Loras Receives DRA Grant for Video Recording Studio

DUBUQUE, Iowa – The Dubuque Racing Association (DRA) has awarded a grant to Loras College to establish a video recording studio for campus use. The project’s overall goal is to ensure students graduate with the skills and knowledge they need to be successful in today’s workplace by enhancing both the pedagogies available to faculty and the options for students’ creative and scholarly output.

The studio will allow faculty, students, and staff to record professional-looking videos against various backgrounds or with the inclusion of a PowerPoint presentation. The grant will fund a video editing computer that will allow users to customize backgrounds and merge the video with still images or other videos to create a more complex visual media.

“The Library is always looking for ways to improve student learning both in and out of the classroom,”  Heidi Pettit, access services & special collections librarian, said. “When we saw a presentation about implementing this technology in an academic library, we knew we needed to find a way to implement it here.”

For faculty, the studio will enhance the teaching and learning in their classes by recording video content for more engaging online courses or on-campus classes so class time can be devoted to discussion instead of lecture. They will also be able to create demonstration modules of skills such as a lab experiment for science classes.

Staff will be able to use the studio to develop training materials for new hires, record information about new procedures and practices and changes to current procedures and provide a suitable and professional space for online interviews and presentations.

The studio will allow students to develop technical skills while using the editing studio to add music, titles, captions, photography, and video footage shot outside the studio. They will also have the ability to create higher-impact responses to current course requirements. The studio will provide a suitable and professional space for online interviews and presentations.

Loras will work with the local company Revolution Lightboards to establish the studio.