Audiologic delivers hybrid teaching facility
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The University of Birmingham has recently developed a new purpose-built Teaching and Learning Building. Developed as an education hub, the facility provides spaces for teaching that adhere to the University’s modern learning experience standards.
The Teaching and Learning Building includes a 500-seat lecture theatre, a 250-seat interactive lecture theatre, ten seminar rooms, as well as individual study sections, collaborative group workspaces, and areas that accommodate creative break-out sessions.
The entire teaching facility has been fitted out with hybrid teaching in mind. Now, more than ever, it is essential that lecture theatres are fitted with the latest AV technology to ensure that remote learning is as close to the in-room experience as possible.
Matt Turner, head of HEFE Digital, University of Birmingham, says: “The university has been looking at the use of hybrid teaching in order to support students who find themselves unable to come to campus, mainly overseas students because of the current restrictions. In the first instance, this has been a small-scale pilot, with academic colleagues who have been running sessions with students in the room and overseas on Zoom.
“The purpose is so that students can be taught together, but also so that our academic colleagues don’t have to teach the session more than once. We are then going to use the rooms that we have got equipped in a similar way in the next academic year to further support those students who are unable to return to the campus from overseas.”
Ben Spurgeon, senior application engineer, Audiologic, comments: “At the heart of the multi-use space are the Shure MXA910 Beam-forming array microphones. We’ve used the microphones for multiple purposes in LT1, including lecture capture, audience pickup for video conferencing and assistive listening feeds. With a theatre of this size, it was key that everyone within the space could be clearly heard by those that are now participating remotely.
“By combining the six MXAA910s and a careful commissioning process, we managed to get fantastic coverage and performance throughout. Management of the system is looked after by the QSC Core110f audio, video and control processor, as well as handling the camera tracking data. By reading gating data from the MXA910s we are able to recall camera positions within the room to make for a more intimate experience than just viewing the whole room. As always, it was a pleasure working alongside GVAV to deliver this project.”
Stuart Harris, technical sales manager, GVAV concludes: “By working with Audiologic, from conception to completion on this project, we really do believe we have delivered a high-end space for the university.”
