Tulane University Freeman School of Business
The Goldring/Woldenberg Business Complex – New Orleans, Louisiana
The Situation
Tulane University’s Freeman School of Business is one of the nation’s best-ranked as one of the top schools for entrepreneurship worldwide, with nearly 3,000 students in programs spanning the globe. In its Essential Science Indicators Index, Thomson Scientific places the Freeman School in the top 1 percent of America’s business schools.
When the Freeman School renovated and expanded its Goldring/Woldenberg Business Complex on Tulane’s Uptown campus, the administration turned to TruConnect’s IES team for AV technology integration. After all, we had a 20-year history of working with Tulane. The client knew that our IES team not only had the expertise to design a state-of-the-art integration but also had the resources to complete the work on a tight, three-month timeline with the systems in place to provide the service and support necessary to maintain educational continuity.
The Challenge
The project involved converting close to 150 classrooms for hybrid education across two connected facilities, one a radically renovated existing structure, the other entirely new.
The stakes were exceptionally high for Tulane University. Its business school is the pride of Tulane and competes with the best institutions in the world for top-tier students. At this level, “good enough” isn’t nearly enough. Students and faculty alike demand a state-of-the-art learning environment.
In fact, a project of this nature has multiple stakeholders, all critical to a successful outcome. Learners demand a premium educational experience, fueled by technology that’s both leading-edge and field-proven. On-campus and remote students alike expect easy connectivity and reliability, and they have zero patience for anything less.
Faculty demand ease of use, a low learning curve for new tech, and glitch-free performance. Perhaps most importantly, they want the flexibility to accommodate their individual teaching styles. It’s important to remember that for an institution like the Freeman School to succeed, it not only has to attract the best students, it needs to attract and retain the most accomplished faculty. Any integration that doesn’t take into account the needs and preferences of instructors is bound to fail.
The Freeman School’s facility managers and service and support staff represented another critical constituency. Charged with maintaining educational continuity, they want standards-based, scalable solutions that can be deployed, extended, and supported with maximum efficiency and lowest cost.
And let’s not forget administrators and executives. Charged with keeping the entire institution afloat, they’re laser-focused on ROI. Will the technology justify the investment? Will it support the school’s mission and brand? In a competitive, fast-changing educational landscape, these questions are critical – all the more so for an elite institution like the Freeman School. However, the administration had additional concerns as well, including a rapidly approaching deadline for substantial completion of the project.
Work was to begin in June, and we needed to have the integration up and running by the fall term – no small task in a project that involved converting nearly 150 classrooms to Zoom readiness.
The Solution
From the very beginning of this engagement, our objective was clear: our IES team needed to deliver the best possible classroom and remote-learning experience – both for students and faculty. It wasn’t enough just to install quality equipment and ensure smooth operation. We needed to put ourselves into the client’s shoes to design a frictionless, reliable, and uniform experience. Our integration also had to be flexible, scalable, and financially justifiable.
In simplest terms, our goal was to design and implement a communication experience that made all students – on-site and remote – feel as though they were sharing the same space and receiving the same quality education. That means everyone had to be able to hear and be heard. Faculty needed to be seen, and educational content had to be readily accessible. All the time, for everyone.
Classrooms were fitted with BIAMP microphones, arrayed so that where students sat had zero bearing on their ability to interact with faculty and their remote classmates. Sony Pro PTZ cameras were simultaneously routed to the instructor’s PC for Zoom and back to Vaddio and Extron equipment in the broadcast studio for recording and distribution. The multitude of presentation sources necessitated easy screen sharing on high-quality, strategically positioned displays.
A key feature in the business school integration is the installation of an additional flat-panel display at the rear of the classroom. Mimicking the instructor’s screen, it untethered faculty from their lectern, enabling them to move about the space to more effectively engage in-class students without losing their connection to remote learners. This issue came up as part of a detailed discovery process in which we explored every learning scenario with faculty. One instructor asked, “How will I know if a remote student is asking a question if I’m not at my desk?” This solution provided the answer.
The overall project was complex, involving a mix of new and existing construction with the facility comprised of a wide range of classrooms, from auditorium-sized spaces to presentation-equipped breakout/huddle rooms. To get it right, we worked closely with the building architects, construction leaders, electricians, and other contractors in addition to Tulane facility managers and other staff. On a project with a tight timeline, there’s a temptation to start now and ask questions later, but in this case, it was essential for all team members to work in harmony. And here is where the IES team’s strength in project coordination bore fruit. Experienced project managers are well-versed in coordinating with other trades. Indeed, many of our project leaders draw on past AV tech experience, so they combine both AV and project management-specific experience.
The Result
Tulane University’s Freeman School of Business is proud of its flagship Goldring/Woldenberg Business Complex. Here state-of-the-art, active-learning classrooms boast technology that can be configured to best meet the learning objectives for the day. More than 20 breakout rooms enable small group study without sacrificing connectivity. The Student Gateway boasts a video wall highlighting alumni, students, and faculty.
Yet features tell only part of the story. Our IES team provides 24/7 remote monitoring and comprehensive service and support to ensure continuity of education.
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