The School of Informatics

Information Technology in Today's Learning
The School of Informatics
One School, Three Campuses
Informatics Research Institute

Information Technology in Today's Learning

When Indiana University was founded in 1820, only Greek and Latin were taught. The curriculum has obviously changed over time, in response to both intellectual and practical needs. The most recent school to be established at Indiana University, the School of Informatics responds to the world's changing needs and offers five master's programs: bioinformatics, chemical informatics (including laboratory informatics), health informatics, human-computer interaction (including music informatics), and media arts and science.

One might say that programming languages and software tools are the Greek and Latin of our times, and no person can be called truly educated without mastery of these "languages." It is not intended to suggest that the classical languages, or any natural languages, have been supplanted by Perl and Java. Indeed, making available the classical corpus in searchable digital form was one of the first applications of computing to the humanities. The point is to suggest the pervasiveness of information technology in all of civilized life. Much as Greek and Latin opened doors to the scholarship of the nineteenth century, so does information technology open doors to the art and science of the twenty-first century.

The development of networks and distributed systems over the past several decades has changed forever the notion of a computer as something that merely "computes." The computer now is an "information processor." Also gone is the idea of a computer as a stand-alone system. Instead it is a "communication node." Arthur C. Clarke once said that "a sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Unfortunately, many people see computers and the Internet as magical. The mission of the School of Informatics is to educate citizens that advanced information technology is indistinguishable, or at least inseparable, from science and the arts.

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The School of Informatics

The School of Informatics studies the application of information technology of the arts, sciences, and professions. The new school uses an interdisciplinary approach, bringing together faculty and students from diverse academic studies. Informatics degrees offer a multidisciplinary approach to an application/subject area and to the core areas of information technology. Having achieved permanent state funding in 2003, the school is engaged in a tremendous period of growth. Informatics envisions itself in three spheres of activity: domain-centered informatics (such as bioinformatics); technology-centered informatics (expressed in programming), and human-centered informatics (such as human-computer interaction, social informatics, etc.). The curriculum focuses in five major areas: mathematical foundations, distributed information, human-computer interaction, social/organizational informatics, and new media.

The master's programs build on a student's undergraduate education and provide a core of courses on information management as well as more specialized courses relating to the particular emphases of the various master's degrees. Their common aim is to educate students in the application of information technology to human problems. A graduate with a Master of Science in Informatics degree will have solid technical skills linked to real-world applications and will have a knowledge of professional practice, including an ethical perspective and awareness of policy issues. The graduate will have strong analytical abilities and problem-solving skills and an ability to communicate and work in teams. The graduate will be prepared for the life-long learning, which is an essential ingredient of the information economy.

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One School, Three Campuses

The School of Informatics spans the IU Bloomington (IUB), Indiana University- Purdue University (IUPUI), and IU South Bend (IUSB) campuses. By combining the strengths of these three campuses, the School of Informatics is able to create a unique environment that enables students to earn degrees with strong information technology components in arts, humanities, science, and the professions. The expert faculty and excellent technological resources foster a synthesis of academic disciplines and cultures. Faculty from varied departments share developments in the fast-moving information technology areas through the School of Informatics and its degree programs. The school is actively forging cooperative arrangements with employers in the state and region and creating internships, cooperative education programs, and opportunities for learning through service.

The Bloomington Campus

IUB is a residential campus that offers undergraduate, professional, and graduate degrees in more than 70 fields of study. In the fall semester of 2003, the campus had a total enrollment of 38,589, including 30,319 undergraduates and 8,270 students in graduate and professional programs. More than 30 schools and departments at IUB are ranked among the top 10 nationally, with more than 100 ranked in the top 20 in their respective fields.

University Libraries at IUB
The University Libraries at IUB rank third in collection size among the Big Ten universities, fourth in the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC), and thirteenth in the nation among major research libraries. The libraries' collections include 6.5 million bound volumes, 4 million microforms, and more than 40,000 current serials. The Main Library houses the undergraduate library and extensive graduate research collections as well as reference services, technical services, government publications, and other essential library services. The Main Library also is home to four student computing centers that provide access to more than 200 computer workstations. These facilities are complemented by the 13 campus libraries serving diverse disciplines, such as music, life sciences, optometry, chemistry, geology, education, business, journalism, and other areas.

