CASTALIA LAUNCHES FEASIBILITY STUDY OF MOBILE LEARNING PLATFORM “Goocus” AS A JOINT PROJECT WITH ITALIAN ONLINE UNIVERSITY UNINETTUNO

Castalia Co., Ltd. (registered main office: Nagano, Japan / Headquarters: Tokyo, Japan / CEO: Satoshi Yamawaki / hereinafter “Castalia”) is launching a feasibility study to examine the efficacy of mobile learning using Castalia’s smartphone-based mobile learning platform “Goocus” in multinational higher education, as a joint project with Università Telematica Internazionale UNINETTUNO (hereinafter “UNINETTUNO”), an online university based in Italy.

 

EXPLORING THE EFFICACY OF MOBILE LEARNING WITH STUDENTS FROM MEDITERRANEAN COUNTRIES

This project will take place until September 2. 17 students mainly from Italy, as well as other European and Mediterranean countries such as the Middle East and North Africa, each of whom have different nationalities and cultural backgrounds, will join the project to examine Goocus through the learning of “Object-Oriented Programming”, the common course at UNINETTUNO, using their own mobile devices. The students have already studied the same course on the UNINETTUNO website using PCs; by comparing the two learning processes, we will look into the efficacy and the issues of learning in a mobile-based environment. After the learning process is complete, Castalia and UNINETTUNO will collect feedback on Goocus from the students to identify the areas for the improvement of the application, as well as the advantages of Goocus.

In this particular feasibility study, we launched a forum in order for the testers and the team (UNINETTUNO and Castalia) can communicate directly with one another upon possible troubles, so that we can accumulate the findings on uses by multicultural users. After the project is complete, we will collect data of the overall review, user profiles and their experiences to obtain more detailed information. The data will then be analyzed at Castalia’s research division as to its learning patterns and situations within the learning history.

 

Here is the statement from UNINETTUNO:
UNINETTUNO started in 1992 as the first Satellite TV channel on-air university in the world. Today we have developed one of the most advanced and interactive e-learning platform where students from 140 different countries are studying in 6 different languages with best professors.
In the time of mobile device and Web App UNINETTUNO is now engaged to improve his services to the global community of students and make even more accessible the University for everyone.
The partnership with Castalia is a further step on this direction, providing with GOOCUS all the students interested to our free courses will allow to test the new frontiers of distance learning and to explore new approaches to education within in mind needs and expectations of the new learners of the 21st century.


By further investigating on advantages and points of improvement of Goocus, and on the technological details of the use of smartphones in learning, Castalia will further strengthen the alliance with UNINETTUNO for their development of global online education.

 

■Università Telematica Internazionale (UNINETTUNO)
http://www.uninettunouniversity.net/en/informazioni.aspx

UNINETTUNO is an online school founded on April 15, 2005 in an ordinance of the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research. It offers undergraduate, graduate and doctorate titles that are legitimate in Italy, Europe, and in the Mediterranean countries. At UNINETTUNO, 43 high-profile instructors teach courses in Italian, English, French, Arabic, Greek and Polish, in real and virtual spaces over an e-Learning platform. Students from 140 countries pursue learning, free from any time or space limit.

■Castalia Co., Ltd.
http://www.castalia.co.jp/

Castalia Co., Ltd. (registered main office: Nagano, Japan / Headquarters: Tokyo, Japan) is a company that reinvents learning under the slogan of “find solutions to social problems with the fusion of education and IT”. We develop mobile learning platform “Goocus” and supply it to corporations and educational institutions. In addition, we collaborate with Shingakukai, an educational conglomerate that operates mainly in Nagano Prefecture, for the curriculum design at Code Academy High School ( http://code.ac.jp ), Japan’s first extensive correspondence high school that sets programming (coding) as mandatory subject.

 

【For more information and interview requests, please contact : Castalia Co., Ltd.】

Email : info AT castalia.co.jp   (When you contact us, convert AT into at sign.)

 

Download this press release here.
150803_Castalia_UNINETTUNO_en