Brown's Career Planning Services, working with the Office of Alumni Relations, turned to live video teleconferencing for a solution. Many corporations have the equipment and capability to teleconference, and increasingly universities are adding similar facilities. Brown installed its PictureTel system in 1992. In addition to using teleconferencing as a way to share information between students and alumni, Career Planning Services is joining a small number of universities that use the technology to help students secure jobs at far-flung companies. Corporate travel and recruitment budgets may be down, but teleconferencing lets employers interview job candidates for less money than flying a recruiter to campus.
Brown professors use the technology to confer with colleagues around the world.
James Head III, professor of geological sciences, holds discussions with researchers in Russia. Theodore Sizer, professor of education, used it to address a conference in Australia. One Brown graduate student has even defended his dissertation in computer science using the technology. With the help of PictureTel, he presented his thesis not only before a panel at Brown, but to a professor at the University of Washington who was able to participate in the proceedings in real time. The student fed his computer and video demonstrations through the PictureTel link to the professor in Washington, who was able to see them and comment almost instantaneously.