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Nano-World

The Virtual Nanoscience Laboratory

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Hans-Joachim Güntherodt
Hans-Joachim.Guentherodt@unibas.ch
Institut für Physik
Universität Basel
Klingelbergstr. 82
4056 Basel

Project Coordinator

Dr. Martin Guggisberg
Martin.Guggisberg@unibas.ch
Universität Basel
Basel

Dr. Tibor Gyalog
Tibor.Gyalog@unibas.ch
Universität Basel
Basel

Project Partners

Summary

The project Virtual Nanoscience Laboratory plans the realization of a virtual nanoscience laboratory consisiting of three virtual experiments to give an insight into the methods of nanophysics and nanotechnology to undergraduate students of different disciplines. The virtual experiments are presented within the scope of a co-operative learning environment.

In recent years nanometer-scale science and technology has gained a lot of interest among researchers and the public. Boosted by the development of scanning probe methods by Nobel laureates Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer at the IBM Zurich Research Laboratory in Rüschlikon, it has become an active field of research and technology. The fascination of investigating, and manipulating, matter in very small dimensions has attracted a large number of research groups, and pictures showing how matter is built up from atoms and molecules regularly make it to the broadcast and printed news. The prospect of nanotechnology is extremely bright, since it promises higher integration, increased functionality, lower-cost and better environmental compatibility of future processes and devices. Numerous applications are already visible.

Science on the nanometer scale naturally touches on conventional disciplines such as physics, biology, and chemistry. Therefore, training in this new field is not only highly important for the relevance of the field for the merging technologies, but it is also very demanding for its high level of interdisciplinarity. Future nanotechnologists will have received training in solid-state physics, molecular chemistry, analytical chemistry, and engineering. The University of Basel, such as many other institutions of higher education in Switzerland, does not yet account for these new needs. The present proposal intends to make a contribution in this respect by offering virtual university-level experiments of nanoscale science and technology.

Studies on learning behavior show that small teams reach higher training efficiency than large groups or individuals. The reason for that is the importance of discussing individual approaches in order to find solutions, and thus to develop new strategies. Therefore the proposed virtual laboratory is a interactive lab ("Praktikum") with experiments from state-of-the-art nanoscience. A cooperative learning environment supports the work in small teams.

Latinum electronicum

A web-based Latin course for beginners

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Rudolf Wachter
Rudolf.Wachter@unibas.ch
Seminar für Klassische Philologie
Universität Basel
Nadelberg 6-8
4051 Basel

Project Coordinator

Irene Burch
Irene.Burch@unibas.ch
Latinum electronicum
Universität Basel
Bernoullistrasse 28
4056 Basel

Project Partners

Summary

The project aims at creating a program in order to teach basic Latin to university beginners. The program should supplement and finally replace the basic phase of the Latin courses taught both at Basel and at other universities in order to fulfill the Latin requirement of the Humanities Faculties. This means: (a) as to content, the program users will achieve basic translation competency; (b) as to didactics, the program is interactive and allows monitoring of the student by the teacher and feedbacks from the student to the teacher; it will be supplemented by tutoring groups; (c) as to accessibility, the program should be accessible on the Internet or Intranet; (d) as to users, it will be usable by all three language groups in Switzerland (this should result in additional marketing possibilities outside Switzerland).

In order to achieve these aims, the project consists of four different workgroups: (1) a programming workgroup which brings together communication and programming specialists from the University of Basel (Prof. Lusti) and from the Facoltà di Scienze della Comunicazione in Lugano; (2) a German language workgroup which brings together specialists for Latin teaching from the Universities of Basel (Prof. Wachter) and Zürich (Prof. Fuhrer); (3) a French language workgroup which is located at the University of Neuchatel (Prof. Aubert); (4) an Italian language workgroup which is located at the Facoltà di Scienze della Comunicazione in Lugano (Prof. Rigotti). These groups will work in close intercommunication with each other and with the project group; the leading house will be the Basel Seminar für Klassische Philologie (Prof. Wachter). Furthermore, in order to regularly evaluate the work of the project teams, there will be an advisory board in which members of all the seven Swiss Institues for Classical Philology will participate.

The project will present its final product after two years. Once established, the program will significantly help to avoid additional costs for basic Latin instruction at Unversity level. There is a double motivation for putting a Latin course on the net, a financial/political one due to the lack of Latin at maturity level and a scientific one.

General chemistry

General Chemistry for students enrolled in a life science curriculum

Project Leader

Prof. Jean-Claude Bünzli
jean-claude.bunzli@epfl.ch
Section de chimie
Université de Lausanne
BCH 1402
1015 Lausanne

Project Coordinator

Emmanuel Fernandes
Emmanuel.Fernandes@centef.unil.ch
Université de Lausanne
Lausanne

Project Partners

Summary

The goal of this 3-year project is to establish a modular and interactive Internet web site for the teaching of general chemistry to freshmen students enrolled in a life sciences university program (medicine, biology, possibly pharmacy and pedagogical studies). Students should become familiar with the basic chemistry concepts needed to understand important life processes and the whereabouts in day-to-day usage of chemical technology.

The idea behind the project, supported initially by four universities (Geneva, Lausanne, Neuchâtel, Fribourg), is to offer a flexible tool to students who have followed very different secondary education programs, some of them not having taken any science course yet. The project aims therefore at optimising their basic science training during the first year of higher education. A system of on-line exercises and tests will help the students to assess their actual understanding of the matter. Video films of live experiments and computer simulations will illustrate the main principles and phenomena described in the teaching program.

The site will offer bilingual teaching (French, German) and is intended to serve 1200-1300 students from the supporting universities. However, efforts will rapidly be devoted to enlarge the number of participating universities and to translate the modules into English (and , possibly Italian), in order to make this teaching site available to all the students enrolled in a Swiss university and, also, to international students. Finally, links will be made with similar programs aimed at more advanced students ("vertical teaching") and also with modules containing prerequisites in mathematics and physics.

BOMS

Basics of Medical Statistics

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Ursula Ackermann-Liebrich
ursula.ackermann-liebrich@unibas.ch
Institut für Sozial- u. Präventivmedizin
Universität Basel
Steinengraben 49
4051 Basel

Project Coordinator

Dr. Christian Schindler
christian.schindler@unibas.ch
Universität Basel
Basel

Project Partners

Summary

Medical students should learn how to form evidence-based judgments in concrete problem situations. This requires the ability of understanding scientific publications and of judging the significance and limitations of their results. For this purpose, medical students must acquire a fundamental knowledge of statistics. Moreover, in their practical research work, they need to be able to apply basic statistical techniques.

