Web Strategy and Development Blog

New Personal Finance course in iTunes U

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A new dual-credit course on Personal Finance was produced this fall semester for Missouri State on iTunes U.

iTunes U Top CoursesCourse information

This course is presented by Roger Wallenburg, and was produced by the Digital Media Production Center.

This course is a study of personal finance topics from the consumer and societal perspectives, and will provide students with the concepts and critical thinking skills to understand the effects of financial decisions on individuals, families, and society.

The course contains a total of 8 lecture videos.

Popularity

This course was published to iTunes U at the beginning of the fall semester in August, and it has already become one of the top courses.

As of this writing, the course is currently the most popular course of all courses available on iTunes U.

New iTunes U Site

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We recently updated the Missouri State on iTunes U site to utilize Apple’s Public Site Manager, which is a new method for uploading and managing all of our multimedia content on iTunes U. This change also means that the design and layout of Missouri State on iTunes U is also now updated to better reflect recent changes in the iTunes U Store, with more options for us to feature specific content and better organization through the use of iTunes categories and tags.

I’d like to now focus on a few of the new features available in Missouri State on iTunes U:

  • Web previews of content collections – you can now preview a collection in your web browser without even having to open the iTunes software. View Great Ideas in Psychology to see an example of this new web preview.
  • Ratings and reviews of content – content in iTunes U can now be rated and reviewed by users. This is also reflected in the new Top Downloads section on the Missouri State on iTunes U homepage.
  • Categories and tags – content can now be categorized in two ways: under the default iTunes categories, as well as under custom categories. An example iTunes category is Humanities while an example custom category is About Missouri State.
  • Custom features on the homepage – it is now possible to highlight selected items or content collections on the homepage. These new custom features are completely customizable and are a great way for us to highlight specific content.

On a separate note, Missouri State instructor Todd Daniel started a new psychology podcast series last week titled The Story of Psychology. Todd’s previous podcast, Great Ideas in Psychology, has been extremely popular with iTunes U users, and we’re sure his new podcast will also be very successful. This week, Apple took note of the new podcast and designated it as the main featured collection on the iTunes U homepage. Congrats to Todd on another great podcast!

New iTunes U courses available

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With the fall semester quickly approaching, we’ve been busy uploading two new complete courses to Missouri State on iTunes U:

College Algebra

MTH 135 – College Algebra

Presented by Patti Blanton, produced by the Digital Media Production Center

This course includes the study of linear and quadratic equations; inequalities and their applications; polynomial, rational, exponential and logarithmic functions; and systems of equations.

The course will contain a total of 31 lectures along with an introduction and various review lectures.

American Democracy and Citizenship

PLS 101 – American Democracy and Citizenship

Presented by Dr. Patrick Scott, produced by the Digital Media Production Center

This course is actually not new, but rather an updated version of this course for 2010. It provides introductions to the institutions and constitutional frameworks of both the state of Missouri and the United States.

An introduction and ten lectures have been uploaded at present, with more to follow in the coming days.

Missouri State on CDNTwo

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Missouri State is now featured on CDNTwo, an online podcast manager for the Roku. This means that users with Roku set-top boxes can now stream Missouri State academic and course content on their television sets.

All of our content featured on CDNTwo  is being fed in from Missouri State on iTunes U. We plan to update the content available on CDNTwo as we add more content to our iTunes U site. We are one of only four institutions featured on CDNTwo, with two of the others being Yale and Berkeley.

Name our new podcast and win a prize!

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We’re planning on starting a regular podcast in the new year and we need your help! We’ve been trying to come up with a good name for the new podcast, but we’ve had no luck so far.Website Owner's Manual by Paul Boag

So, for all of you creative types: whoever can come up with the best name for our new podcast will win a copy of the new Website Owner’s Manual book by Paul Boag.

You can share your best ideas by either posting below in the comments area of this post or by replying to us via our Twitter account: @MSUWEB.

We’ll announce the winning name on Wednesday, Jan. 13th., so send in your ideas now!