OrlandO ( January 27, 2005) - Questia Media, Inc. today integrated the world’s largest online academic library into secondary school instruction by announcing the arrival of the Questia Classroom. The Questia Classroom is the first course management system (CMS) to be attached to a vast scholarly collection of full-text copyrighted and public domain material. Currently offered at no charge to schools purchasing Questia’s online library, the Questia Classroom enables teachers to efficiently interact with students online and engage students in a 21 st century learning environment.
“The modern classroom thrives on interaction and collaboration among students, teachers, and technology,” said Troy Williams, president and CEO of Questia. “The Questia Classroom not only provides anytime, anywhere access to an academically-vetted collection of research materials, it also delivers a forum that encourages student-teacher interaction and provides an invigorating learning experience .”
The Questia Classroom is an online CMS that allows teachers to easily create, plan, and manage unique course material while leveraging the power of a built-in, online library collection that is continually growing. With the Questia Classroom, educators gain access to a wealth of academic resources and tools including more than 50,000 full-text books and 400,000 journal, magazine, and newspaper articles focused in the English Language Arts and Social Studies disciplines.
Students using the Questia Classroom develop modern research skills as they complete assignments online with the aid of dynamic research tools and gain 24/7 access to resource materials that can be viewed simultaneously by multiple users. Students can quickly and easily set their own workspace and reading preferences, create project folders and personal bookshelves, and automatically develop properly formatted footnotes and bibliographies in seven different citation styles. With Questia, students also avoid the inherent hazards of the Internet, such as inappropriate content or non-academic material.
“Our faculty and students thrive with the Questia Classroom,” said Trina Trimm, principal of St. Lucie West Centennial High School in Port St. Lucie, Florida. “It’s an effective management tool that allows teachers to be creative while helping them stay organized in a busy setting. And, since the Internet is today’s preferred research method for students, the Questia Classroom keeps them excited about reading and studying while giving them a forum to be resourceful in a managed environment. The Questia Classroom will improve our overall academic performance and better prepare our students for the real world.”
Since the launch of its online academic library in January 2001, Questia has achieved widespread success among students, educators, and researchers in the higher education market. More recently, Questia has seen an increased demand for an online companion to physical libraries among the secondary school market due in part to increasing book prices and shrinking school district budgets. Using Questia as an online companion, school districts can affordably extend their physical library’s reach, capability, and availability for a fraction of the cost.
In the coming year, the Questia Classroom will expand to include additional functionalities to help fulfill its mission of integrating vital resources into secondary school curricula. “Educators have been excited about Questia’s service from the start,” continued Williams. “Now we look forward to taking the next step toward integrating a comprehensive online library into every classroom.”
Recently, Questia earned the Rookie of the Year Award at EdNET 2004, the Annual Educational and Telecommunications Markets Conference, by demonstrating the greatest potential to substantially impact the education community. Also, Questia recently donated a free, one year subscription to one librarian at every secondary school in America.
A demo of Questia Classroom can be found on the Questia website at www.questia.com.Founded in 1998, Questia Media, Inc., launched its revolutionary online library in January 2001, with powerful search and writing tools created specifically to help students do better research and write better papers. Questia provides unlimited access to the full content of an extensive collection of books and journal articles, as well as a wide range of tools, including highlighter, markup, automatic footnotes and bibliography builder. For millions of students and researchers, the Questia SM service enables them to efficiently research and compose papers at any time, from virtually every connected corner of the world. Based in Houston, Questia is delivering on the true promise of the Internet by providing access to a wealth of human knowledge.
Visit www.questia.com for more information.