Back in the dark days of the pre-Internet age, students had to rely on college papers and rubbish rag mags for news and information tailored to their needs. Not any more. Two recently launched Irish websites, Businessed and Campus are aiming to fill what was a very considerable gap.
Businessed (www.businessed.net) gives students a weekly update on business news. Produced in association with Athlone Institute of Technology, it was moved to a website when 90 universities worldwide responded to the e-magazine. The subscription list includes Oxford University, the London School of Economics and institutes in Kenya, Latvia, and South Africa.
College lecturers and librarians can get what the site calls The Business Eccountant by e-mail each Sunday night. This tracks news from 40 companies worldwide, as well as giving other business news in brief. It aids students by allowing them keep in touch with "live case-studies". There is no subscription fee for this facility.
Businessed's editor Paul Prendergast, who provides much of the content, says that without the assistance and co-operation of other business school staff the project could have floundered. Athlone IT director Professor Ciaran O'Cathain says "the collaborative venture which engaged experts from several departments is part of a developing college ethos".
There are many good features to the site. The internal search engine is fast, accurate and comprehensive, which is all you can ask of any such device. The Graduate Jobs section will be a great selling point (and serves as a poke-in-the-eye for the Celtic Tiger nay-sayers). The business links section is good, but should be expanded.
Overall, the only gripe with the site is that the background can make things a little difficult to read at times. However, with the archive facility going right back to the first issue, this site is very well worth visiting for any business student or lecturer. It is also great to see an Irish publication supplying information to so many different colleges around the world.
Campus (www.campus.ie), which was launched on September 18, aims to offer a complete range of services and information for Irish students, customised to each college. Its homepage is a busy and bright place, which is always a good way to greet new visitors. The first thing that catches your eye here is an invitation to register for what they call MyLocker.
In what is likely to be a popular option, MyLocker offers 10 megabytes of storage space. A major boon to those with home as well as college-based Internet access as it allows the user to store projects and files that they are working on. Thus the student can easily work on the same document at home and in college without the need for a floppy disc which can get corrupted when bounced in a bag.
The site offers free e-mail addresses, reasoning that people need one outside their college address as these become inactive once you graduate. There is also an online planner into which students can add events and tasks to act as a reminder to themselves.
Once the technical advantages are availed of, the site also contains national and campus news stories. National news is sourced from the Irish Examiner. When you register, campus.ie will automatically customise the site to your college based on the information you provide. That means college news, sport, local clubs, part-time jobs, local accommodation and lots more that relates to the individual. According to its own PR, this makes it 39 sites in one. There is also the option to view news from other campuses if you wish - something which will be handy if planning to go to another town for a college gig, for instance - and you are invited to send in contributions to the site by e-mail.
