Behind The Curtain
Pay no attention to those people behind the curtain. Wait! Actually, you should since they are DELTA’s own Laura Stephenson and Larry Evans— the distance education academic technology team. They were behind the successful live broadcast feed of NC State University’s 14th chancellor installation on Oct. 26 at Reynolds Coliseum in Raleigh, N.C.
There were 874 live views of W. Randolph Woodson’s installation ceremony via Mediasite—a Sonic Foundry hardware and software used by distance education since 2008. Even the chancellor’s own parents were among the online audience, as he noted during the ceremony.
“That felt really good to hear,” said Stephenson, the associate director of DE academic technologies coordination.
There were an additional 778 on-demand views totaling 1652 views over the course of two days before the link was removed from the NC State website. This was the largest number of concurrent views to date for DE on Mediasite, which helped Stephenson and Evans with their on-going test of the software.
This broadcast was a collaborative effort between NC State’s Installation Planning Committee and DELTA. The committee reached out to Stephenson for the installation live-stream coverage after seeing other Mediasite broadcast efforts on campus. The fact that the Mediasite software can generate viewing statistics is very helpful in determining the attention a broadcast receives, which makes it appealing for event coverage such as the installation.
Stephenson and Evans spent hours at the day-before rehearsal waiting to test the feed to ensure success during the ceremony. Of course, the broadcast went smoothly and they don’t have any incidents to report.
“The beauty of the Mediasite system is it’s dependable,” said Stephenson.
“[The chancellor’s installation] was actually easier for me because it was so high profile,” explained Evans, the academic technologies coordinator. “It was like a control room.” There were numerous crew members handling the recording so Stephenson and Evans were able to focus solely on the live feed connection.
They are normally responsible for every aspect of an assigned recording including the cameras, audio and publishing online. They travel all over campus and to off-site locations so that education opportunities are available to those who don’t have the advantage of attending classes on campus. Their Mediasite recordings usually include faculty instruction for distance education courses, classroom lectures or guest speakers and events on campus and across North Carolina.
“I see it as a great service we can provide,” said Evans.
Stephenson believes the ceremony was a great accomplishment in getting the word out about Mediasite and this service. She hopes to see more requests for coverage of campus events using the Mediasite technology.
For additional information, contact Laura Stephenson at laura_stephenson@ncsu.edu.
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