Quinton Bogart came to ASU in 1970 from Texas Southmost College, a community college in Brownsville, Texas where he had been President. He joined the Center for the Study of Higher Education, now called Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, in the Education College. Quinton’s area of interest was community colleges and the important role they play. Universities and Community Colleges are often in competition and this interview shows how he was able to work for both sides: helping community college districts, developing future community college teachers and administrators, and working to smooth the transfer from community colleges to Arizona’s universities. Quinton discusses working with President Michael Crow to have the Retiree’s Association officially recognized as part of ASU.

Robert (Bob) Barnhill came to ASU in 1986 as Chair of the Computer Science Department and left in 1997 as the Vice President for Research. The interview addresses a number of topics including the beginnings of Computer Graphics, moving the Computer Science Department to a more research-oriented effort, achieving Research 1 status, working with the University of Arizona to develop a new statewide Intellectual Property template, dodging the Unabomber and playing soccer. Common themes throughout the interview include Bob’s success at getting groups of people to actually do something other than just meet and the importance of a strategic plan.

Marigold Linton, Director of American Indian Programs at ASU Polytechnic campus, came to ASU with her husband Bob Barnhill in 1986 and stayed for twelve years. During her twelve years Marigold worked sequentially as Director of Educational Services in the College of Education and then the Mathematics Department before moving to the ASU Polytechnic campus.

Marigold is an enrolled member of the Morongo Band of American Indians and grew up on the Morongo Reservation in southern California. She received her undergraduate degree from UC Riverside and a PhD in experimental psychology from UCLA. While at ASU and later at the University of Kansas she was engaged in creating, sponsoring, and directing a wide variety of programs aimed at helping Native American Indians be successful in their educational efforts. She was an active member of SACNAS (see Note 2 below)

Roy Doyle was born and raised in Arizona, the son of a cotton farmer and a teacher. Roy’s father passed away when he was in the 6th grade leaving his mother to raise 3 boys and a daughter. Roy began his working career as a morning and evening paper boy for the Arizona Republic and the Gazette. After high school, he enrolled in what was then Arizona State Teachers College to pursue a degree in Education. His college career was interrupted by the war after the attack on Pearl Harbor. After the war, he returned to ASTC, along with his new bride, to complete his degree.

His first position after graduation was at the Madison School in Phoenix. During the summers, he attended the Teachers College at Columbia University where he earned his masters and PhD in Education and Administration. He returned to now named Arizona State University where he began his career in the College of Education. His first position was as Principal of the Payne Training School, an on-campus K-8 school designed as a training school for future teachers. He served as assistant and associate dean for the College of Education prior to his retirement.

Spatial audio can be especially useful for directing human attention. However, delivering spatial audio through speakers, rather than headphones that deliver audio directly to the ears, produces the issue of crosstalk, where sounds from each of the two speakers reach the opposite ear, inhibiting the spatialized effect. A research team at Meteor Studio has developed an algorithm called Xblock that solves this issue using a crosstalk cancellation technique. This thesis project expands upon the existing Xblock IoT system by providing a way to test the accuracy of the directionality of sounds generated with spatial audio. More specifically, the objective is to determine whether the usage of Xblock with smart speakers can provide generalized audio localization, which refers to the ability to detect a general direction of where a sound might be coming from. This project also expands upon the existing Xblock technique to integrate voice commands, where users can verbalize the name of a lost item using the phrase, “Find [item]”, and the IoT system will use spatial audio to guide them to it.