schedule provided quite a few opportunities for informal talks, e.g. during the conference dinner on a river cruise. The organizing committee of DIVERSE was very concerned about community building and took newcomers cordially into the fold.
Next year's DIVERSE conference will be hosted at Glasgow's Caledonian University.
