New Media Research Institute

The New Media Research Institute is proud to collaborate with ITT Visual Information Solutions to build the tools that educators nationwide can use to develop data literacy in the United States. With key funding by NASA's Science Mission Directorate, and NASA Earth System Science, NMRI uses it's IDL-based authoring tools to develop software for education in a wide variety of settings outside the usual research laboratory setting where IDL is found.

You can read about this effort on the ITT Visual Information Solutions website:
IDL Donations Help Foster Early Interest in Scientific Data Exploration

Here is an exerpt:
"ITT Visual Information Solutions, the developers of IDL, donate the runtime IDL licenses for distributed DIAL applications. 'We are committed to promoting interest in the sciences in the younger student community,' said IDL Product Manager Bill Okubo. 'Providing these licenses encourages students to see the potential in scientific discovery, without the need to learn a complex tool geared to high level research.'

New Media Research Institute finds funding in scientific organizations that share in their vision of cultivating future scientists and researchers. Their current sponsor, NASA, is supporting the program until 2009. 'They’ve really helped us make it possible to provide teachers with the tools they need, and to put data into the curriculum when that has been difficult in the past,' said Caron."

In the coming years, with NASA funding, the DIAL project will train NASA partners to develop smart-client software applications for their educational/public user communities. It all starts with a forefront private-public collaboration between ITT Visual Information Solutions and the New Media Research Institute.