News for and about the Internet2 community

[Dan Downing <>]

News from the Ohio Supercomputer Center
May 18, 2005
 
OSC Supercomputers, Third Frontier Network to Power
Megaconference Jr
 
Worthington Kilbourne, Thomas Worthington High School Students
will Participate from OSC Headquarters
 
Columbus, OH – May 18, 2005 - More than 200 school
districts and thousands of students will participate May 19th
in Megaconference Junior, a project designed to give students in
elementary and secondary schools across the country and around the world
the opportunity to communicate, collaborate and contribute to each
other's learning experiences in real time, using advanced multi-point
Internet videoconferencing technology. Megaconfernece Jr will run
Thursday May 19, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. 
 
More than a dozen countries worldwide are participating in the second
annual Megaconference Jr, with a variety of presentation subjects such as
Human Rights Issues, Marine Laboratories, U.S. Constitutional Amendments,
The Great Lakes, Native American Tribal Dancing, Robotics, and Rain
Forests. Additional presentations are being conducted by the U.S.
Department of Education, the British Consulate in Indonesia, the U.S.
Library of Congress, a tour of Barcelona, the Cleveland Museum of Art,
and African Poetry and Art. 
 
Megaconference Jr will be streamed live for those interested in viewing.
For more information and a complete listing of events go to
www.megaconferencejr.org
and select “Streaming” from the Event Day column.
 
Worthington Kilbourne High School teacher Kevin Johnson said his
students are very excited to participate in Megaconference Jr this year.
 
“The use of advanced technology for helping students and teachers around
the world gain a deeper understanding of our different cultures is
invaluable. This event will help to break the walls of our schools and
engage students with issues that are meaningful to them,” Johnson said.
“Beyond the Megaconference experience, our students will hopefully
continue to build new bridges of learning and communication with students
around the world through the use of technology at home and in their
school.”
 
K-12 students from the Netherlands, Canada, Taiwan, England, the United
States, Spain, Japan, the United Arab Emirates, China, Russia, Malta,
Pakistan, Australia, Ghana, the Philippines, and Singapore are
participating in Megaconference Jr, and will use this pioneering
communications technology to addresses local, national and international
curriculum standards, and interact in panel discussions, science
presentations, and even songs, dances and games. 
 
The Ohio Supercomputer Center (OSC) and its networking division, OARnet,
provide the technical support for Megaconference Jr. including managing
the Network Operations Center (NOC) for global Internet2 H.323 Services.
OSC is a technology initiative of the Ohio Board of Regents. Everyone
participating in Megaconference Jr. is routed through the OARnet Support
Center (located on The Ohio State University West Campus), which provides
services such as testing connections and connecting participants to the
conference through Multipoint Control Units (MCUs).
 
OSC Executive Director Stan Ahalt said deploying the underlying
technology for Megaconference Jr is both an honor and a challenge for the
Center.
 
“As the technical hub for Megaconference Jr our engineering staff work
many hours for months in advance to make sure this technology works at
hundreds of locations around the world. Our staff are some of the
brightest and most dedicated individuals in this field, and their
dedication to using technology to bring the students of the world
together in this cross-cultural forum is part of the larger mission of
OSC,” Ahalt said.
 
Supercomputers from the Ohio Supercomputer Center and the Mid-Atlantic
GigaPoP in Philadelphia for Internet2 (MAGPI) are being used to run the
MCUs and other technical and network resources. Ohio’s new high-speed
statewide fiber optic network, the Third Frontier Network (TFN), will
handle Megaconference Jr traffic throughout the state, and the Internet2
network will handle nationwide traffic. Internet2 is the national
high-performance backbone for advanced networking applications
development that connects more than 200 universities throughout the
United States and to networks in dozens of countries worldwide.
 
OSC Engineer Arif Khan, one of the lead technical organizers for
the event, said he is amazed to see how much this event grows with each
consecutive year. 
 
“This year we have more than twice as many locations as last year, and it
just keeps growing. We finally had to turn people away who wanted to
participate because our schedule is overflowing with presentations,” Khan
said. “The students are very excited about this event, and some of them
have been planning their presentations for the past year. Megaconference
Jr will definitely set the example for how students throughout the world
can use technology to break down barriers of place and time to
communicate with, and learn from, each other.”
 
Presenters, activity leaders, and audience members in Megaconference Jr.
include students, teachers and technical staff from elementary, middle
and high schools around the world. Presenters design and conduct
videoconference-based presentations and activities.
 
Building international cultural and academic awareness is a major
component of Megaconference Jr., and participants will have opportunities
to address questions to presenters and collaborate with their
geographically dispersed peers in this collaborative learning
environment. It also helps students and teachers develop the capacity to
effectively utilize high-speed networks, Internet videoconferencing, and
other emerging technologies that enhance the learning experience.
 
For more information about the Ohio Supercomputer Center go to 
www.osc.edu
 
Media Contact:
Dan Downing
Ohio Supercomputer Center
614-688-3949

Dan Downing
Public Relations Coordinator
Ohio Supercomputer Center
Ohio Academic Resources Network
Third Frontier Network
1224 Kinnear Road
Columbus, Ohio, 43212
phone (614) 688-3949
fax (614) 292-7168

www.osc.edu
www.oar.net
www.tfn.oar.net