PBL furnishings in PRESENT

The physical arrangement of PRESENT reinforces collaborative principles by emphasizing flexibility and multi-person workspaces. Traditional labs tend to seat one person to a computer while traditional classrooms tend to use inflexible seating facing the front for lecture style presentations. The entrance to PRESENT leads immediately to what appears to be a single round table. In reality it is composed of two hexagonal tables on wheels so that they can be easily rearranged. The round table can accommodate up to six participants. All initial discussions take place around this table. The focus is on the participants and their learning goals and not on equipment. We have hookups for a projector, Ethernet and power built inconspicuously into the floor so that a laptop can be attached and projected at anytime it is appropriate during the discussion. All the chairs are on wheels for ease of rearranging and regrouping. 

After initial discussions, participants move to multi-person multimedia workspaces. There are no cubicles separating workstations. This is a consulting site allowing for spontaneous interactions. There are 6 workspaces with enough space to accommodate 3 people at one multimedia computer. There is enough room to set up a laptop along side the desktop computers. All of the workstations connect to a projector and can be projected at anytime to the screen in the front of the room. Everyone in the room can see and comment on what is projected on the screen. For additional flexibility, the side wall of PRESENT is movable and opens up onto a conference room. For larger gatherings, we use conference room round table which comfortably seats 12 people. It is composed of 6 hexagonal tables on wheels which can be moved and grouped into smaller clusters depending on the need. This room also has a projector, and we can project from one room to the other or we can project the same thing in both rooms.