CNBC spotlights COBA iPad pilot program

Posted June 16, 2011

Abilene Christian University's mobile-learning initiative was featured today on a CNBC report about how ACU's digital textbook research is showing publishers and students a new frontier in education, aided by Apple's iPad.

This companion story on the CNBC website quotes ACU sophomore Prentice Ashford, senior Caitlyn McCoy and Dr. Bill Rankin, the university's director of educational innovation, about this past school year's research that centered around business classes. Dr. Ian Shepherd, associate professor of management, used a digital text developed for the iPad by Inkling in his microeconomics class. Other research took place in a senior-level marketing course taught by Dr. Rick Lytle, dean of ACU's College of Business Administration, as well as faculty projects.

Abilene Christian is in year two of a three-year partnership Cambridge University Press and Alcatel Lucent's Bell Labs to help rethink the future of publishing.

Campus Technology recently published this story about ACU’s research into student perspectives on the functionality of digital textbooks. You can read more about it at ACU Connected, and watch videos highlighting recent ACU faculty perspectives here.

"The iPad makes mobile learning practical,” Shepherd says of what he and his students learned by using it to interact with a digital textbook. “It allows us to be in touch and online all the time. From an economics perspective, it is truly a productivity enhancer and increases the efficiency of learning."

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