CALL CENTRE PROJECT

Portable Call Centre Project

The Citizen Society Research Lab is a full service public opinion research enterprise within the Centre for Teaching Learning and Innovation at Lethbridge College. Under the direction of principal investigator Dr. Faron Ellis and researcher Marda Schindeler, the CSRL conducts one omnibus public opinion survey of Lethbridge and area residents each semester for use by Lethbridge College students and faculty as well as selected community partners. From the fall semester of 2004 through the fall of 2006, our sampling, data collection and interview activities were hosted by an international public opinion research firm operating a local 150 seat call centre. When that facility was closed, we were left without a host call center. To resolve this situation, CSRL partnered with Dr. James Manis and Lethbridge College's Open Source Learning Lab (OSLL) to research the potential of using open sources software, VOIP, and other low or no-cost techniques to equip as a call center, on a temporary and portable basis, a 150 station computing commons in the College Instructional Building (IB).