An exciting peice of news from the University of Colorado! Many of us have
been working on this project for the past year and are happy to make the
following announcement...
Press Release:
Contacts: Bob Nero or Brad Bohlander
University of Colorado, Office of Institutional Relations
303.492.6206
Nero Cell: 303.263.2191 Bohlander Cell: 303.908.0729
CU Receives Largest Gift Ever Given Public University
Quarter-Billion Dollars to Fund Institute for Cognitive Disabilities
DENVER, Colo. (Jan. 16)--University of Colorado president Elizabeth Hoffman
today accepted the largest gift ever given an American public
university--$250 million--from Bill Coleman, founder and chairman of BEA
Systems of San Jose, Calif., and his wife, Claudia, a former manager with
Hewlett-Packard. The endowment will fund advanced research and development
of innovative technologies to enhance the lives of people with cognitive
disabilities. Cognitive disabilities are associated with a number of
conditions, such as mental retardation and developmental disabilities.
The quarter-billion-dollar endowment, to be paid over five years, will be
used to establish the University of Colorado Coleman Institute for
Cognitive Disabilities.
"This unprecedented gift is a tribute to the Colemans' generosity and
vision, as well as to the university's growing reputation for work in
developmental disabilities and assistive technology," said Hoffman. "The
Colemans' vision, as well as ours, is that the Institute will make CU the
international center of excellence in developing adaptive assistive
technologies, based on advanced biomedical and computer science research,
for people with cognitive disabilities."
Hoffman said, the gift would be used primarily to build on existing
interdisciplinary research and develop new and creative multi-campus
partnerships. A small portion may be used to enhance facilities for these
activities.
"The Institute is designed to break through the barriers that separate a
wide array of programs and encourage the cross-pollination of ideas that
foster real innovation," Hoffman said.
-more-
Bill Coleman, a U.S. Air Force Academy graduate and a former executive with
Sun Microsystems, said the idea for the gift stems from a tour of CU's
Center for LifeLong Learning and Design following his visit as a guest
lecturer in a freshman computer science class.
"I saw some of the incredible research being done in cognitive science,
including the use of computer-based technologies to support lifelong
learning and online community building," Coleman said. "I saw a connection
with the work my company, BEA Systems, has been doing with the development
of personalization technology for the Internet and possible techniques to
help those with cognitive disabilities."
Coleman said that he and his wife, who have a niece with special needs,
understand the benefits and the promise new technologies can offer people
with cognitive disabilities.
"We have witnessed the challenges this population faces every day with
problem solving, reasoning skills and understanding and using language," he
said. "I passionately believe that we as a society have the intelligence
and the responsibility to develop technologies that will expand the ability
of those with cognitive disabilities to learn, to understand and to
communicate."
In addition to developmental disabilities, such as Down Syndrome and
autism, the term "cognitive disability" covers a wide range of conditions
in which cognitive functioning is impaired, including certain traumatic
brain injuries, stroke and various forms of dementia such as Alzheimer's
disease.
Coleman said he hopes the Institute will create a "space program effect"
through which adaptive assistive technologies developed for people with
cognitive disabilities will find application in the broader population.
The Colemans, who have a home in Aspen, Colo., plan to play an active role
in the Institute. They said the gift would not have been made without
Hoffman's personal commitment to the project and the "incredibly strong"
team of researchers CU has marshaled to support the initiative.
"I have made a personal commitment to leverage the Colemans' gift by
obtaining additional funding from government, individuals and industry,"
Hoffman said. "I expect this exciting enterprise to become the premier
example of the new 'venture philanthropy,' which, I believe, will have a
central role in shaping research universities in the 21st century."
-more-
The Coleman Institute will be the first system-wide institute in CU's
history. Helping design the Institute are Michael Lightner, Ph.D.,
associate dean for Special Projects in CU Boulder's College of Engineering
and Applied Science, and David Braddock, Ph.D., a leading expert on
cognitive disabilities, head of the Department of Disability and Human
Development at the University of Illinois at Chicago and former president
of the American Association on Mental Retardation.
