Introduction
Prof. Christopher Plummer’s classes go way beyond music and sound coursework. His vision is to build a culture where students create mixes, support one another, and learn from each other’s creativity. He only lacked the means to enable such creativity and collaboration. Having looked at other tools, Prof. Plummer ultimately decided on Pibox.
“Pibox keeps us talking to the students and giving them feedback, and students interacting with each other instead of fighting technology.”
Christopher Plummer,
Professor, Visual and Performing Arts at MTU
About Michigan Tech and Prof. Christopher Plummer
Michigan Technological University is a public research university founded in 1885. Sound Design and Audio Production & Technology programs prepare students for their careers as audio content creators in any context.
Professor Christopher Plummer runs the sound programs at Michigan Tech. He sees the purpose of his work in the success of his students — when they walk into high-level jobs right after graduation. His students have been on tour with Taylor Swift, Madonna, and Lady Gaga. Some of them do award-winning sound designs for video games and work in the National Archives, the Smithsonian, installing Iron Man.
Challenges and Goals
Previously, Michigan Tech had its own gigabit network with shared drive space. Students would turn in their mixes in a folder there. Then the professors typed up comments and added timestamps separately. Because they had to be looking through so much student work, the feedback might not be that detailed. Quite often, the teachers had to review the work and schedule follow-up one-on-one meetings with students. When the number of enrollments increased, professor Plummer realized the process wasn’t feasible anymore.
“We used SoundCloud for a while. Dealing with compressed audio was an issue, especially for the students who were getting good. We couldn’t get into as much detail as we wanted”
says Prof. Plummer.
Prof.Plummer started looking for tools to enable detailed timeline commenting and discovered Pibox.
After switching to Pibox, Christopher can focus on his work and his students’ work without any distractions.
“I immediately liked the interface, it was cleaner. I was looking at just the stuff I wanted to look at.”
says Prof. Plummer.
Results
Five-six hours saved on system setup
A simple tool enabling creativity
Effortless remote collaboration
Five-six hours saved on system setup
With Pibox, Michigan Tech made vital improvements to its educational process. First of all, when onboarding new students, Christopher doesn’t have to write step-by-step instructions on how to use different tools, and where each student needs to go to start working.
Pibox saves Christopher up to five-six hours per semester since the system is set up exactly the way he needs.
“Even if I invite somebody who’s less technical, I add them into
the group and they get to work. I’ve never had any questions from them. So that’s just amazing. Because that can eat up time real fast.”
says Prof. Plummer.
A simple tool enabling creativity
Now the entire class is in a single Pibox project, and everyone posts their work there. Students go through their classmates’ mixes and comment on them. Often, that process of listening to other people’s work, seeing other people’s approaches brings out the best ideas and encourages students to strive for more.
“It’s so much more powerful for the bar to be set by their peers than by the instructor. Because, you know, we’re old folks, and they are here to study from us. But sometimes they don’t take us seriously because we’re just teachers. So learning from other people’s creativity in your class is super, super valuable.”
says Prof. Plummer.
Being able to do that on the exact timeline and having high-quality audio makes this process easier and more fun.
Effortless remote collaboration
Pibox also levels up remote collaboration with professional actors for Michigan Tech. Since the university is located in a remote part of the United States, the artistic community in the area is small. So Michigan Tech is hiring outside professionals to work with students on directing and producing radio dramas. Thanks to Pibox, it’s easy for the actors to listen to the student’s mixes to see how their performance is fitting in with the sound effects, and then create another version of their performance if needed.
“It’s enabled us to teach more students more effectively. It’s helped us create this community, and it’s allowed us to do things that just aren’t possible without it.”
says Prof. Plummer.
Michigan Tech and Prof. Plummer continues to use Pibox successfully and has started testing the new functionality – video review for their film sound design class.
Do You Want To Review Tracks Faster, Cut Costs,
And Grow Your Customer Base?
Pibox is an all-in-one place to review, discuss
and share creative content.