Practicum and Thesis Opportunities
The Center for Dental Informatics at the School of Dental Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, offers exciting opportunities for students interested in a class project, practicum or thesis. The center has a very active research and information technology infrastructure program that offers many opportunities to put didactic skills into practice.
Project areas and applicable skills and technologies include:
| Project | Skills and technologies |
| Quantitative Image Analysis using Adobe® Photoshop® CS3 Extended: A student worker is required who possesses Photoshop CS3 technical skills as well as Web talents to become part of the development team for a cutting edge biomedical research educational resource. The project is funded by an Innovation in Education award from the University of Pittsburgh's Office of Provost's Advisory Council on the Instructional Excellence. | Good Photoshop CS3 features knowledge, advanced general computing including video and audio editing, familiarity with Web 2.0 technology: wiki use, social bookmarking, basic knowledge of CourseWeb/Blackboard course management system (see details about the position and the project) |
| Web design: The Center for Dental informatics maintains and develops several large Websites, and will undertake a major Web redesign project later this year. | Needs assessment, specification development, graphic and Web design, user interface design, usability tests HTML, Flash, XML, php, mySQL, JavaScript, Java |
| Online communities: The Center is working on the development of two online communities through NIH-funded projects. | Specification development, Web design, system architecture development, evaluation design, usability tests, knowledge management Web and database technologies, scripting |
| Educational software development: Several projects center on the development of cutting-edge educational software in clinical dentistry or the basic sciences. | Specification development, Web design, information design, educational design, adaptive learning, typography, user interface design Web and database technologies, programming (several languages) |
| Custom programming projects: Periodically, the Center requires small-scale programming projects for special needs. | Specification development, programming, testing, usability tests Java, C++, mySQL, Oracle, php4, JavaScript |
| Computer-based dental record projects: Currently, the Center is working on implementing a computer-based dental record for all patient care areas in the school. | Needs assessment, comparative product review, systems integration (various commercial platforms) |
The center offers opportunities for short- and long-term engagements for class projects, practica and theses. If you're interested, please contact: Dr. Heiko Spallek, Asst. Professor, Center for Dental Informatics, School of Dental Medicine, Phone: (412) 648-8886, Fax: (412) 648-9960, E-mail: hspallek@pitt.edu, http://www.dental.pitt.edu/informatics/.