Recent restructurations of the medical curriculum at the Swiss medical schools have integrated problem-based learning in nearly every medical discipline. In Basel and elsewhere, it is also planned to introduce a more practically oriented training of statistics. However, given the existing limitations in infrastructural and human resources and the large number of students, only traditional lectures are feasible when trying to address all students of an annual course. On average, 130 to 250 medical students per university are registered for a given annual course. Practical training sessions require an amount of infrastructure that cannot be easily provided for such numbers of students when practical skills are expected to be taught using computer-based methods. By using web-based technologies, exercise and training sessions will become independent of location and time schedule. A web-based training module can complement the traditional lectures and replace practical training sessions. Moreover, interactive simulations and problem-based exercises will increase the attractiveness and the effect of a training program in medical statistics. Basic understanding and practical skills can be directly tested. Most universities have started to award credit points for the assessment of the students' learning success. This will also be the case for medical statistics. The technology of web-based training software packages allows the automatic individual assessment of every student's performance in the statistics exercises. Therefore the applicants of the present project intend to develop a problem based interactive training program in medical statistics for all Swiss medical students which uses web-based technologies and offers two languages.

DOIT

Dermatology online with interactive technology

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Günter Burg
burg@derm.unizh.ch
Dermatologische Klinik
Universitätsspital Zürich
Gloriastrasse 31
8091 Zürich

Project Coordinator

Dr. Roger Kropf
roger.kropf@usz.ch
Dermatologische Klinik
Universitätsspital Zürich
8091 Zürich

Project Partners

Summary

In the field of medicine Dermatology is an ideal speciality to develop multimedial teaching concepts, because the skin as an organ is readily accessible and visual aspects are very important.

The CyberDerm DOIT project is a program for dermatological training of medical students as well as of postgraduates. It consists of three modules:

1. CyberLecture; a virtual lecture text and atlas, accessible via the internet
2. CyberTrainer; an interactive training unit (virtual dermatology clinic). This is a computer program with exercises on diagnoses, diagnostic procedures and therapy, both to be used offline and online via internet. The cases presented will be updated regularly.
3. CyberNet; an interactive teleconferencing system, which will be used for discussion of case-presentations (from part 2) in analogy to bedside teaching, but without the need for the patient to be present, and no need for the physical attendance of students and teachers.

The combined use of the three modules will provide the stage for problem-oriented learning for students and improve their skills in dermatology, for the benefit of dermatological patients.

Moreover the involvement of multiple centers and of specialists for didactic and informatics promote distribution of the program throughout the country and abroad to other german speaking countries.

French, Italian or English speaking versions of some parts of the program (especially patient modules) are planned in cooperation with the recently established European Confederation of Telemedical Organisations in Dermatology (EctoDerm).

SOMIT

Sport Organisation Management Interactive Teaching & Learning

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Jean-Loup Chappelet
jean-loup.chappelet@idheap.unil.ch
IDHEAP
Université de Lausanne
Route de la Maladière 21
1022 Chavannes

Project Coordinator

Dr. Nathalie Suisse Baenziger
Nathalie.SuisseBanziger@idheap.unil.ch
IDEHAP
Université de Lausanne
Chavannes

Project Partners

Summary

Ce projet consiste à créer un enseignement à distance interactif en management des organisations sportives, un sujet pour lequel il existe une forte demande dans les hautes écoles suisses et étrangères, notamment dans les facultés de sciences économiques, de sciences sociales et les instituts de sciences du sport. Cet enseignement en français, allemand et anglais nécessitera un développement sur trois ans. Il s'appuiera sur un matériel didactique interactif disponible via l'internet (plateforme WebCT) et sur une pédagogie faisant appel à la résolution de problèmes par les étudiants. Le projet SOMIT réunit à cet effet les deux seuls instituts suisses enseignant de façon traditionnelle le sujet retenu à un niveau postgrade (IDHEAP et VMI), ainsi que des partenaires habitués à travailler ensemble sur des projets d'enseignement à distance (HEC-INFORGE et IDHEAP), ainsi que des partenaires tant publics (HEC, CDISS, EFSM) que privés (Swiss Olympic) représentant une majorité des utilisateurs potentiels.
Un chapitre en démonstration est disponible sur le site du projet http://www.somit.ch (user name et password: somit).

e-Ducation in environmental management

Project Leader

Dr. Hanspeter Graf
hanspeter.graf@hta-bi.bfh.ch
NDS Umwelt
Hochschule für Technik und Architektur
Seevorstadt 99
2501 Biel

Project Coordinator

Dr. Hanspeter Graf
hanspeter.graf@hta-bi.bfh.ch
NDS Umwelt
Hochschule für Technik und Architektur
Seevorstadt 99
2501 Biel

Project Partners

Summary

The need for additional education in environmental management systems to improve sustainable development in all kinds of organizations is given taking into account that less than 10% of the potential users of such systems have it already. The potential users of such a formation are already in business and are interested to spend as less time as possible away from their working place. It is therefore desirable to offer it in form of webbased courses. But also students in higher semesters are more and more interested to learn new topics by doing it in a playful way and over the internet.

The project wants to combine these different aspects by creating a webbased course in environmental management. It will be based on a model (virtual) company where the system can be implemented from the students by themselves after a face to face introduction. After entering it into force the system can be tested with several simulations - incidents, client complaints, stakeholder complaints, environmental reports, ...- where the students can be active as environmentalist of the organization.

It is planned that the model company will be created on the web within the first 8 months of the total project duration of 1 year with extended graphic enhancement. After an extensive test a pilot course will be held, which will show if this kind of a webbased training is suitable for introducing environmental management systems on a broad base and if and how the idea of a model company can be improved. The project is done in close cooperation with different schools (Universities of applied sciences of Biel, Winterthur and Sion, University of St. Gallen, ETHZ, University of Economy Lucerne) and interdisciplinary through scientific, technical, economic, informatics and artistic oriented people. A broad support of the course and the model company is ensured because the different schools involved already offer courses in this direction and are interested to test new education tools also for other students in the appropriate schools. The total costs are estimated to be around Fr. 475'000.- where of the amount of Fr. 188'500 will be asked to be funded by Swiss Virtual Campus.

