TIER-ED Leveraging Campus-Wide Strengths for Educational Technology Innovation

CHAMPAIGN, Ill., Dec. 17, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Based in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the TIER-ED community is poised to find education solutions through innovative uses of technology.

Technology Innovation in Educational Research and Design (TIER-ED) brings together experts in various disciplines from within the College and around campus who work with a variety of technologies—augmented reality, virtual reality, data analytics, multitouch and other interfaces, and online learning platforms—to enhance their uses as technological tools in classrooms, museums, and other educational settings. Robb Lindgren, an associate professor in Curriculum & Instruction at the College of Education, is director of TIER-ED.

"TIER-ED supports new research that would effectively use the digital media platforms that are becoming available to us to solve big pressing issues in education," Lindgren says. "Through TIER-ED, we will be creating new tools and new designs that we can scale up and have an impact on the state first and foremost, but also nationally and internationally."

This fall, the College added three new faculty members—each with different interests within educational technology research and development—to its TIER-ED ranks: Drs. Nathan Castillo, Cynthia D'Angelo, and Michael Tissenbaum.

"Innovating in the space of educational technology is something that Illinois is accustomed to," Lindgren says. "But we needed a burst of momentum to keep that going into the future."

Creating more equitable and accessible educational experiences for diverse learners is a major thrust of TIER-ED. From better-using mobile devices to cultivate literate practices, to building gesture-recognition systems that help people understand challenging science and math concepts, TIER-ED provides opportunities to build effective and practical tools that educators can use to open new worlds to students.

Large-scale interdisciplinary research is another core component of TIER-ED, Lindgren says, and he emphasizes that such research is not new to the University of Illinois. Working with investigators in the campus' existing interdisciplinary research powerhouses, like the College of Engineering and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, TIER-ED provides the necessary infrastructure to develop wide-ranging educational technology solutions.

"Often, such interdisciplinary initiatives are serendipitous. With a bit more attention to those possibilities, TIER-ED will attract people in different disciplines to collaborate. And those collaborations will happen more frequently and with more power," he says.

Lindgren foresees TIER-ED growing far beyond its three years of secured funding. "Our initial proposal was based on a 10-year vision," he says. "With the injection of new talent and new resources, we aim to generate revenues through grants and student tuition that can fuel TIER-ED well beyond 10 years."

View the TIER-ED video to learn more. Visit tier-ed.education.illinois.edu for more details and follow TIER-ED on Twitter @TierEdIllinois for the latest updates.

About the College of Education within the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Founded in 1905, the College of Education is one of the nation's first land-grant schools of education, revered for its groundbreaking research, preparation of educator-leaders, and worldwide impact. U.S. News and World Report consistently ranks the College and its programs among the world's best. Home of the late Dr. Samuel Kirk, the "father of special education," and now more than 70 tenure-track faculty and over 2,000 undergraduate, graduate, doctoral, and online students—Great Minds Think Illinois.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, founded in 1867, has a total enrollment of over 47,000 students from all 50 states and more than 100 countries. The University of Illinois pioneers innovative research—like inventing the MRI, designing the first graphical web browser, and defining the modern tree of life—to tackle grand challenges and expand the human experience. With interdisciplinary hubs of discovery including the National Center for Supercomputing Applications and the largest public university library in the nation, our transformative learning experiences are designed to produce alumni who desire to make a significant societal impact.

Contact

Gina Manola, Director of Marketing and Communications, College of Education
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
217-300-5939
[email protected]

Related Images

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Food for Thought app helps kids understand the environmental impact of food choices
Students drag food choices to their plates to investigate how much water and carbon goes into the production, as well as the calories and cost per serving for each food. The Food for Thought app was created by College of Education, Curriculum & Instruction scholar Emma Mercier, who is part of the TIER-ED community at Illinois.

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Ed Tech in the Classroom: Exploring Virtual Reality
Students explore VR and AR in Robb Lindgren's class. Lindgren is an Associate Professor in the department of Curriculum & Instruction and the Director of TIER-ED.

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Robb Lindgren, TIER-ED Director
"It was apparent as soon as I started that it was in the DNA of this University to take on big challenges and to do so in interdisciplinary fashion, particularly in the area of new technology development."

SOURCE College of Education, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign