Technology is at the forefront of higher education and Touro College of Pharmacy is among the first colleges of pharmacy in the country to embrace its use by adopting a blended curriculum!  A blended curriculum incorporates classroom and laboratory instruction with community experiences and the use of technology to enhance learning.  This means that opportunities for learning are found in-class, online, in the community, and on your own.

With this emphasis on technology in the classroom and its varied uses, students have the opportunity to broaden the way they learn, using tools they have become familiar with in their daily lives to build on the learning that happens in the classroom. In class, faculty members use a variety of active learning teaching strategies to engage students and help them develop a deeper understanding of the material. Students can then review and reinforce their grasp of material presented in class through web-based activities while completing work when and where it is convenient for them. Also, students may be required to take in-class computer-based examinations.

In order to function in this environment, students should own or have convenient access to a reliable computer with broadband* Internet access at their primary place of study. This computer should be at minimum a Netbook†-type computer with the following system specifications:

    1. Intel® ATOM™ Processor N570/2600 or higher performing dual core microprocessor
    2. 2 GB system RAM or above, (4GB system RAM if running 64 bit version operating systems)
    3. 10.1” WSVGA or larger screen size
    4. Operating system: MS Windows 7; Apple OS X 10.5 or above  
      • Install Apple Boot Camp or VMWare Fusion 4 with 64-bit editions of Microsoft Windows 7.
    5. MS Office Suite 2010, (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) or MS Office for the Mac 2011
    6. Ability to view Adobe Flash and Adobe pdf files
    7. Web browser: MS Explorer 9 or FireFox 11 or Google Chrome 18
    8. WiFi 802.11g or above

    Generally, computer performance increases with price. Nevertheless, students should not feel compelled to purchase expensive hardware. Laptop computers costing less than $1,000 are readily available with more than adequate performance for successful participation in your studies‡. Students should feel comfortable performing basic computer tasks including using email, opening and closing files, and creating word-processing documents and navigating the Internet using a Web browser. Training in Blackboard, Touro’s course management system, will be provided.

    

    *Broadband as define by the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is data transmission speeds of at least 4 megabits per second (Mbps), downstream (from the Internet to the user’s computer) and 1 Mbit/s upstream (from the user’s computer to the Internet)

    †Netbook is a term trademarked by Psion. Manufacturers of this type of computer include Asus, Hewlett Packard and Lenovo among others.

    ‡ If you are unsure about any of these matters and want further clarification, please refer additional questions to Dr. Fisher, john.fisher@touro.edu