Corporate Finance

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Rudolf Volkart
volkartr@isb.unizh.ch
Swiss Banking Institute
Universität Zürich
Plattenstrasse 14
8032 Zürich

Project Coordinator

Dr. Peter Lautenschlager
lautensc@isb.unizh.ch
Universität Zürich
Zürich

Project Partners

Summary

Our project "Virtual Campus 'Corporate Finance'" shall generate a number of Internet applications allowing virtual studies in Corporate Finance (CF). The product design will offer a comprehensive framework of CF at an undergraduate (Framework U) and graduate level (Framework G). Framework U is entirely Internet based, without any need for further materials (books, etc.). This framework aims at undergraduate level (Universities) and at diploma level (Universities of Applied Sciences). The project concept will be capable of adjusting to the respective educational interests of the different participants. The aim of the partners is to replace the traditional lectures / classes environment with a virtual one.

Furthermore, our project shall deliver Framework G for advanced, graduate purposes. This framework will combine traditional and new media to pass on subject matters and extend the students' knowledge. To link modules U and G in the best way possible, the structures of the two modules will be designed along the new book "Corporate Finance". This book will be published in autumn 2000 by the Swiss Banking Institute and represents an advanced text in Corporate Finance both in terms of content and didactics.

The project deliberately encourages the simultaneous use of traditional and new media to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the virtual learning environment "Corporate Finance". Thus, the frameworks will offer problem presentations, video clips illustrating important topics, examples, finance quizzes and test modules allowing to receive university accepted credit points on both, undergraduate and graduate level.

Given the multilingual state of the project partners, it is planned to develop the two frameworks U and G in three languages. The development of a German version has priority, but the English and French versions will soon follow.

Dealing with natural hazards

Network for educating and teaching in the inter- and transdisciplinary field of natural hazards and extension service

Project Leader

Dr. Walter J. Ammann
ammann@slf.ch
Eidg. Institut für Schnee- und Lawinenforschung
Flüelastrasse 11
7260 Davos

Project Coordinator

Nicole Bischof
bischof@slf.ch
Eidg. Institut für Schnee- und Lawinenforschung
Davos

Project Partners

Summary

Our intensively settled human environment intersects more and more significantly with the world of hazardous natural processes. Because of the complexity of such processes and impacts, dealing with the risks demands a broad education in many sub-domains of the earth sciences and the socio-economic field. Inter- and trans-disciplinary training and education of professionals is therefore essential.

The main goal of this Virtual Campus (VC) project "Dealing with natural hazards" is to provide a common educational and course program that makes available to a large number of students the cross-disciplinary basics of dealing with natural hazards, including technical, environmental and social aspects. The Virtual Campus will encourage increased exchanges between researchers who are often very widely separated from each other geographically.

Courses in the field of natural hazards and risk management are divided into many sub-disciplines in Switzerland. The relevant institutes of the universities and the ETH-domain therefore research and teach in a very sectoral way.

Although the analysis and assessment of individual hazardous natural processes demand sectoral knowledge, a comprehensive overview of risks and the vulnerability of systems is also essential. This comprehensive approach will be significantly enhanced by the Virtual Campus project. In particular, it will enable teachers and students to discuss this increasingly important field of dealing with natural hazards in an interdisciplinary fashion and to fill gaps in knowledge in a cost-effective way through networking. The results of current research work will flow directly into the teaching of the course through the virtual platform and thus will rapidly become available to a large community of users.

The course content has been distributed over 5 Modules: 1 Basic Knowledge and Tools, 2 Hydrological / Meteorological Hazards, 3 Geological Hazards, 4 Vulnerability of Property and of Socio-economic Systems, 5 Integral Natural Risk Management. The VC courses also serve as preparation for the very important joint exercises of field work.

The Virtual Campus "Dealing with Natural Hazards" is being developed primarily in English so that it is available for all our language regions (which are represented in our network of partners). At a later phase this will also make the Virtual Campus accessible internationally.

The project of a Virtual Campus "Dealing with Natural Hazards" represents a worldwide first in the form proposed here, and is widely welcomed by our partners in other countries as are the pedagogic activities we already organize in a coordinated and interdisciplinary framework to deal with natural hazards.

Computers for Health

A Swiss Virtual Campus proposal of the five Swiss medical faculties for a Medical Informatics Course for medical and non-medical students

Project Leader

Dr. Bengt Kayser
bengt.kayser@medecine.unige.ch
Unité de développement et de recherche en éducation médicale
Université de Genève
1, rue Michel Servet
1225 Genève

Project Coordinator

Dr. Vanya Loroch
vanya.loroch@medecine.unige.ch
Unité de développement et de recherche en éducation médicale
Université de Genève Genève

Project Partners

Summary

Computers for Health is a nation-wide effort to develop, to co-ordinate and to teach the essential content and aspects of medical informatics to medical and other students using Web-based "Virtual Campus" technology. We are planning to build educational contents, not technology.

The content of the course will focus on aspects and skills which physicians and other medical professionals need while learning and practising medicine in the information era. These skills include:

• Basics of information and communication technology: databases, the Internet, problems of security and encryption and their related ethical and legal aspects (privacy, confidentiality, security)
• Information indexing and retrieval: nomenclatures (ICD, Tarmed, MeSH), information encoding, bibliographic searching, on-line resources, critique of the information available on the Internet
• Medical reasoning and expert systems: theories of medical reasoning and their computer-based applications, challenges for the construction and maintenance of knowledge bases, potential and limits of expert systems
• Clinical informatics: the electronic patient record, medical decision-support systems, hospital information systems
• Digital imaging: basics, PACS, non-radiological imaging
• Bio-statistics, the basics and use of statistics as pertaining to medical informatics specifically, and to the health sciences and the understanding statistics in the bio-medical literature in general

In line with the Swiss Virtual Campus framework, our project, initially geared toward pre-graduate medical training, has the ambition to become the stepping-stone towards a comprehensive modular system of pre- and post-graduate training in medical informatics. In this regard the active involvement in the project of the Swiss Society of Medical Informatics is to be pointed out specifically.

