================================================================
08/15/01 to 10/31/02:

The primary activities cited from 08/98 to 08/01, namely the workshops
and software, continued this year.  In addition, we note two other
forms of training:


 - Industrial Training:

   One company (Lexia) visited our lab for one week to learn how to develop
   a speech recognition system for learning applications. Several
   government labs (MITRE, DoD, Nuance) requested remote help in
   developing systems for their applications. These interactions
   often involve week-long consultations where we exchange software
   via email, and debug failed experiments. These are excellent
   opportunities for our students to learn how to educate others,
   and to interact with external researchers.

 - On-line Documentation:

   This year we spent a great deal of time developing an on-line
   tutorial on how to use our system. This was primarily developed
   by undergraduates under the supervision of staff. Students
   involved in this learned a great deal about effective
   technical communication. Most of the students started the
   project with minimal computing skills, so they also acquired
   valuable computing skills (e.g., web programming) in the
   process.

================================================================
08/15/00 to 08/14/01:

 - Workshop:

   Students attending our one-week summer workshop receive 5 
   half-day lectures on theory and implementation details as described
   below. Participants in our two-day workshop held annually in January
   receive a half-day training in which they learn how to run large-scale
   systems.

 - Software:

   Both undergraduates and graduate students learn state-of-the-art
   skills in large-scale software engineering. For example, they
   learn to develop software using a configuration management tool,
   and to prioritize problem solving using a problem-tracking tool.
   Such real world experience makes them invaluable to leading edge
   software companies.

================================================================
08/15/99 to 08/14/00:

 - Workshop:

   Students attending our one-week summer workshop receive 5 
   half-day lectures on theory and implementation details, and
   then spend afternoons in the lab acquiring hands-on skills.
   Students are led through some lab exercises by a senior graduate
   student, and then supervised by lab instructors on more
   open-ended assignments. They work from individual workstations,
   and can see the lab instructor's work on a projection system at
   the front of the class. This format has been very successful for
   training students on our software.

================================================================
08/15/98 to 08/14/99:

Students working on this project develop skills
in four major areas:

 - core technology: speech recognition

   In the first year of this project, students have been exposed
   to all major components of a speech recognition system:
   search algorithms, acoustic modeling, training, and lexicon
   development.

 - software engineering: concurrent software development

   Our students are trained to use a state-of-the-art concurrent
   development package (CVS). We make heavier us of this than most,
   and students quickly learn to grapple with the realities of merging
   code from several developers.

   Students are also exposed to a strict procedure for software design
   and development that includes design reviews, code reviews,
   diagnostic testing, memory and format checking, multiple platform
   portability testing, documentation, and release.

 - programming languages: C++, perl, and Tk/Tcl

   Since our primary programming language is C++, students are quickly
   trained to be experts in C++. While we emphasize that code be clean,
   simple, and easy to read, students nevertheless learn about subtle
   issues of the language, including memory management and compiler
   optimization.
   
   Students also perform some of their work in perl and Tk/Tcl.
   Tk/Tcl is particularly useful for developing high performance
   GUI-oriented applications. Perl is used primarily to massage data into
   our standard formats.

 - web programming languages: HTML and Java

   All students must deliver documentation and presentations in html,
   and hence quickly become proficient web programmers. A significant
   portion of our project involves the development of Java applets.
   Our undergraduates, in particular, get a heavy exposure to Java.