Stop Waiting to Check Out a Camcorder

Butler University came to Panopto searching for a technology solution that could enable students to role play scenarios, practice skills in simulations, and otherwise learn by experience was key to enhancing a number of Butler’s academic programs.

Challenge: Overcoming Complicated Video Capture at the College of Education

At Butler University’s College of Education, students serving internships in school counseling had taken to videotaping live sessions with clients. The recordings were used during classes or in private meetings with professors to evaluate the student’s performance.

Some students were using handheld digital video cameras, such as a Flip cam, and saving the recording to DVD or a memory card; others were using VHS cameras and videotapes.

Sharing the videos required students to offload the large raw recordings from media cards, manually convert those files into a smaller format, and upload them to a local server. Not only was this process exceptionally time consuming, but even after all that effort, the videos could only be viewed on campus—compounding the burden for commuting students.

The College of Education needed a video solution that was not only easy to use across a wide range of equipment, but one that would streamline the process of recording and privately sharing content.

Solution: Panopto’s Secure, Cloud-Hosted Video Content Management System

With Panopto, the College of Education was able to simplify the recording process and enable professors to offer timelier feedback on specific aspects of the student’s performance.

Instead of recording to memory cards or DVDs, interns now record directly to Panopto using their laptops and onboard cameras. Moreover, access to the recordings could be controlled by login and only granted to program professors and peers.

Professors at the College of Education review the recordings weekly during study groups and individual supervision, and have come to rely on Panopto’s Notes feature, which enables them to append time-stamped comments to a student’s video.

Brandie Oliver, an Assistant Professor who oversees interns in the School Counseling program, uses the Notes feature extensively in providing feedback to her students. “I can go to a specific point in the video and say, ‘I’d really like for you to look at this skill,’ and that leads us to in-depth and thorough discussion of what we’re trying to talk about.”

“It’s been wonderful,” Ms. Oliver says. “Panopto lends itself to letting us provide really detailed feedback, even at a distance.”

Want to find out more about how Butler is improving classes campus-wide with video? Download our newest case study today.