Wallenberg Blog

Well, there are several times in the year when Wallenberg Hall gets a little busier than normal (if that were possible!). The end of each quarter, and in particular the end of the academic year are some of those times. However, the time I like best is the Holiday Season. Besides the flurry of "final presentations", end of quarter class pizza parties, cramming for exams in the lounge areas at all hours, requests for space for running studies before the quarter ends, and the usual frenzy of last minute applications for space for teaching in Winter quarter, this is the time of the year we also host some fun and interesting events.

The beauty of a building like Wallenberg Hall is that it can be adapted for so many purposes. From a Business Plan competition event, to a multi-screen/multi media presentation, to a Metaverse speaker event beamed out to Second Life, to a holiday party. From an "off-site" retreat for a leading venture capital company, to a symposium, to a Santa Lucia party for Scandinavians at Stanford. These are all happening in December, and that is just on the first floor, using our innovative learning spaces.

Many of our events are open to the public, and we encourage you to visit any time and see the building in action. I can give you a tour by arrangement, and I am usually in the building from around lunchtime into the evening, especially when we have events on.

If there is interest in what goes on, I can post regularly on upcoming events. If you are interested in holding events here, whatever you have in mind, please contact me to discuss your ideas.

As the fall quarter ends, student teams created presentations with added layers of context to demonstrate their work.

In Tanya Shashko's French class, students used one of the computers in class to give a high-level outline presentation. They complemented that presentation with specific examples that they drew from popular internet sites to demonstrate specific points. Having both the macro and micro view of a particular issue side-by-side was valuable for other students in the audience and also helped the instructor better assess how the presenting team was able to integrate several aspects of the content that was covered during the quarter.

In Russ Altman's Biomedical Informatics class, a student team used the three screens of the Peter Wallenberg Learning Tehater to show three different 'views' of their project that helps individuals build better family medical histories. While demonstrating their project the students could move seamlessly between the patient's view, the doctor's view, and a presentation that called out some specific points. After the presentation, the students said, "This was a much more challenging presentation to give but we feel like we could show more of our work in a shorter period of time."

When faculty and students ask about multiple screens I often say that 1+1 is more than 2; that is, the sum is greater than the parts because of the different kinds of learning activities that having multiple screens offer. With two side-by-side screens, presenters can compare materials, add context, analyze original and annotated documents. Using multiple screens requires more preparation certainly, but the benefits can quickly accrue to many.