Apple leaves its mark on north country colleges

Although apples have long been associated with learning, a different Apple has left its mark on colleges in the north country.

Everyone from nightly newscasters to President Barack Obama took notice when Apple founder and former CEO Steve Jobs died Wednesday, and professors and students at SUNY Canton, SUNY Potsdam, Clarkson University and St. Lawrence University have felt the impact of Apple’s technologies for years.

“I think Apple is well-respected in education. They have innovative products, and students like technology,” said Brian K. Harte, an associate professor of criminal justice at SUNY Canton.

“We always try to incorporate technology wherever we can in lessons to increase student interest. They have a plethora of educational resources, so they are definitely one of the preferred products when it comes to education.”

In his classroom, Mr. Harte has used iPods purchased with a SUNY Canton College Foundation grant to screen videos of traffic stops from the viewpoint of police officers. According to Mr. Harte, letting his students pause and replay the videos at their own pace gave them better control of the content and more individualized learning experiences.

“Based on the student feedback, it’s helped them increase their confidence and their ability to observe and pick out key details,” he said. “We plan on using Apple technologies well into the distant future.”

Elsewhere at SUNY Canton, Southworth Library recently initiated a pilot iPad lending program to expose students to new technology. The five library iPads, which can be rented for up to four hours at a time, feature 13 electronic textbook titles as well as many other academic and literary works.

According to Michelle L. Currier, director of library services at SUNY Canton, the library also uses iPads as roving reference points for students. Whereas library staffers used to be stuck behind desks answering questions, she said, they now can wander the library looking for students in need of help.

“Having a tablet makes us very mobile, and that’s in turn incredibly helpful in terms of helping students,” Ms. Currier said. “I think that Apple … has especially had an impact because not only do they have incredibly powerful apps that improve and heighten the educational process, but also they change the way that students learn. More and more, we see students who are very engaged in the library with their own devices.”

At SUNY Potsdam, Apple technologies have made some noise — literally — at the Crane School of Music. According to Peter M. McCoy, an associate professor of music education and the coordinator of music technology at Crane, Apple products have been an industry standard ever since the original Macintosh computers were released with built-in sound cards.

These days, 21 iMac computers and digital piano keyboards comprise Crane’s Musical Instrument Digital Interface laboratory, a learning space in which music students can practice digital arrangement, composition, notation, video editing and website creation.

While the education programs at Crane use Apple products to acquaint teachers-to-be with the technologies they will encounter in school districts, classes ranging from conducting to music techniques also use Apple products to record student and faculty performances.

“It’s definitely changed the way that many of us at Crane teach. We’re able to do things now with music that we just couldn’t do before,” Mr. McCoy said. “I see students listening and watching to lectures on the treadmills over at (John W. Maxcy Hall). It’s definitely changed the way we function in the educational environment.”

At Clarkson University in Potsdam, the impact of Apple products has been felt more at an individual rather than an institutional level, as all of the college’s laboratories and libraries are equipped with PCs.

“There’s not a huge direct impact, because we don’t have a ton of Apple products on campus from an institutional perspective,” said Kevin P. Lynch, the college’s chief information officer. However, he said, some of Clarkson’s engineering, technology, math and science departments recently have begun switching to Apple hardware, which now boasts Unix operating systems.

“The impact indirectly has been pretty significant in that the technologies Apple has developed have influenced the entire technology realm,” Mr. Lynch said.

At St. Lawrence University, Canton, the recently renovated Johnson Hall of Science and the Newell Center for Arts Technology boast solely Apple products, although other buildings on campus contain a mix of technologies. While students in the Sullivan Student Center on Thursday were divided on Mac versus PC ownership, sophomore Leonardo Claudio Jr. said he had no doubt that Steve Jobs has changed students’ lives.

“I own a Mac, several iPods,” said Mr. Claudio, a communications major. “Coming to a school like this, it’s like if you don’t have a Mac, you’re inadequate. When you’re buying a Mac, you’re buying an image. Once you get a Mac, you don’t go back.”