The University also offers financial support through its Teaching with Technology Learning Center. The TTLC offers small grants often used for release time to help faculty initiate courseware development with technology. A faculty collaborator explains:

The University was very supportive. There was equipment support and small grants from the TTLC, Teaching with Technology Learning Center. You can apply for a faculty development grant there; you can get money to develop courses; so there is support from the administration to do things like that. (Elias Deeba)

Status
Use of technology in one's curriculum reform seems to bring some status to UHD faculty. There are two avenues for being recognized when doing such work: First is the teaching award mentioned above. It is important to note that although the college algebra reformers have not yet been given the teaching award, their colleague who uses technology in his teaching of linear algebra has. This award winner comments on the campus culture.

I think my use of technology had an impact on them selecting me for the award. (Elias Deeba)

Second, UHD enjoys the exposure and marketing benefits from the technology work done by its faculty. As a result, faculty involved in these activities enjoy a small status advantage.

Cultural Shift
Faculty who have implemented reform at UHD have faced challenges from both students and faculty colleagues who are hesitant to accept it. The faculty's central objection was the issue of content reduction in the college algebra course, but there was also opposition to new technology, as explained by one of the reformers:

I think the biggest challenge is trying to get your peers to accept the idea, the change. That still hasn't happened. The main issue has to do with content. They feel like content is being taken out. In addition, they are not familiar with the technology, and they don't want to learn anything new. They don't want to change the way they teach. But fortunately no one has told us we can't change. (Ongard Sirisaengtaksin, Faculty)

The use of technology in the reformed college algebra course also provided some peer pressure for colleagues to use modern techniques at least to present, if not reform, course content. At this time, faculty colleagues feel comfortable because they don't have to engage in these activities, but some are wondering, if in the future, they will be asked to. An administrator gives his assessment of faculty and student views of the math department's use of technology:

In the math group, you'll find a lot of faculty who are very resistant to using much technology in the classroom. In courses like college algebra and calculus, many of the instructors still want to use the old methods. They are finding that some students are reluctant to accept the technology as well. When we can, we'll put in two sections at the same time, one being traditional and another using some technology. When we do that, we find a lot of switching around as we move along. I've had students come in here and say, "I don't want to buy a calculator," or "the course I had, I'm repeating it, I don't want to learn something new. I want to do it the old way."

This comment quickly reminds one of the UHD culture where reform, even if it is successful, cannot be imposed on other colleagues. The departments at the University appear to be very compartmentalized. Each group managing one or more courses is fairly free to implement new approaches, as long as others are not required to use them. Hence use of new methods on the part of some faculty does not seem to have created department conflicts or affected tenure and promotion decisions.

I don't think that there have been any problems or conflicts. The faculty seem to be happy with the fact that it's ok to use various methods, as long they aren't forced on the rest of us. That is sort of the attitude. So I don't think there's any problem at all. People are, I think, working together very well in the department in terms of the program committees. Whether they use technology or don't use technology has not been an issue in terms of getting tenure.

Like some faculty, some students also have not been easily convinced of the efficacy of using technology. Given that most of them can spend only a limited amount of time on coursework, any activities they perceive as superfluous are not welcomed. A collaborator comments:

Another challenge is to convince the students that these computer-based activities are good for them. That still continues to be a problem because they don't see the need for these methods. They want to do it fast and go. My job is to convince them how very important this type of activity is for them. (Elias Deeba)

Time is not the only factor in the students' resistance. Some are still not entirely comfortable using computers and have completely internalized the value of traditional methods for teaching mathematics. One reformer explains:

The computer is still something new to our students. Talk about student resistance, I've had this comment more than once, and this is really funny. They'll be complaining about the way the course is taught, and they'll say, "You know I've had this course before," meaning that they've taken it and either dropped it or failed it. "I've had this course before, and this is not the way it's supposed to be done." So even though they may be successful in the technology-based course, they are still telling me that I've got to get with the program. "You're not supposed to be teaching it this way," they'll say. "This is a math course; this isn't a writing course. Why are you asking me to write a sentence?" (Linda Becerra, Faculty)

Organizational Savvy
Getting reform implemented in the college algebra course at UHD required little organizational know-how for the faculty. Classroom and laboratory modifications needed for the reform to take hold were and are being done by the College for reasons not directly connected to college algebra. However, one important change worth noting was the reformers' ability to get UHD to agree to commit one technical support person to the math department, so they would not need to rely on the less responsive college-wide technical staff:

In terms of having our own technical support in the department, we've been able to convince the administration that it's a necessity. The reason is that we got external grants to build the lab, and in the grants they promised that we would have technical support. So they didn't have much choice, if they signed off on it, but to go along with it. (Bill Waller, Faculty)