Financial Markets

Modern Portfolio Theory and Derivatives

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Heinz Zimmermann
Heinz.Zimmermann@unibas.ch
Wirtschaftswissenschaftliches Zentrum, Abteilung Finanzmarkttheorie
Universität Basel
Holbeinstr. 12
4051 Basel

Project Coordinator

Dr. Jacqueline Henn
Jacqueline.Henn@unibas.ch
Wirtschaftswissenschaftliches Zentrum, Abteilung Finanzmarkttheorie
Universität Basel

Project Partners

Summary

The objective of the project Virtual Campus Module Financial Markets is to develop a self-contained Internet-based distance learning course introducing the fundamental concepts of Financial Markets: The primary focus is on Modern Portfolio Theory, Asset Allocation, Fixed Income Management and Derivatives.

The course is aimed to be an introductory course for students specializing in Finance. At the same time the course can also be used to give a general overview of Financial Markets for students with other specialization. The complete course will be the equivalent of a traditional course covering two semesters with two hours of lectures per week. The course will be structured into topical units to permit individual sequencing of topics, as well as to permit the combination of individual units for a shorter introductory course focussing on selected topics only. The course can be used to replace traditionally taught courses or to augment such courses, allowing class-time to be used for discussions. The course is designed to be taught purely with the help of a tutor who will only be accessible by electronic means.

The market for potential students taking this course or significant parts thereof is at present estimated at over 300 each year in Switzerland alone. Additionally, the course can also be used by the approximately 400 students learning towards Swiss national degrees in portfolio management or financial planning, or towards certain MBA courses. Although the latter is not the primary focus of the Financial Markets course, it could be a source for funding future enhancements and maintenance.

At present there is a shortage of highly qualified teachers to cover the high demand in training in the area of Financial Markets in Switzerland and worldwide. The Virtual Campus Module "Financial Markets" will help significantly to alleviate this problem.

Course language will be English in order to make the course available for a maximum number of students within and outside of Switzerland. The course will run on a standard Distance Learning platform. Care will be given to make the course platform independent to allow widespread implementation and to protect development investments.

The project is managed under the auspice of experienced academics. The project leader is Professor Dr. Heinz Zimmermann, an expert in financial sciences. Additionally Professor Dr. Rajna Gibson and Professor Dr. Jean-Pierre Danthine are responsible on the content side and will assist in the implementation of the course at the universities of Zurich and Lausanne respectively. Futhermore the cooperation of Professor Martin Gruber, one of the world`s leading experts in Financial Markets, and Prof. Norman White, Professor for Information Technology, both from New York University, has been secured to expand the pool of experience brought to the project.

The course will be developed over a period of 2 years and will be tested in an existing class. It is intended that within 6 months two pilot units Capital Markets and Modern Portfolio Theory will be developed and will subsequently undergo a pilot test.

POLE

Project Oriented Learning Environment

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Christoph Holliger
ch.holliger@fh-aargau.ch
Fachhochschule Aargau
Steinackerstrasse 5
5210 Windisch

Project Coordinator

Prof. Dr. Christoph Holliger
ch.holliger@fh-aargau.ch
Fachhochschule Aargau
Steinackerstrasse 5
5210 Windisch

Project Partners

Summary

Die Vision des "Project Oriented Learning Environments" (POLE) entstand als Folge der wachsenden Ansprüche in dem heutigen, höchst komplexen, segmentierten und kompetetiven Baumarkt. Fachleute aus den Bereichen der Architektur, des Bauingenieurwesens und des Baumangements fordern eine breitere Ausbildung und erweiterte Kompetenzen der Ingenieurstudenten und -studentinnen. Die vorgeschlagene Lernumgebung POLE und die mit ihr verbundene Methodik ermöglicht es den Studierenden, ihr erworbenes theoretisches Wissen anhand von Fragestellungen aus der Praxis anzuwenden und zu üben. Durch die Zusammenarbeit in interdisziplinären Teams sollen die Studierenden die Beziehungen und Rollen der unterschiedlichen am Bauprozess beteiligten Fachbereiche in ihren sozialen, ökonomischen und politischen Dimensionen verstehen lernen. In der neuen Lernumgebung erwerben sie sich Kenntnisse im Umgang mit modernsten Computerhilfsmitteln zur Unterstützung der Kommunikation und der Zusammenarbeit.

POLE verbindet die akademische Ausbildung mit der beruflichen Praxis durch den Einbezug von Fachleuten als Mentoren in der Ausbildung. Diese können direkt von ihrem Arbeitplatz aus mit den Studenten kommunizieren. POLE wird nicht nur das Lehren und Lernen an den Universitäten grundlegend verändern sondern auch einen grossen Einfluss auf die Entscheidungsfindung und die Gestaltung der Arbeitabläufe in der Praxis haben.

Objective Earth

A planet to Discover. 1st year Earth Science Course

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Gérard M. Stampfli
Gerard.Stampfli@unil.ch
Institut de Géologie et Paléontologie
Université de Lausanne
UNIL-BFSH2
1015 Lausanne

Project Coordinator

Nicolas Kramar
nicolas.kramar@unil.ch
Université de Lausanne
Lausanne

Project Partners

Summary

This course is supported by the Coordination romande des Sciences de la Terre which links the Earth Sciences departments of the universities of Basel, Bern, Fribourg, Geneva, Lausanne and Neuchâtel, and by the Coordination romande de Géographie.

One of the major challenges for our world in the next millennium is the management of our environment. To face up to this task we have decided to develop a multilingual (French, German, English), interactive Earth Sciences course for first year university students in Geology, Geography, Biology, Civil and Rural Engineering. This course will also provide a continuing education for secondary school teachers.

The Earth Sciences are perfect subjects to teach through NICT - How better to explain Plate Tectonics than by showing an animation of the wandering continents? This course, based on new learning technologies, is designed to bring students in their first university cycle to the requisite academic standard and release time for more specific and advanced teaching in the curriculum.

The audience is estimated at 700 students (universities, HEP) and teachers who will participate in the course every year.

This course will contain sections with courses, with bibliography, exercises, corrected exercises and self-evaluation test-modules. A course using the NIT is sympathetic to individual learning rhythms. Actually, the student is no longer constrained by a rigid lecture timetable, but rather can take the time needed to build his own knowledge.

As an integral part of a university program, this course corresponds to 8 to 10 ECTS credits. It will replace a large part of the traditional frontal teaching of the first academic cycle.

The project will last 36 months including extensive field tests of 12 months. The success of the project is guaranteed by the full time appointment of the co-ordinator, by the disposal of a sabbatical semester of the project leader and a trimester of another professor of the same university, and by the commitment of the partner-professors from all the Swiss Universities.

