CATS (Computer Assisted Teaching System)

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Introduction
The Design Philosophy
The CATS System
Available Modules
CATS Developers
Future Plans

photo by Owen Stayner

Introduction

In the summer of 1993, the Department of Pathology began a project to develop a computer assisted teaching system (CATS) to serve as an additional educational tool for our medical students. In generic terms, the structure of the tool consists of one large capacity computer, referred to as a file server, connected via a network to smaller units that function as workstations. The file server is designed primarily for distributing ("serving") programs and data to the workstations over the network, and for developing these programs. Each workstation is dependent on the file server, but is independent of the other workstations. The workstations can be physically separated in space within the limits of an Ethernet network that can easily span different buildings on campus. The file server is the hub of a development laboratory to be described below.

The innate appeal of this system is its ability to be uniquely customized for a department's or school's curricular needs. The software of the system combines text with images and simulations that are relevant to both basic science and clinical science learning. The format allows an essentially infinite number of links to be created in the program, so that images or information provided by one faculty member can be linked to relevant information put into the system by another faculty member.

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The Design Philosophy

The design philosophy of the software is oriented around the notion that the student is, within reason, master of the process. The student is able to manipulate the system to suit his/her own learning style and needs. Programs and the subjects served by them are structured around menus and branching fork patterns that can quickly take the student to the areas of study desired. Any particular subject can be treated as a collection of facts, images, theories, problems, questions and practical applications that is linked together by the software. This allows the student to traverse through the various parts of a subject more or less in any order, to whatever depth is available and for whatever time period is allowed. Clearly, such an approach has the advantage of presenting information of greatest interest and concern to the student, in the order and priority desired. Just as clearly, it challenges the student to formulate his or her own sense of completeness in studying the subject in this fashion, and is likely to be good training for the self learning skills ultimately demanded of these future physicians. The system has revolutionized the way pathology and other disciplines are taught in the College of Medicine, with more emphasis on small group, interactive, problem-based learning, rather than large lectures and laboratories.

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The CATS System

CATS is a Macintosh-based system composed of a six gigabite Workgroup Server 95-based server, two Power PC-based development stations, a Quadra 800-based image capturing system and student workstations (six set up at the moment). The major software being used for creating multimedia programs is Authorware Professional (Macromedia) that allows for scripting of an infinite variety of text/graphic/image combinations. The basic notion is to create a multimedia, interactive, image-based system that will facilitate student learning for individuals or small groups. The system combines text, graphics and images collected using our image capturing station. The station is capable of capturing images from glass histologic slides, 2 X 2 kodachromes or photographs using digital camera mounted on a microscope, a slide scanner, or a flatbed scanner. One of the basic tenets of the system is an investment of medical student and pathology resident time to participate in its development. Since the onset of the project in the Summer of 1993, eleven medical students, two undergraduate students, and one pathology resident have participated in system development. The pathology resident, Mark Tuthill, serves as the network administrator and project co-director.

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Available Modules

The Pathology Slide Box is now complete, and it is currently available for student access on the workstations in the departmental teaching lab. Dr. Jerome Fiekers in the Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology has completed the development of the Histology Slide Box which provides students with simultaneous access to normal histologic features of tissue. Dr. Fiekers has pursued this project with independent funding but in collaboration with the development laboratory.
In addition, the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine within Fletcher Allen Health Care has introduced IntelliPath for use by pathology residents to aid in surgical pathology training. This extant program is a video disk oriented software package that combines a compilation of surgical pathology with actual case material and literature reviews. The faculty in the Anatomic Pathology Division are enthusiastic that this program will significantly augment the surgical pathology repertoire of our graduating residents.

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CATS Developers

Project Director W.W. Pendlebury, M.D. Professor, Department of Pathology College of Medicine University of Vermont Burlington, VT 05405 (802) 656-0383 wpendleb@zoo.uvm.edu	Project Co-Director J. Mark Tuthill Resident, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine College of Medicine University of Vermont Burlington, VT 05405 (802) 656-0076 jm.tuthill@vtmednet.org
Senior Technician Judith Kessler College of Medicine University of Vermont Burlington, VT 05405 (802) 656-0076 jkessler@salus.uvm.edu	Program Developer Jill Robin Zimmer College of Medicine University of Vermont Burlington, VT 05405 (802) 656-0076 jzimmer@zoo.uvm.edu

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Future Plans

We are nearing the completion of our next major project, the Electronic Lecture, which will provide students computer access to all lectures given in the Pathology 301 (General) /302 (Systemic) course. These will be based on course outlines and the actual 2 X 2 kodachromes used in lectures in the two courses. We will continue to utilize student developers for much of this work, and we hope to add additional workstations to increase the accessibility to the system to the students. We are currently exploring available software packages that will allow us to monitor student use of the system to quantify its value.

Our greatest endeavor, by far, has been our current project, aimed at providing the Electronic Lecture and Slidebox to students and physicians over the World Wide Web. The Electronic Lecture outlines for much of Pathology 302 (Systemic) are currently available over the Web, and we plan to complete our Web Electronic Lecture and Slidebox collection by the fall of 1998.

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Questions? Comments? Send a message to the CATS guru: jkessler@salus.uvm.edu