Butler County Community College Launches New Video and Content Management Platform to Make Learning More Flexible and Engaging for Students

BUTLER, Pa., May 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Butler County Community College (BC3), a community college that offers two-year degrees and short-term certificates to Western Pennsylvania students, recently announced the roll out of a new video management and active learning platform designed to create a more student-centric learning experience that extends far beyond the pandemic. Using the fully accessible Echo360 video platform, students are now be able to actively engage with instructor-recorded lectures and presentations with embedded polling and note-taking features, and more easily collaborate with faculty and peers at any time through online discussions linked directly to relevant course materials.  

"Thanks to the hard work of our faculty and students, our community was able to quickly transition to remote instruction and continue teaching and learning in the midst of a global pandemic. This was an important accomplishment that we must continue to build on to provide our current and future students with the best possible learning experience whether they are learning online or in-person," said Ann McCandless, Dean of Educational Technology at Butler County Community College. "With Echo360, we can allow students to more easily access and engage with our existing library of video content while providing faculty with simple to use tools to create new and innovative instructional materials and in turn provide the best possible instruction for their students."

With the Echo360 platform, BC3 faculty can easily stream and record lectures and other learning content using a single application, regardless of whether they are at home or on campus, or whether they use a Windows or Mac device. Faculty can use these tools designed specifically for higher education to seamlessly teach across in-person, remote, hybrid, and online learning formats. When participating in class and watching recorded learning content, students can use the Echo360 platform's active learning tools to take notes that are automatically time-synched to the lecture, discuss course content with their peers, and gauge their comprehension by responding to quizzes and polls from instructors.

In addition to creating new video learning content, BC3 faculty can use the platform to manage, organize, and share their existing video content and provide students with seamless, 24/7 access to their courses' video content via their computer or mobile device. The platform's analytics features enable faculty to then analyze student engagement with the course material and identify students that may be struggling and at risk of falling behind.

"Across the country, higher education faculty and students rose to meet the challenges created by COVID-19. New approaches were created that combine technology's strengths with the unique benefits of the classroom experience. Successful institutions will continue to adopt these new models and put what they have learned over the past year into practice -- even as higher education enters its new normal," said Fred Singer, CEO of Echo360. "BC3 is doing exactly that and will provide an important model for how community colleges can create a better future for their students and faculty, and not just return to the normal of the past."

The Echo360 platform is now available to all BC3 students, administrators, and faculty.

About Butler County Community College: Butler County Community College has been ranked as the No. 1 community college in Pennsylvania five times since 2015, most recently for 2020 by BestColleges.com. BC3 offers 56 career and transfer programs, and 22 certificate and workplace certificate programs. In addition to its main campus in Butler Township, Butler County, BC3 has additional locations in Armstrong, Butler, Jefferson, Lawrence and Mercer counties. Visit bc3.edu

About Echo360: Echo360 believes that improved outcomes start with great moments in the classroom. Developed by educators, Echo360 helps instructors record and extend those moments to improve learner engagement through accessible, engaging video-based learning. Through our smarter video platform, learners and instructors have 24/7 access to discussion of course material, presentation materials, and the lecture itself. We generate data that helps instructors, higher education institutions, and continuing education organizations proactively identify and pursue opportunities to improve learning outcomes. Today, Echo360 technologies reach more than two million learners at approximately 1,200 schools and organizations across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia Pacific.

SOURCE Echo360