European Law Online

Project Leader

Prof. Samantha Besson
samantha.besson@unifr.ch
Université de Fribourg
Département de droit international et droit commercial
1700 Fribourg

Prof. Pascal Pichonnaz
pascal.pichonnaz@unifr.ch
Université de Fribourg
Département de droit privé
1700 Fribourg

Project Coordinator

Project Partners

Summary

The European Law Online project aims at creating a multilingual - French, German, Italian and English - European Law course corresponding to 2 hours/week/year, using the internet.

The European Law Online project uses a modular structure (see õ 6): each field forms a module which may be followed separately; there are also three difficulty levels. Every module includes a video presentation, where the teacher sums up the unit's main topics, an interactive guide and the reading materials . The interactive guide specifies the documents and the exercises which belong to the module (see õ 7). The course is built on a distance learning integrated system such as WebCT (see õ 10).

The European Law Online project is supported by the following partners: the University of Fribourg (leading partner), the University of Bern, the University of Neuchâtel, the Università della Svizzera italiana (Lugano), as well as by the Fondation Jean Monnet pour l'Europe (Lausanne) and the Office for European Integration (Bern) as supportive (« business ») partner. The course will be recognised by the four universities and it will be integrated into their curriculum. the project will be extended to continuing education - through a close co-operation with private partners and professional organizations - and to international mobility - thanks to the Erasmus program and to the network of the Jean Monnet Chairs (hundreds of European Law departments throughout the world).

The project's execution requires three steps (see õ 18): the finalization of the concept (1st year), the production of the modules (2nd and 3rd year) and an evaluation under real conditions (3rd year). The finalization of the concept and the evaluation will be carried out by a project coordination, while the production of the modules will be divided between the four associated universities.

Embryology

A Web-Based Training in Medical Embryology

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Marco R. Celio
marco.celio@unifr.ch
Departement de medecine, division histologie
Université de Fribourg
Pérolles
1705 Fribourg

Project Coordinator

Dr. Manuèle Adé-Damilano (Co-Leader)
manuele.adedamilano@unifr.ch
Departement de medecine, division histologie
Université de Fribourg
Pérolles
1705 Fribourg

Project Partners

Summary

Institutes at three Swiss universities, one in each of the German- (Bern) and French- (Lausanne) speaking regions and the other in a boundary zone between the two cultures (Fribourg), will cooperate to produce a 52-hour web-based course in human embryology for medical students at the preclinical stage of their education (1st and 2nd years). This web-based training (WBT) for an estimated eight hundred to nine hundred students will improve the interaction between individuals and their teachers. WBT lends itself admirably to the teaching of embryology - which forms an important part of a medical doctor's education - in that it permits the display of movement and tridimensionality, both of which are necessary to understand the process of development.

The concept of active learning embraces the view that learning is more effective when students become actively engaged in the subject matter and take more responsibility in the learning process. We wish to achieve this goal by incorporating a variety of activities, including questions, case-studies and/or discussions panels. A systematic and practice approach will be adopted in the construction of each module. The student will be first presented with information, concepts and techniques, and at the end of each module will be tested on what has been taught. The student's individual needs and weaknesses will be assessed and satisfied by online feedback.

This WBT will be developed using web-authoring software, which will combine content development, user management, document retrieval and database administration. To ensure consistent and browser-independent delivery on either PCs or Macs, the programming languages will be Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), DHTML, Java and/or JavaScript.

Postgraduate Courses in a Hybrid Classroom using Mobile Communication

Project Leader

Dr. Lorenz Müller
mueller@eduswiss.ch
HTA Biel
Technologietransferstelle, Quellgasse 21
2501 Biel

Project Coordinator

Dipl.Ing.ETH Niklaus Degunda
niklaus.degunda@fhso.ch
Fachhochschule Solothurn Nordwestschweiz
Bittertenstrasse 15
4702 Oensingen

Project Partners

Summary

The aim of this project is to develop a hybrid course concept for the postgraduate continuing education of engineers and IT specialists. The proposed course pattern uses a combination of computer supported and conventional learning methods and integrates conceptual, explorative and constructive learning phases. A combination of self-controlled interactive learning, tele-tutoring and classroom teaching allows a highly scientific quality level and a time optimised, individually adaptable learning and training schedule minimises the duration of absence from work. The use of new mobile communication tools guarantees a more flexible and intensified exchange between tutors and students during the self-controlled learning phases. It not only enhances the learning efficiency but also helps to respect timing and geographical constraints of part time students.

Three sets of pilot course modules using the new concept will be held within the NDIT/FPIT (postgraduate education in informatics and telecommunications) and NDAT/FPAT (postgraduate education in automation) programs. The first course set covers a more theoretical and software oriented field (computer security), the second set treats more practical matters with integrated laboratory work (automation) and the third set covers topics of the IT technology (digital broadband telecommunication with and without packet switching), where virtual laboratory schemes (see also project Nr.990040) can be used. The courses cover a large range of content types for scientific, technical and logistic oriented education and thus they form a representative development and test environment for new forms of delivery and communication. To obtain a controlled development, evaluation and improvement cycle the courses will run two to three times each. In a final phase of the project the achieved overall results will be evaluated and integrated in a generalised realisation concept for hybrid courses with facilities for an intense remote communication among tutors and students. This practical knowledge will then be used at a large scale for the future generation of NDIT/FPIT Online courses.

The realisation of a hybrid course concept relies on several forms of computer mediated communication. During presence teaching we use an electronic classroom and optionally interactive tele-learning infrastructure for the delivery to remote sites. The interactive distance studies will be supported by mobile Web-browsers with full functionality and with adequate communication bandwidth (HSCSD protocol). This new mobile technical infrastructure will be provided by industrial partners. The development of these tools has been supported by the CTI project 4446.1.

Experiences from first pilot courses within the SPP classroom 2000 project have shown, that new learning technologies only improve the learning flexibility and efficiency if they are based on a stable, ergonomic and easy to use technical infrastructure. Students and tutors have to be motivated for the use of the new technologies. It is essential that they perceive an evident gain for the learning process other-wise the new services and tools are not used; the proposed project will take particular care of this point.

