Curtin University of Technology has become the first Australian university to introduce a mobile website to help students access information about support services and campus facilities.
CurtinMobile — purpose-built by Curtin staff, and modelled on similar sites at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford in the United States — was developed as part of the University’s C2010 curriculum project and student retention strategy.
Curtin’s Director of Teaching and Learning, Professor Beverley Oliver, said the research showed that even though there was a great deal of information on the University website, students needing help in a hurry couldn’t always find it.
Curtin service is national first
“So we decided to explore the concept of a mobile ‘help at your fingertips’ website,” she said.
“We also know that 99 per cent of our students have mobile phones and that 75 per cent of those phones are web-enabled, so this sort of website is going to reach the vast majority of our students.”
The website offers all sorts of support information such as a directory to find teaching staff, campus maps and local transport services through to where to eat on campus. There was also more focused support information — where to find study support, financial support, housing, and so on.
“There’s also information on the website that shows students where they can find a computer that is available for use on campus.”
Professor Oliver said development of CurtinMobile involved extensive student research and consultation with staff at overseas universities such as Stanford, Duke and MIT.
“The original plan was to build an iPhone app, like Stanford’s, which was built by a student startup company. However, our research six months ago showed low penetration of iPhones at this stage, so we decided to build a site that looks like an app, but also works on other smart phones,” she said.
“Our research shows that a much higher proportion of students are likely to have iPhones in the near future, so an iPhone app is definitely on the cards at some stage, and it will very likely have a strong connection with Curtin’s recently developed iPortfolio system.”
The site was also likely to be useful to staff and visitors.
“We are all part of the Net Generation in this sense. Most of us like to be ‘connected and always on’, so this website is a natural development in the information age. We also envisage that new students of any age will find this service helpful in the transition to study.”
CurtinMobile can be accessed by visiting http://m.curtin.edu.au
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