ROCK HILL, SOUTH CAROLINA – Winthrop University will become a laptop campus beginning with the 2022-23 academic year.
Board of Trustees’ members voted unanimously during their Oct. 29 quarterly meeting to make the transition from campus-wide desktop computers to laptops across the academic landscape. Interim President George Hynd said that laptop computers, as opposed to desktop computers in computer laboratories, will make it easier to promote collaboration and data sharing. It also will give students more flexibility for when and how they complete their work.
“It facilitates interaction, while providing alternatives to traditional print textbooks,” Hynd said. “With the use of laptops in the classroom, faculty can more easily include additional video, audio, artwork, print and digital components into their lectures.”
This move also will allow faculty members to design their curriculum and pedagogical techniques around possible student technology capabilities.
There are other changes that will need to occur to achieve a laptop campus by the 2022-23 academic year, Hynd added. The campus-wide WiFi system will need to be upgraded so that the campus community can access an expansive, reliable WiFi network.
Likewise, Winthrop will research options to provide students with discounted prices on laptops, the best and most economical way to provide on-campus IT support, computer repairs and access to loaner laptops when needed.
In other board action at the quarterly meeting, members voted to:
· Decrease the cost of the Master of Arts in Arts Administration graduate program beginning in fall 2022. Tuition for the program would decrease from $915 per credit hour to $700 per credit hour to make the program more competitive in terms of cost in the region.
· Reallocate the $300 Enrollment Deposit to fund the New Student Fee—$210 for freshmen and $85 for transfers—and a one-time, non-refundable $50 housing application fee which will accompany all first-time housing applications commencing in spring and summer 2022 for the 2022-23 academic year.
· Adopt suggested course fee changes.
· Approve state-funded capital projects amounting to $10 million.
· Approve $500,000 to use toward marketing and enrollment efforts. The allocation, which will be sourced from the university’s net position, is pending and awaiting the submission of a comprehensive plan of action.
· Appoint Associate Dean Beth Costner as the interim dean of the Richard W. Riley College of Education starting in January 2022 while a national dean search is underway.
For more information, contact Judy Longshaw, news and media services manager, at 803/323-2404 or longshawj@winthrop.edu.
