TECHNOLOGY REIGNS IN PROTOTYPE CLASS

The future of education is taking shape today in a high-tech, computerized classroom in the basement of Southeast Missouri State University's Kent Library.

This isn't your typical classroom. Everything about it is different, from its sleek, charcoal gray desks outfitted with computers to its state-of-the-art, ceiling mounted, color projector.

"It is a really neat room," said Dr. Ken Dobbins, Southeast's executive vice president.

Dobbins said the instructional lab is one of the best equipped anywhere. "This definitely puts us ahead of other institutions in the state of Missouri."

The newly completed lab, costing $75,000 to $100,000, brings computer technology into the classroom.

It will be used for computer training for faculty, staff and students, library instruction, academic classes on an appointment basis, university telemarketing efforts to recruit students, and future telephone fund-raising efforts by the Southeast Missouri State University Foundation.

It also will be used as an open computer lab for students after 9 p.m. daily. The room has its own external doors, allowing students to use it after Kent Library closes at night.

School officials designed the lab after touring a computer facility at the University of Notre Dame and studying computer operations at other schools.

Southeast's lab is a prototype for classrooms in the new business building now under construction and for technology upgrades in other campus buildings.

The business building, Robert A. Dempster Hall, will have at least four such rooms, with up to 45 work stations, and an open computer lab with 55 work stations for students.

Dobbins said the opening of the Kent lab will allow College of Business faculty to familiarize themselves with the new technology before the business building opens.

The room features 28 personal computers, one at each desk.

Two of the desks sit up higher to accommodate students in wheelchairs. The computer screen can be magnified for visually impaired students.

The front of the room has $15,000 worth of high-tech equipment for the instructor, everything from a computer with CD-Rom to a video visualizer. The device allows documents, photographs, slides and three-dimensional objects to be displayed on the 120-inch screen that descends from the ceiling.

Other equipment allows the instructor to show everything from video tapes and satellite feeds to computer copy and graphics on the large screen.

An instructor can call up information or graphics on the Internet and the World Wide Web. What the instructor sees on his computer monitor can be projected onto the big screen.

The lab has a wireless "mouse" that serves as a remote control, allowing the instructor freedom to move about the room and still operate the computer.

The room has a customized sound system.

Regina Smart, a computer specialist at Southeast, helped set up the lab.

Demonstrating the new lab last week, Smart called up Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 on a computer CD that lets her choose which parts of the symphony to play.

Smart also clicked onto the university's computer "home page," which displays basic information about Southeast, including a map of the campus and photographs of various campus buildings.

"It's pretty nice," Smart said.