Students return to upgraded tech at CSUSB

California State University San Bernardino’s Next Generation Smart Classroom project (NGSC) has upgraded nearly 300 classrooms with leading-edge audio-visual communication technology.

NGSC is a collaboration between the university’s Information Technology Services (ITS) and CSUSB faculty to provide students with access to classrooms at the cutting edge of the current education environment.

“The NGSC classrooms have created the flexibility in teaching/learning modalities that our faculty and students were looking for in the post COVID environment, so that the institution can meet our students where they need us,” said Sam Sudhakar, ITS vice president.

CSUSB President Tomás D. Morales applauded the collegial process and the effective way in which the project is being unrolled.

“CSUSB views our students as deserving of the best possible educational facilities to enhance the excellence of its teaching,” he said. “The NGSC project, along with its supportive Cosynchronous Teaching Program, are on track to do exactly that. We continue to define the future for our students right here in the Inland Empire, where they live and work.”

Equipment upgrades included: ceiling-mounted professional grade PTZ (pan-tilt-zoom) video cameras with instructor-controlled framing; a ceiling-mounted microphone with “beam-forming” processing technology which isolates and clarifies the sound of the instructor’s voice; touch-screen podium-top monitors; and easy-to-use control panels to facilitate faculty’s effective use of the new system, said Bradford Owen, director of CSUSB’s Academic Technologies & Innovation.

For more information, visit the Next Generation Smart Classrooms website.