The Friday Institute for Educational Innovation is located on North Carolina State University’s Centennial Campus and physically connected to Centennial Campus Middle School, a Wake County, NC public middle school.  After years of intensive planning, fundraising, and developing foundational projects, we opened our state-of-the-art building in November 2005. The 33,000-square-foot multidisciplinary research and educational outreach institute is among the most technically advanced facilities at NC State University.

The Institute contains spaces designed for conducting research, teaching both face-to-face and online, developing multi-media educational resources, working collaboratively, and convening meetings and running conferences related to our mission, all supported by sophisticated technologies.

Technology Infrastructure. More than 400 gigabit Ethernet ports and 18 3rd generation wireless access points provide access to over 3 Gbps of Internet capacity to the N.C. Research and Education Network and to national research networks, including Internet2 (Abilene) and the National LambdaRail.

The Friday Institute server room comprises 20 enterprise class servers and more than 12 Terabytes of enterprise class storage. This infrastructure supports a mixed Windows-Mac-Linux client environment, a SIP-based VoIP telephone and collaboration infrastructure, IP-based digital content distribution, and on-demand application delivery

Wachovia Innovation Hall. A large reception andmeeting space including four widescreen digital projectors, two remotely controlled videocameras, video conferencing unit, integrated audio system, digital document camera, various analog and digital sources, and an automated control system.

Nortel Meeting Room. A reception and meeting space, including two digital LCD projectors, two interactive whiteboards, a digital document camera, integrated audio, various analog and digital sources, and an automated control system.

BB&T Multimedia Classroom.  A tele-classroom including two Plasma displays, a digital LCD projector, ceiling mounted document camera, two remote control video cameras, video conferencing unit, push to talk microphones, a lectern tablet, integrated audio, various analog and digital sources, and an automated control system.

Clark Board Room. A conference room including an LCD display, video camera, video conferencing unit, integrated audio, and automated control system.

Progress Energy Discovery Classroom.  A highly instrumented classroom space designed to North Carolina (Wake County) specifications for math and science, including two digital LCD projectors, two interactive whiteboards, a digital document camera, integrated audio, various analog and digital sources, and an automated control system.  In addition, the classroom is instrumented with twelve pan/tilt/zoom remote control video cameras and high-quality microphones used by researchers for gathering digital audio and visual data.

Collaboratory Commons. An open design project area instrumented
to promote creative collaboration among faculty researchers and
students involved in innovative teaching and learning applications. It
includes a large plasma display, video conferencing unit, integrated
audio, various analog and digital sources, and an automated control
system.