Collaboration, Contributed by Organizations or Campuses, and Effective Practices

Many small, undergraduate colleges aspire to similar curricular goals yet lack opportunities to share resources in ways that could help them meet these common goals. These campuses go it alone by choice or for lack of information about others' solutions to their common challenges. Consortia have made progress in sharing administrative services; curricular collaboration is much more difficult in a context where faculty members work independently and are evaluated as individuals. Curricular wheels are reinvented when faculty on neighboring campuses develop similar course materials. Less commonly taught languages remain out of the reach of many small campuses. Students compromise on electives when faculty members take sabbatical leaves. Opportunities to enhance learning are often missed.

On the other hand, technologies that facilitate communication and collaboration, many of which are basic and reliable, allow our faculties to work more closely on curricular projects to the benefit of our students.

New technologies have always challenged the way we consume art. The merging of enhanced technologies with live interactive performance is particularly exciting and challenging for theater artists. With the technologies available today, the question of how we can collaborate artistically with distant artists, without the expense of travel, can be addressed.