The project is embedded in the priority action programme on new learning technologies (net4net - network for new educational technologies) within the national competence network for telecommunication (KTI accreditation pending), which guarantees an intense knowledge exchange with other net4net projects. The project starts this spring and will be completed before mid of 2003. The total costs are 3.1 Mio-sfr and we apply for a Swiss Virtual Campus grant of 707 k-sfr. The predominant part of the costs is covered by the participating business partners, who provide leading edge mobile communication equipment.

Do it your soil

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Jean-Michel Gobat
Jean-Michel.Gobat@unine.ch
Institut de botanique
Université de Neuchâtel
11, rue Emile-Argand
2007 Neuchâtel

Project Coordinator

Géraldine Bullinger-Weber
geraldine.bullinger@unine.ch
Université de Neuchâtel
Neuchâtel

Project Partners

Summary

In this project we want to develop a guided self-teaching course in applied soil ecology on the Internet. The course is intended to substitute existing teaching units and to become accredited in place of these in the study plans of the three partner universities. The course is directed to students which have a basic training in soil science including first experiences with soil profiles in the field. The objective of the course is to show and to practice how this knowledge can be used to solve applied problems with respect to the sustainable management and protection of soil as a valuable environmental resource. The course consists of six modules, each covering an important area of the field of applied soil ecology. In each module a problem which is typical for the respective field has to be solved based on a real case using data taken from reality. The modules are structured in such a way that the students are guided step by step through the problem (according to a 'Leitprogramm'). The material, instruction and feed-back required to perform the tasks is completely available on the Internet. Interaction with other users as well as with teachers and tutors is possible through the Internet itself, as well as by direct personal communication according to the needs of the users. To our best knowledge there are no such courses teaching applied problem solving capabilities in soil ecology and we are not aware of other Internet courses using the teaching form of a 'Leitprogramm' for a similar purpose. The Internet opens up completely new possibilities for this type of teaching. Serving as a pilot study to explore these possibilities, our project is innovative as it aims to combine the advantages of the medium Internet with the teaching form 'Leitprogramm' and thus tries to make the best use of both of them.

Mesosworld

Methodological Education for the Social Sciences

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. René Hirsig
rene.hirsig@access.unizh.ch
Departement of Psychology
Universität Zürich
Zürichbergstrasse 43
8044 Zürich

Project Coordinator

lic. phil. Béatrice Hasler
b.hasler@psychologie.unizh.ch
Psychologisches Institut, Psychologische Methodenlehre
Universität Zürich
Zürichbergstr. 43
8044 Zürich

Project Partners

Summary

The overall goal of the project is to develop a high-quality, efficient, and modular virtual learning classroom that introduces social scientists to basic methodological thinking. It is aimed primarily at first-semester social science students and provides introductory level knowledge. Other target audiences (e.g., teachers, practitioners in government offices and in the industry) can benefit from the virtual teaching offerings to support life-long learning in a form which consolidates and integrates basic methodological knowledge across disciplines and which provides information about new methodological developments (e.g., web-based surveys and web experiments).

In contrast to many current (traditional and electronically mediated) classes, the virtual learning environment is not conceived as just another statistics course, but tries to integrate statistical knowledge with methodological principles. Furthermore, it tries to overcome institutional and discipline-specific boundaries by bringing together partners (and thus students) from a broad spectrum of scientific disciplines, such as psychology, sociology, political science, the media sciences, philosophy, and education. The development of a sharable and reusable source of basic methodological knowledge will greatly benefit from synergy effects and should reduce current duplication of teaching efforts.

The major pedagogical and technological differences to other distance learning approaches and virtual classroom projects are our attempts to

• allow for a more flexible teacher and learner-oriented customizability and adaptability,
• integrate methodological and theoretical issues with basic statistical and formal knowledge,
• provide interactive elements to support the acquisition of deeper knowledge,
• allow for quality-controlled, credit-earning learner evaluation and assessment, and
• address the issue of different scientific backgrounds by providing specialized, "plug-able" guidelines, examples, and data.

eduswiss online

Implementation of elearning in postgraduate courses

Project Leader

Karin Wäfler
waefler@eduswiss.ch
Berner Fachhochschule
Morgartenstr. 2c
3014 Bern

Project Coordinator

Karin Wäfler
waefler@eduswiss.ch
Berner Fachhochschule
Morgartenstr. 2c
3014 Bern

Project Partners

Summary

Rapid changing demands on firms and employees have forced Swiss universities and enterprises to set up a training partnership in the field of information and communication technologies. The post-graduate studies called NDIT/FPIT (Nachdiplomausbildung in Informatik und Telekommunikation / Formation postgrade en Informatique et Télécommunications) is a successful example of a collaboration between universities and technology oriented industry. The partnership is organized according to the model of a virtual enterprise. About 30 partner institutions contribute by offering standardized modular courses in their special domain. The compact courses are held all over Switzerland at the sites of the participating partners. The target public are engineers and project managers in the field of computer science, business information systems, automation, telecommunication and multimedia. Every year between 140 and 170 students enroll in the post-graduate courses, and they assemble their individual curriculum from the modular program according to their professional needs. The geographically distributed course providers and the collaborative organizational concept with modular courses and highly motivated students make this program an ideal test bed for the implementation of new educational technologies. The project intends to transfer the experiences gained within pilot courses to the rest of the course program.

BiotechLAB

Modelling and Simulation of Dynamic Systems - a Collection of Applied Examples

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Karin Kovar
k.kovar@hsw.ch
ZFH, Wädenswil
Wädenswil

Project Coordinator

Stephan Wyss
s.wyss@hsw.ch
ZFH, Wädenswil
Grüental, Postfach 335
8820 Wädenswil

Project Partners

Summary

Die meisten realen Prozesse können mit Modellen simuliert werden. Da viele Studenten Schwierigkeiten haben, mathematische Darstellungen von Prozessen zu verstehen, bietet biotechLAB einen einfachen und pragmatischen Zugang zur Modellierung dynamischer Systeme.

BiotechLAB ist als Unterstützung für Kurse mit Präsenzunterricht gedacht. Der Hauptteil dieser E-Learning Umgebung besteht aus Fallstudien zu biotechnologische Prozessen, die auf Daten von echten, von Studenten und Lehrkräften durchgeführten Experimenten beruhen. Simulationsexperimente erleichtern hierbei den Studenten den Zusammenhang zwischen den beobachteten Phänomenen (Realität) und ihrer mathematischen Repräsentationen (Modelle) zu erkennen. Zusätzlich können virtuelle Experimente durchgeführt und verschiedene Ebenen der Modellerstellung erlernt werden.

