Why Telepresence Robots Are Popular In Higher Education How to Use One in Your Classroom

Matthews also says these solutions enabled his team to give a new meaning to the “flipped classroom,” and bring it to a larger scale.

“When you think of the flipped classroom, we believe we’ve flipped our university and allowed it to be accessible to anywhere in the world,” he says. “We do that because now we’ve got the infrastructure moving smoothly to the point we can trust the technology will work, faculty have confidence in it, and the president is bragging about it.”

While institutions like FIU and ORU are using telepresence robotics to take distance learning to new lengths, Elaine Shuck says rising college students are starting to expect these technologies to be a part of their college experience.

“If you’re a high school student or a community college student coming out of that age bracket where people are so use to technology, it’s expected,” says Shuck, Director of Education for Polycom. “It’s expected for you to weave in all this technology so you don’t miss anything, whether it’s accessing content after the fact on-demand, or maybe there was something you didn’t quite get and you can go back and use that technology to help you understand the concept.”

Tips to Handling a Telepresence Robot

1) See what other colleges are doing

Shuck says one of her jobs is to connect colleges so that they can collaborate on technology-usage ideas. Before investing in a telepresence robot, Shuck recommends reaching out to schools like FIU to see how they’re using the solution.

“We know that FIU has great success using these robots,” she says. “My first suggestion would be to connect with FIU and find out what challenges they had, why they picked this particular robot, and what would they recommend in their scenario…Why not connect those dots so other institutions don’t have to start at ground zero when they’re trying to implement new technology? Do your homework to see who else is using it, and get connected.”

2) Customize your solution

Matthews says utilizing the robotics solution grows easier if end users can customize it to fit their needs – even down to what they call it.

Matthews says colleges should work with their solution vendor to make sure they can customize the solution and brand it to their liking. That way, any confusion surrounding the solution can be reduced.

“I’m very careful as a CIO not to call too many product names out because it confuses the students,” he says. “When students look at the robots, they see the name “Geo.” The robots are named Geo 1, 2, 3, 4 etc. That’s all I want them to know….Be careful that the vendors allow you the flexibility to brand it under your name, not their name. Make sure they’ve got some big successes under their belt, or they won’t understand what you’re trying to accomplish.”

3) Make sure your infrastructure can support it

Before pulling the trigger on a new telepresence robot, Gomez suggests that colleges check their network to make sure it can handle the solution.

Gomez says FIU’s network could support their telepresence solution, until they moved it into smaller spaces, like elevators.

However, after multiple rounds of testing, Gomez and his team were able to keep the robot connected, and up and running.

“Make sure it’s compatible with your existing infrastructure, whether it’s your Wi-Fi networks, security, and then of course the room systems as well,” Gomez says. “We did test it…once we got into the elevator, it cut off, but once the doors opened I was able to connect back and maneuver the device. The great thing about it is it does give a presence in the room, a physical presence, and I think that stimulates the students, rather than having a talking head on a monitor.”