contents
    Summer 2002,
vol. 44, No. 1/2
 
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Session at the UNDP conference room in Beirut, with Dean Mitchell shown on the monitor.
  Videoconferencing Helps Realize E-topia    
  -      In what seems to be its first application in the context of classroom teaching at AUB, videoconferencing is being used in an FEA course on Digital Rules. This new seminar is offered as an elective by Associate Professor Tarek Kazzaz, of the Department of Architecture and Design. Collaborating with him is Professor William Mitchell, Dean of the School of Architecture and Planning at MIT. Dean Mitchell is a world renowned and widely published authority in the field of computation and design
      The course cultivates understanding of the nature and potential of digital technologies and investigates the paradigm shifts necessary for their effective implementation in design, architecture, and urbanism. Mitchell's latest and much celebrated book, E-TOPIA, is the focus of the research component of the seminar. The work is used to investigate the potential for urban e-topia and knowledge-based economy in Lebanon, as a case study of the ideas presented in his book. His 		participation includes class discussions of assigned readings, as well as evaluation of students' final term papers and presentations. This interaction is realized through 90-minute videoconferencing sessions.
      Since the capacity for international ISDN is not yet available to local universities because of government regulation, the UNDP and the World Bank have generously allowed AUB students to use their facilities. As a result, the videoconferencing sessions are held at the UN House in Beirut while Dean Mitchell participates from his office at MIT, Boston.
      The course is interdisciplinary in scope and is attended by students in the programs of graphic design, architecture, urban planning, and computer and communication engineering. The new course structure, as well as the collaboration with Dean Mitchell, are direct outcomes of a long-term faculty development grant, which supported Kazzaz's research work at MIT last summer.

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