VITELS

Virtual Internet TElecommunications Laboratory of Switzerland

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Torsten Braun
braun@iam.unibe.ch
Institute of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics (IAM)
Universität Bern
Neubrückstrasse 10
3012 Bern

Project Coordinator

Thomas Staub
info@vitels.ch
IAM
Universität Bern
Neubrückstrasse 10
3012 Bern

Project Partners

Summary

VITELS (Virtual Internet and Telecommunications Laboratory of Switzerland) proposes a learning environment where real simulated, emulated and real laboratory experiments can take place via the Internet. Each VITELS project partner - four universities (Bern, Fribourg, Neuchâtel, Tübingen) have developed modules in the field of computer sciences and telecommunications based on the own competences and laboratory equipment.

The development of the course by different partners allows using the different available resources and the sophisticated technological knowledge and experience available at the various partner organizations.

Today VITELS offers the following modules: Simulation if IP Network Configuration, Client/Server Concepts, IP Security, Firewall Management, Sockets and RPC, Remote Method Invocation, Application Server, Security and Privacy in the Internet, Wireless LAN.

VITELS is using the Swiss-wide authentication and authorization infrastructure supported by SWITCH.

eBioMed

Biomedical sciences teaching modules

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Pierre J. Magistretti
Pierre.Magistretti@iphysiol.unil.ch
Fac. de Médecine/Physiologie
Université de Lausanne
Rue du Bugnon 7
1005 Lausanne

Project Coordinator

Fabrice Holzer
fh@swissmed.net
Centre des Technologies pour l'Enseignement et la Formation (CENTEF)
Université de Lausanne
Château de Dorigny
1015 Lausanne

Project Partners

Summary

This project aims at developing a computer-based learning and tutorial system in the biomedical sciences. The system will consist of hypertex/hyperimage individual modules which can be linked to each other or be used separately. The principal applicant and three co-applicants (AB, MRC and BZ) have already produced this kind of interactive modules.

The modules will also include animations, simulations, auto-assessment programs as well as a set of simple tools which allow the instructors to prepare questions, practical cases for problem-based learning as well as student assessment programs.

A managing program that allows the instructors to access an on-line assessment of the course and students status will be an integral part of the system.

Basic course in Medicine and Pharmacology

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Andreas Schaffner
klinsar@usz.unizh.ch
Medizinische Klinik B
Universitätsspital Zürich
Medizinisch Klinik B, AW 9
8091 Zürich

Project Coordinator

Kathrin Gilg-Frischknecht
Universitätsspital Zürich

Project Partners

Summary

The aim of this project is to develope two modules concerning the "Basic Course in Medicine" for students in the third year medical curriculum. Three Swiss universities collaborate in the production of the modules which comprehend the four basic topics of clinical medicine: pathology, pathophysiology, pharmacology and clinical medicine. Students are able to learn in a problem-, organ- or case-oriented manner, often interactive. The web course is launched nation-wide and allows faculties to integrate it into their local curricula as they choose. The web-course gives students the opportunity to get an autonomous yet structured access to the basic topics of clinical medicine either as a self-study program or as a complementary learning tool. The program provides a lively forum, wich is moderated by a senior lecturer, as well as quizes and self-assessment forms.

artcampus

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Oskar Bätschmann
oskar.baetschmann@ikg.unibe.ch
Institut für Kunstgeschichte
Universität Bern
Hodlerstrasse 8
3011 Bern

Project Coordinator

Dr. Christian Bracht
christian.bracht@ikg.unibe.ch
Institut für Kunstgeschichte
Universität Bern
Hodlerstrasse 8
3011 Bern

Project Partners

Summary

This project proposes to develop an internet-based survey course in the history of western renaissance, baroque and modern art. Although survey courses are widely taught above all in the English-speaking world (where several texts from the 1950s and 60s are readily available in book form but not on the internet), there is no up-to-date art historical survey in German-, French- and Italian-speaking countries. However, the lack of such courses constitutes a real disadvantage for students in these countries.

This project intends to fill the gap with a two-phased introduction to the history of art. The first phase (1 semester, 6 points in the ECTS) not only conveys the essentials of the development of the arts, it also serves as a primer to the internet as a research tool. Students are not only asked to take small exams monitoring their progress in the course material, they are also required to fulfill subsidiary research assignments such as finding literature on a specific subject in different OPACs and on-line bibliographies. At the same time, they are encouraged to explore their local "real life" resources for information on art (libraries, museums) and to share this information with others in order to realize the information collected on the internet.

The second phase of the course (1 semester, 6 credits) will offer a first opportunity to apply the newly-gained knowledge. Students are combined in teams (10-15) in order to explore a theme involving original works of art (e.g. public scultpure in their neighborhood). Each student is required to research two or three paintings or sculptures and to present this information in small texts (comparable in format to an extensive museum label). The texts are then made accessible to the other students of the course and will be discussed by the whole team. Eventually, the information thus gathered will be set up in a thematic website which - if the quality proves to be satisfactory - is made accessible to the general public. As such, students will acquire first insights into the tasks usually fulfilled by professional art historians.

In order to maintain and broaden its effect, the course will be accompanied by a discussion forum for students which will deepen the communication and exchanges of ideas over the internet.

SWISSLING

A Swiss network of Linguistics Courseware

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Eddo Rigotti
eddo.rigotti@lu.unisi.ch
Istituto Linguisticio-Semiotico
Università della Svizzera italiana
Via Ospedale 13
6900 Lugano

Project Coordinator

Andrea Rocci
roccia@lu.unisi.ch
Istituto Linguisticio-Semiotico
Università della Svizzera italiana
Lugano

Project Partners

Summary

SWISSLING is a joint project with the major objective to develop an introductory course in linguistics targeted to university beginners in human sciences (linguistics; communication sciences; literature and languages). The concerned departments of five Universities in Switzerland (Lugano, Basle, Geneva, Lausanne and Zurich) have ensured their support to the project and declared their willingness to recognise SWISSLING into their curricula. Thus, already in the test phase, more than 700 students will be involved in the project and profit from a reduced classroom presence ranging about 75%.