University Information Technology Services (UITS) at IUB
University Information Technology Services at IUB supports the application, use, and development of information technology for research, teaching, and learning. UITS makes available more than 1,200 computer workstations located in 43 Student Technology Centers for both scheduled instruction and individual study and more than 200 "InfoStations" and other limited-use workstations in locations across campus for access to e-mail and the Web. The Assistive Technology Lab, located in the Main Library, offers programs and specialized information technology services for students with disabilities. Research computing facilities on campus include the CAVE virtual reality lab, two high-performance supercomputers (a 47-processor IBM SP and a 64-processor SGI/Cray Origin2000), a multiterabyte massive data storage system, and a state-of-the-art campus backbone network. Another strength UITS brings is the Network Operations Centers for both Abilene (Internet 2) and TransPAC. These (more fully described in the next section) are housed on the IUPUI campus, but scholars and students in Bloomington also benefit from these high-speed communication links.

The IUPUI Campus

IUPUI is an urban campus that combines IU and Purdue programs. In the fall semester of 2003, its schools had a total enrollment of 29,860, including 21,388 undergraduates and 8,472 students in graduate and professional programs. IUPUI currently ranks among the 10 largest campuses in the nation that offer graduate professional degrees.

IUPUI Library
The IUPUI library is a technology learning center that symbolizes the university's real and virtual information resources. It supports teaching and learning in classrooms, in faculty offices, at the hundreds of workstations in the library, in the 18 centrally supported campus learning centers, and in the home workstations and offices of students. Current holdings within the IUPUI University Library include more than 1,592,144 volumes, more than 36,000 current periodicals and journals, more than 1,197,000 microforms, and more than 152,400 government documents and audiovisual materials. The library also includes excellent resources, a powerful communications infrastructure and widely deployed workstations for students. There are 1,760 data connections to 640 individual carrels for laptop connectivity, 8 computer clusters, 42 group study rooms, 40 faculty study rooms, a 50-seat general classroom, 2 computer classrooms, a 100-seat auditorium, and an adaptive educational services center.

University Information Technology Services (UITS) at IUPUI
UITS at IUPUI supports the application, use, and development of information technology for research, teaching, and learning. Students have access to more than 500 public workstations on campus. UITS partners with academic schools on campus to provide consulting support in 16 student technology centers and operates 2 other centers as campuswide resources. The network operations center for Abilene, the high-speed Internet2 backbone network, is located on the IUPUI campus, as is the network operations center for TransPAC, a high-speed network connecting the United States to countries in Asia and the Pacific Rim. The IUPUI campus also is home to the Cisco Networking Academy Training Center and the Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE) Practice Lab. One of two such labs in the nation, the CCIE lab provides a testing environment for networking professionals worldwide who are candidates for certification as Cisco Certified Internetwork Experts.

Because Indiana's government, business, industry, finance, health, service, and nonprofit organizations are centered in Indianapolis, the urban environment plays an important role as a learning resource for students enrolled in the informatics programs at IUPUI. Many of the state's communication industries are concentrated in the capital city, and the larger organizations based here have made commitments to improve their communication and business processes through the use of information and information technology. IUPUI has established strong working relationships with both industry and government agencies in communications, information technology, and media arts and sciences.

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The IUSB Campus

Information on the School of Informatics degree programs offered at the IUSB campus can be located on the Web at www.iusb.edu/~majors/inform.shtml.

Informatics Research Institute

Research and theory in informatics move rapidly to application and development. The faculty teaching in the School of Informatics participate in research activities and new applications of technology. As a result, faculty can transmit state-of-the-art knowledge to their students. Indiana University is capitalizing on this great research strength in informatics at both IUB, IUPUI, and IUSB with the formation of an Informatics Research Institute (IRI). The IRI will conduct research in areas of emphases shared with the School of Informatics, including: fundamental research in human-computer interaction; fundamental research in capturing, managing, analyzing, and explaining information and making it available for its myriad uses; and expanding research into policy and socioeconomic issues arising from information technology.

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