The number of UCSD classes with podcasts has swollen to 15 this quarter from the initial podcast offered last fall in a pilot program.
About half of chemistry professor Carl Hoeger’s students use podcasts, with 22 percent listening to the whole recording, according to the results of a survey he administered to his class.
While Academic Computing Services has been recording classes at the request of professors since 2000, the popularity of podcasts, along with the lower cost associated with recording and making the audio available online, has allowed the department to offer the recordings to the public for free, according to Computer Resource Manager Don Olliff.
Anybody can download or stream lectures from the podcast Web site, which is maintained by ACS, and most recordings are available a few hours after the lecture is completed.
There are 23 lecture halls currently podcast-ready. ACS e-mails professors with classes in those rooms a few weeks prior to the beginning of the quarter with invitations to offer podcasts of lectures.
Despite its limited offerings, the podcast Web site had 150,000 hits and 100 GB downloaded in the first two weeks of spring quarter.
The professors involved have generally been pleased with the program’s ease.
“”Unless there are difficulties that I don’t know about, the process has been completely and entirely invisible to me,”” associate professor of psychology Victor Ferriera said in an e-mail. “”I logged on to the podcast.ucsd.edu and listened to a part of a couple of lectures, and they seemed to play just fine. Seriously, all I do is turn the wireless mic on at the beginning of lecture and turn it off at the end. It’s a brilliant service.””
Some professors have voiced concerns about the accessibility of the podcasts, but generally agree that the benefits outweigh their concerns.
“”I think it might be good to at least have the option to integrate the podcasts with WebCT or something like that,”” associate professor of psychology Eric Bakovic said in an e-mail. “”It feels just a little odd to have a semi-permanent record of my lectures available for all to hear; if they were only accessible to students enrolled in the class with WebCT access, that would mitigate that feeling a little.””
Mary Boyle, a lecturer in the cognitive science department who teaches two classes in podcast-capable lecture halls, also has mixed feelings.
“”It would add an element of self-consciousness that would inhibit my performance,”” Boyle said. “”I think it would it would be a great resource for students, so I am for it in that aspect, but I am also concerned about the possibility of [it] changing the classroom dynamic.””
According to ACS, student attendance in podcast-equipped classrooms has only dropped slightly, while test and quiz grades have gone up. Similarly, students say that podcasts do not stop them from attending class.
“”I have to admit that it is very tempting to skip class because I know that I can just listen to the podcasts,”” Earl Warren College freshman Agnes Kwon said in an e-mail. “”However, I know that Professor [Carl] Hoeger writes notes on the board, and it’s hard to accurately visualize what he is writing on the board. It’s nice to know that if I do miss class, though, that I can rely on the podcasts. This doesn’t mean that I will intentionally miss class.””
Hoeger, a chemistry professor, has used the podcasts through both winter and spring quarters and has surveyed his spring quarter CHEM 6B and 6C classes on their use of his podcasts.
According to his data, about 49 percent of the 500 students polled have neither downloaded nor listened to any of the podcasts.
Twenty-two percent of the students listen to all of them in part or in full, 10 percent of the students listen to two-thirds of the podcasts in part or in full, another 10 percent listen to one-third in part or in full and the remaining students have downloaded podcasts but have not listened to them.
Hoeger said he believes the number of students listening to his podcasts will rise as midterms approach.
The students who answered that they do not use the podcasts overwhelmingly cited their class attendance and understanding of the material as their reason for not using the podcasts.
Other reasons included a lack of time and the need to see what is being written on the board during lecture.
Those who do use the podcasts said they have found them helpful in making sure they have not missed any material discussed in class.
“”I listen to the podcast the day after the lecture, so that I force myself to go over the material again,”” Kwon said. “”So, basically, when I listen to the podcast and copy the notes over again, I’m studying and making sure I have written down every important thing that Professor Hoeger has said. It’s hard to write everything that is said in a lecture at that time.””
