Brainify.com is a new Web site where students can connect with others academically outside the classroom and around the world.
The site, said Murray Goldberg, the founder and creator of Brainify.com, uses the collective intelligence of its student members to determine which Web sources will be the most helpful to them.
“The problem students have is not finding material online,” Goldberg said. “The problem generally lies in finding the best resources available.”
Students may have to sort through an abundance of Web sites, but “Brainify allows students to be pointed right away to the best Web sites available to them,” Goldberg said.
One student who finds a certain Web site helpful can put it on Brainify, Goldberg said, allowing all students access to it.
“These Web sites might not show up on a Google search,” he added.
Charles Westgate, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Binghamton University, agreed.
“You can cheat and write a computer program that gives a Web site many hits,” he said. “Google searches are organized by how many hits Web sites get.”
Web sites are tagged by students through “bookmarks.” When a student bookmarks a site they are allowed to rate and give complete descriptions of that site.
Westgate said Brainify is an interesting and potentially useful Web site for students.
“It depends on the input received from students,” he said. “If many submit bookmarks it might very well succeed.”
Jessica Fridrich, a professor of electrical engineering, said the site’s concept “makes sense.”
There are two ways to search on the site. One of these is an academic hierarchy which organizes bookmarks by subject with different subtopics under them.
“It is like a library on campus,” Goldberg said. “However it is a library of academic Web sites.”
Students can also search within the database.
“It is very easy for students to find bookmarks on any topic they are looking for,” said Goldberg.
The sources considered the most helpful are then presented at the top of the result list.
Professors, Goldberg said, are also putting groups on Brainify with useful Web sites and are asking their students to join.
“This gives professors the ability to work with students to build a nice resource for their course,” Goldberg said.
Students can also use the resource to ask any question they have pertaining to their courses.
“A student can ask a physics question and other students that identify themselves with physics can answer,” Goldberg said.
Brainify, Goldberg said, is a source that students all around the world can use to form an academic community. “It’s not a social networking site like Facebook.”
Although anyone can view the information on Brainify, a college or university e-mail address is required to become a member.
“The best way to make sure that the site is useful for students is if it is only students and professors whom are building it,” Goldberg said.
The best way to learn, Goldberg said, is to know that there are others out there who have the same questions that we do.
“If we want to be able to learn effectively we have to be able to connect,” he said.