Lightner said one of the challenges facing the cognitive
disabilities field is to understand how people with cognitive disabilities
learn and perceive the world around them, and then to develop tools that
complement an individual's own brain function and continuously learn from
the user's daily activities.
"There have been many assistive technology devices for people with
cognitive disabilities, ranging from simple homemade systems to
sophisticated communication enhancers and prompting systems," Lightner
said. "But what we've found is that the current devices tend to be
relatively expensive, often cumbersome and, most importantly, they do not
continuously and automatically adapt to the environment of the user.
"Current data reveal that, for a variety of reasons, about half of
assistive technology devices for those with cognitive disabilities are
abandoned within three months. Building on advances in biomedical research,
computer technologies for continuous learning, adaptation and
customization, and the convergence of computing and communications, one of
the Institute's goals is to significantly reduce the abandonment rate and
improve the quality of many types of assistive devices for those living
with cognitive disabilities," he said.
Braddock said the scope of the cognitive disabilities field is such that
the new Institute must develop partnerships across multiple disciplines at
CU and eventually involve other universities and research organizations.
The Institute also must establish partnerships with private, state,
national and international support programs.
"The Institute has the capacity to create a bridge among health sciences,
computer science, information science and technology, and special
education and to create a research focus that provides critical mass that's
truly a beacon of light and hope for individuals with cognitive
disabilities and their families," said Braddock.
The Institute's activities will begin with a partnership between CU's
Boulder campus and the CU Health Sciences Center campus. As the Institute
develops, all four CU campuses,
-more-
which also include CU Colorado Springs and CU Denver, will be involved in
the Institute's work.
On the Boulder campus, the Institute's initial focus will be in the
College of Engineering and Applied Science, where work has already begun in
the Computer Science Department's Center for LifeLong Learning and Design.
Also involved will be the College of Engineering's nationally recognized
educational programs in the Integrated Teaching and Learning Laboratory
(ITLL) and the Discovery Learning Center (DLC). The ITLL focuses on
hands-on, teams-based education and the DLC integrates undergraduates into
the College's research activities.
Other CU Boulder partners offering expertise in the area of cognitive
disabilities include the Institute of Cognitive Sciences, the Psychology
Department, the Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Science and the
Center for Spoken Language Understanding. A key to the Institute's success
will be the partnership between researchers on the Boulder campus and the
Health Sciences Center, where CU has internationally recognized researchers
and clinicians in the area of developmental disabilities. The Health
Sciences Center researchers include experts in assistive technology,
autism, fragile X syndrome, augmentative communication and communication
research for those with cognitive disabilities. The Health Sciences Center
and its affiliated institutes are also known for biomedical research into
the causes of Down Syndrome and ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease).
The work at the Health Sciences Center is currently focused in the
departments of Psychiatry and Pediatrics, the Colorado Mental Retardation
and Developmental Disabilities Research Center (one of just 14 in the
nation), the JFK Partners (founded in 1966) and the affiliated Eleanor
Roosevelt Institute.
The University of Colorado system is comprised of four campuses, Boulder,
Colorado Springs, Denver and the Health Sciences Center. The campuses have
a combined enrollment of approximately 46,000 students.
The University of Colorado ranks 15th among public universities and
colleges in overall research expenditures and ninth among public
universities in federally funded research. Sponsored research activities
within the university system generate approximately $450 million per year.
Elizabeth Hoffman has been President of the University of Colorado system
since September 1, 2000.
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James A. Rebman
Cognitive Levers Project
Center for Life-Long Learning and Design (L3D)
Department of Computer Science
College of Engineering and Applied Science
University of Colorado, Boulder
"In times of change, the learners will inherit the earth, while the learned
will find themselves beautifully equipped for a world that no longer exists."
- Eric Hoffer
"...and the times they are a changin'..."
- Bob Dylan
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