Monash University

Students Connect Campuses

Source: http://www.monash.edu.au/news/monashmemo/stories/20051116/coolcampus.html

16 November 2005

Malaysian arts student Ms We Lin Chen has won the Coolcampus Monash Mobility Competition for her design of the campus of the future.

Students from the faculties of Arts, IT, Business and Economics and Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences entered the competition that encouraged students to design a university campus, taking into account future technology and staff and student needs.

Ms Chen's design used wireless technology to connect all campuses, enabling students to enrol in subjects at any of the university's campuses and to take part in online discussions. Her artwork depicted a university where geographic boundaries were no longer an obstacle to viable communication.

Mr John Page, from the Faculty of Information Technology at the Caulfield campus, won second prize while Saguna, also from the IT faculty at Caulfield, and Mr Saburo Okita, from the Malaysia campus, received consolation prizes.



CoolCampus competition finalists, from left, Saguna, and Ms We Lin Chen and Mr Saburo Okita on screen.


The winners were announced at the CoolCampus Monash Mobility Workshop last month at the Clayton campus.

The CoolCampus project aims to connect the university's existing "pervasive computing" research activities and to generate opportunities for its researchers to collaborate with and engage university and industry partners. Pervasive computing research investigates the technical and social challenges of creating computerised environments that will recede into the background of people's everyday lives.

The CoolCampus workshop brought together researchers, developers and users from Monash as well as invited guests from around the world who joined the workshop online using the interactive technology, Marratech.

It aimed to consider the use of mobile technologies to improve connectivity for students and staff anywhere, anytime and with any technology.

The Pro Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for Campus Coordination, Professor Phillip Steele, said one of the challenges of a multi-campus, international university such as Monash was making the university operate as a single entity.

"Technology such as that being discussed at this workshop can play an important role in reaching that aim," he said.

"In many respects we are still learning how we interact effectively across campuses. This workshop is helping us consider the way forward."

For information on CoolCampus go to the CoolCampus website.