In particular, the project's goals comprise the following issues: (1) Common use of distributed resources, improving the educational program of individual universities. (2) Better presentation of complex material by using multimedia strategies. Dynamic educational display of know-how and know-that training materials using multimedia tools. (3) Promoting co-operative learning. (4) Providing facilities for studying independently from both time and location; enabling self-paced individual and interactive learning and evaluation. (4) Co-ordination of the teaching of Linguistics in the three main language areas of Switzerland.

To cope with the wide diversity in course structure and size in the field of linguistics, the contents of the courseware will be organized in 12 modules, which will deal each with a fundamental topic of linguistics. In order to warrant the different curricula of the single universities, the modules of the course can be exploited either completely or selectively. This flexibility will allow also the integration of SWISSLING in other study curricula, specially that of Germanistik and Anglistik, thus greatly enlarging the potential audience.

The SWISSLING consortium comprises one partner with a broad experience in the field of new media and their use in learning (Institut Tecnologies de formation et apprentissage, Université de Genève), and one partner in charge of the pedagogical evaluation of the course (Faculté de Pédagogie et de Sciences de l'Education, Université de Genève). Finally, the Department of informatics of the Scuola Universitaria Professionale della Svizzera italiana will take care of the technical support for the project. A co-operation agreement has been also signed with a leading company in the field of translation of on-line materials (LOGOS), in order to provide multilingual support for the course.

FNL

Forum New Learning

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Andreas Ninck
ninck@hta-be.bfh.ch
NDIT/FPIT
Berner Fachhochschule
Morgartenstrasse 2c
3014 Bern

Project Coordinator

Andreas Röllinghoff
rollinghoff@hta-be.bfh.ch
Berner Fachhochschule
Morgartenstr. 2c
3014 Bern

Project Partners

Summary

At the Swiss Universities of Applied Sciences (UAS) the application of New Learning Technologies (NLT) is not yet usual. Therefore it is intended to create for the didactical and technical aspects of NLT a common service, training and information office, named 'Forum New Learning'. The main goal of the project is the implementation of a permanent place of contact and collaboration for the UAS. The purpose of the 'Forum' will be similar to already existing institutions at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology or at some Universities (NET at ETHZ, Centre NTE at UniFR, etc.). In its structure it will differ in the way, that all its services and counselling will not necessarily be carried out by the geographically central office, but through a distributed network of persons, who start building or further develop specific NLT competencies in the frame of the project 'Virtual Campus'. The intended activities can be summarized as follows:

• Knowledge Sharing: Build and maintain an 'Interactive Knowledge Sharing System' to allow partners to file and exchange didactical knowledge components concerning NLT. Collect, adapt and provide available technical and didactical material.
• Networking: Organize meetings or workshops, and communicate with tools such as Mailing Lists or Newsgroups, to strengthen the relationship between the partners, and for setting up a didactical dialogue.
• Education: Set up a pool of courses for the training and education of teachers in the field of NLT.
• Tool Sharing: Provide, maintain and administrate tools and platforms for participating UAS.
• Technology Watch: Discuss and evaluate possible future developments.
• Support: Set up a network of competencies concerning technical and didactical aspects of NLT which aims at a highly qualified counselling for NLT projects.
• Translation: Guarantee an English translation at least for the most important information, resources and services.
• Web Portal: Set up a web site as a meeting point and portal to the services mentioned above.
• Exchange: Maintain contacts to institutions whit a similar mission.
• Organisation: Set up concepts to assure a smooth co-operation between the partners; serving as clearing-house to the payment of different services such as support and education.

MACS

Continuous Education Modules

Project Leader

Dr. Carlo Lepori
lepori@die.supsi.ch
Dipartimento di informatica ed elettrotecnica
Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana
Galleria 2
6928 Manno

Project Coordinator

Dr. Carlo Lepori
lepori@die.supsi.ch
Dipartimento di informatica ed elettrotecnica
Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana
Galleria 2
6928 Manno

Project Partners

Summary

The continuous education program MACS (Master in Advanced Computer Science) of SUPSI is a postgraduate education program built on modules. Objective of this proposal is to test if an IT-based realization of one or more modules can improve their quality, extending the collaboration between students and the contacts between teachers and students beyond the limits typical of this kind of course. Special attention will be given to specialized modules that must be offered to a broader circle of person than our local customers (possibly in different languages) and their integration in the Swiss system of continuous education modules.

Relevant questions to be researched during the project:

• choice of the most appropriate modules
• realization of didactical materials for online distribution
• environment for exercises, discussions and collaborative learning
• experiment with new didactical approaches
• assessment of the quality of learning compared with traditional forms
• evaluation of financial aspects

Internet based course on Fundamentals of Signals and Systems

Project Leader

Prof. Dr. Georgios Lekkas
lksg@zhaw.ch
Zürcher Hochschule Winterthur
Postfach 805
8401 Winterthur

Project Coordinator

Prof. Dr. Georgios Lekkas
lksg@zhaw.ch
Zürcher Hochschule Winterthur
Postfach 805
8401 Winterthur

Project Partners

Summary

The goal of this project is to realize a complete CBT (computer based training) -course on the subject "Fundamentals of Signals and Systems" that is suitable for use over the internet.

This subject is being covered at the ZHW by a regular basic course that must be attended by all students studying Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Sciences and partially also Mechanical Engineering, Data Analysis & Process Design. Therefore over 300 fully enrolled students are expected to follow this CBT-course per year in the German Part of Switzerland.

The planned CBT-course "Signals and Systems" will satisfy the following requirements:

• Adequate modern technical contents.
• State of the art in the methodology of educational theory.
• State of art in the CBT-Technology. In particular: i) easy navigation for students, ii) possibility to run interactive simulations, animations and other experiments from course pages, iii) a flexible, easy to use course production environment for a scientific text with navigation tools and embedded animations and simulation experiments.
• Suitable for use over the internet and as a virtual class room with a simulation lab.
• Built-in learning tests, self evaluation and exams.
• Embedding of the course in the ECTS credit system.

• A precise coordination of the course development between the participants of the project.
• Use of common tools and platforms for its realisation.
• Establishment of a network of lecturers for maintenance and further improvement of this learning module, as well as realizing new similar projects.
• Building up of a methodical and didactical service and consulting team at the ZHW to develop similar Web-based courses.
• Commercial partner.

We are convinced that this project will trigger a development of similar Web-based-courses in other areas at the ZHW and partner schools and that our experience and tools will be of valuable help for their development.

The production environement as well as the CBTs can be made available in the framework of a common knowledge pool to interested parties all over Switzerland.