LEVERAGE News 3

LEVERAGE
LEarn from Video Extensive Real Atm Gigabit Experiment

LEVERAGE News No 3, September 1997

Welcome | Pedagogical | Technophile | InterACTS | Conference report

Co-ordinator's column
Patrice Le Moing, LEVERAGE Project Manager from CAP GEMINI TELECOM FRANCE in Rennes, gives his impressions of the project at the halfway mark.
The partners in the LEVERAGE project are exploring how the technological possibilities of high-speed networks can be married with innovative task-based pedagogy to provide a solution to the growing need for enhanced linguistic and cross-cultural skills which enable people to operate in an increasingly international environment.
There is a certain satisfaction in reaching the halfway stage in a project such as LEVERAGE. I am fortunate to work with an extremely competent and motivated team of academics and engineers who, while confident of their abilities, are also keenly aware of the challenges ahead.
We have completed our first set of trials and carried out a market survey of potential end-users of a LEVERAGE-type system. However, there is still much to do as we prepare for our second, transnational end-user trial using the experimental paneuropean JAMES network and also for the first LEVERAGE conference which will take place in January 1998.
Amost 2,000 virtual towns in Europe
The Internet as a forerunner of advanced communications demand: virtual towns in Europe
(Source: Databank Consulting, 1997)
civicweb Civic WEB (Web sites created by the local administrations)
cityweb City WEB (Web sites created by or in connection with local tourist boards or economic promotion agencies)
The Internet is convincing even the most recalcitrant that the knowledge of the world is at everyone’s fingertips; that computer power is virtually free of charge; that communications will also be in a few years and that, even now, there are no barriers between people other than the ones they put up themselves to protect their freedom, their worldly goods or their culture. In the footsteps of machines and systems, even people have become "compatible".¹
For individuals to become ‘compatible’ they have to understand each other not only on a linguistic but also on a cultural level. We in the LEVERAGE project believe that such understanding (which is the key to social, commercial and academic co-operation) is impossible without dialogue. This dialogue takes place at many levels: between project partners, between end-users, and, as featured in this newsletter, between ourselves and potential end-users.
To find out more about our work, including further details of the LEVERAGE trials, the end-user market survey and a hands-on live demonstration of the LEVERAGE system as well as an opportunity to hear and discuss the major issues and challenges facing those involved in education and training over broadband networks, you are welcome to join us at the first LEVERAGE conference. I look forward to meeting you there. (Report on first LEVERAGE conference featured in LEVERAGE News 4).
¹CAP GEMINI annual report 1996, letter from Serge Kampf, Executive Chairman