What is a unique feature of your lab? The lab was specifically designed to support team-based collaboration. It features six workstations designed to accommodate six teams of four or 12 teams of two. Each workstation is fully equipped for electronic design and fabrication, with two sets of dedicated power supplies, soldering stations, meters, and hand tools. The installation is designed around the award-winning Steelcase media:scape system, which serendipitously happened to closely match the design spec for the original lab concept.

The media:scape system provides videoconferencing and is capable of handling any resolution, from Skype to HD. Each workstation has been set up with two 32-inch monitors that can be used to support a shared vid-eoconference for the entire class or independent video links from each team at each workstation. In a teaching scenario, the instructor can deliver video directly to each desktop from a laptop or from the high-resolution overhead camera on the instructor’s station. Conversely, students can share work directly from their desktops via the webcams at their workstations. Each workstation has a resident computer equipped with basic instructional software, conferencing software, and a range of bookmarked Web-based resources. In addition, the media:scape system provides four ports at each workstation that allow any student to plug in his or her own laptop and share one or both of the 32-inch monitors.