Dr. Steele is the founding Director of the Center for Information and Communication Sciences at Ball State University. He has created two of the nation's leading graduate academic programs in the telecommunications field, first at the University of Pittsburgh and currently at Ball State University. In 1993, the Center won the National Networking Education Award from Network World Magazine.

Dr. Steele is a Frank Stanton Fellow with the International Radio and Television Society. He is the second inductee into the Teleconferencing Hall of Fame, the first academic to receive the Pfister Award from BICSI, and is the ICA Foundation's second Montgomery Award winner. A recent past President and Chairman of the Board of the United States Distance Learning Association, Dr. Steele currently serves as their International Ambassador. He has worked with the FCC and several states' legislatures and regulatory commissions.

A nationally known spokesman in the field of communication technologies, he speaks regularly across the US and in Canada, Europe, Mexico, Latin America and Singapore. He also consults with Fortune 100 companies and their CEO's, universities, state governments, and K-12 educators as well as healthcare clients.

Included among Dr. Steele's accomplishments is the creation of two leading graduate academic programs, the first at the University of Pittsburgh and the second at Ball State University. He also created the first K-12 electronic school district model employing voice, data, video, satellite and fiber optics in the late 1980's. Lamar Alexander, while the United States Secretary of Education, awarded Indiana's only, "A+ for Breaking the Mold"; School Award to Dr. Steele's K-12 America 2000 project in Westfield, Indiana. In 1993, US News and World Report selected four top technologically capable environments, among those Dr. Steele had led the creation of three of them.