If the digital mechanics and infrastructure of Berea College confuse you, you’re not alone. First-year students and Google-acclimated staff members may have trouble adjusting to the Microsoft Office system that the College uses, but there are resources on campus that can help—one of which is the Tech-Tonics program.
The Tech-Tonics program is a Students First program offered to Berea College students, faculty, and staff. During one-on-one training sessions that you can schedule to suit your needs, a student expert or IT staff member can help you better understand various essential electronic areas at your own pace. These training sessions can be focused on Windows, Microsoft applications (Excel, Outlook, Word, etc.), myBerea, Box, and more.
Knowing these applications, from basic operations in Microsoft applications to advanced skills to make your life easier, will make the Berea hustle-bustle all the more manageable.
However, if one-on-one training sessions aren’t up to your speed, there is another option available to you: training modules on LinkedIn. The licenses for these training modules are supplied by the College, and the modules cover a variety of topics that cover the topics of the Tech-Tonics program and even extend beyond it. There are dozens of modules related to professional skills, from lessons in Microsoft applications to coding languages.
Shifting back to Tech-Tonics, the program has its roots in a concerned GSTR 110 professor whose first-year students were having significant trouble navigating the Microsoft Office system of the College, as well as myBerea and Windows in general.
Some of these students likely came from Google-acclimated academic spaces and have little to no experience with Microsoft Office. Regardless of these students’ specific circumstances, the students and staff at the IT department are offering their assistance to those who need it.
In the first week of the program alone—from October 8th to the 15th—eleven people signed up for one-on-one lessons, ~80% of whom were students and ~20% of whom were staff. The most popular training topic was Windows, followed by Microsoft Office.
Phillip Logsdon, Chief Information Officer at IT, is interested in “meeting people where the need is.” He finds that training people one-on-one on their own time allows instruction to be catered more closely to those being instructed. This change removes potential inhibiting factors found in group training sessions like answering bias or social stigma attached to a limited understanding of software systems.
With that being said, the one-on-one meetings with IT staff are no-judgement zones. Those who sign up for specific time slots can expect student experts and IT staff to meet them where they are—that is the philosophy of the Tech-Tonics program.
Logsdon is invested in the Tech-Tonics program not only for its ability to meet people where they need assistance but also in its capacity to help students in IT grow professionally. Instructing their peers and College staff hones IT students’ knowledge of the systems they’re teaching about, which benefits the instructor as much as the one being instructed.
Logsdon is also impressed by the expansive options available with the LinkedIn training modules. The training tools available on LinkedIn extend to more advanced lessons, such as advanced lessons in Photoshop, and more. He emphasized that it would be wise to capitalize on resources like the Tech-Tonics program and LinkedIn modules while they are available.
The Tech-Tonics program made its debut in the Fall 2024 semester and will continue with scheduled one-on-one appointments until December. Logsdon and the IT department are running the program and seeing how it goes, with the hope it will continue well into the spring.
To schedule a one-on-one appointment with a student expert or IT staff member, you can do so here.
If you are interested in the LinkedIn training modules, you can find and access them here. Note that you will need to use your college credentials to claim an activated account to use the licenses provided by Berea College.
If you have any questions, you can contact Phillip Logsdon at logsdonp@berea.edu or the IT Help Desk at (859) 985-3343 or help_desk@berea.edu.
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