THEME - All Those Technologies and Media - How Do I Choose?

Broadcast Video, Videotape, Satellite, Audioconferencing, Compressed Video, Videoconferencing, Desktop Video, Computer Assisted Learning, the Internet, the World Wide Web, Collaborative Software and Correspondence Study offer a wide variety of choices for instructors and learners. All of these technologies and media - how do you make choices? That 's a question that we are only beginning to sort out.

UPFRONT - Some Criteria for Making Choices
FOCUS - "Using PBS Telecourses in Distance Education" Char Bell of the ECB
NOTEWORTHY - the WETC Keynoter, Dr. Ben Shneiderman
CAMPUS HILIGHTS - UW Campus Information
FUNDING UPDATE - WATF Guidelines and Deadlines
SYSTEM UPDATE - Distance Education Pilot Policies Extended
FAIR USE UPDATE - Opposition to Fair Use Proposals; Legal Issues Video Series
IN PERSPECTIVE - PCWeek Authoring Software Picks
FYI - News, Institutes, Conferences
NEW ON THE LIST - New Subscribers
ENDNOTE - Nov. PK-20 Distance Education Symposium Planned
SEPT. ISSUE - "Successful Curriculum Writing for Learning Space" Martha Mealy of Flexible Learning

UPFRONT - Some Criteria for Making Choices

To date, the best criteria listing I've found for looking at technology and media considerations is from The Marine Corps Institute of Washington, D.C. It lists five areas (and details sub-criteria) to look at when making your choices: 1) instructional needs, 2) target audience needs/constraints, 3) organizational capabilities/constraints, 4) cost constraints and 5) time/timing constraints. Do you have others?

Of course, you need not choose just one technology or medium for the course or program you have in mind. Mixing is becoming more and more the way to go. During the next few months, DESIEN will be looking closely at some of the various technologies and media. Test them against the criteria. We hope you'll add your comments as we go along. We're beginning with Telecourses...Rosemary Lehman

FOCUS

"Using PBS Telecourses in Distance Education"
by
Char Bell, Educational Communications Board (ECB)

Telecourses are valuable sources of coursework for distance learners for two main reasons. They are flexible in that they can be taped off of a broadcast by or for students. Just as importantly, telecourses bring the content to life!

Time is the element most adult students worry about in their learning goals. Telecourses can be viewed at the convenience of learners - not only when they have time but WHEN THEY ARE IN THE RIGHT MOOD! The medium's visual element reinforces the content and subject experts can be gathered and delivered to distance learners. How better to learn about business than to examine best practices in a number of real companies? How better to learn about psychology than to see actual experiments in process? How better to learn a foreign language than to follow an interesting storyline using that language in real conversation? All from the convenience of home.

PBS telecourses are academically rigorous and combine stimulating and informative television programs with challenging textbooks and other materials. Their inventory covers many disciplines, including the arts science, mathematics, social sciences and teacher education. They are developed by the nation's respected and experienced colleges, public television producers and independent producers.

A number of Wisconsin colleges and universities use telecourses with their students, combining the video with either ETN live sessions with students, on-line contact, print or software materials. Several higher educational institutions have team-taught telecourses, combining the best talents from several locations.

The Wisconsin Educational Communications Board serves as the clearinghouse for licensing and broadcasting those telecourses needed by postsecondary institutions. Often group buys and long-term licenses create discounts worth pursuing. For further information on these opportunities, call Charlotte Bell at 608-264-9730.

NOTEWORTHY - This year's Keynote Speaker for the Wisconsin Educational Technology Conference (WETC), scheduled for Nov. 4-6 at the Holiday Inn in Stevens Point, is Dr. Ben Shneiderman, a professor of Computer Science and Director of the Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory at the University of Maryland. His presentation will look at how human values shape educational technology and will be delivered during the general session on Nov. 5. Shneiderman will also facilitate an on-line discussion center for 10 days following the event, so that WETC participants can ask more questions and further discuss the topic. Shneiderman is the author of several books, including Designing the Interface: Strategies for Effective Human-Computer Interaction.

Thirteen pre-conference Workshops and Labs and more than 100 presentations will cover an array of subjects at the conference. Presentations are grouped in six areas: developing a technology plan distance learning, funding, integrating technology into the curriculum, staff development and technology topics. Exhibitors will present the latest in hardware and software applications and demonstrations.

Plan to register for WETC before Oct. 6 to obtain "early bird" registration rates. For further information contact Linda Connolly, conference manager at 608-264-9724 or by email at lconnoll@mail.state.wi.us Online registration is also available through WETC's Website at http://www.wecb.org/wetc/. WETC is cosponsored by the Wisconsin Educational Communications Board, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, the University of Wisconsin-Extension, and the Wisconsin Technical College System.

DE CAMPUS HILIGHTS

(Send DE CAMPUS HILIGHTS to: DESIEN-List@uwex.edu)

UW-EAU CLAIRE - K-8 teams of teaching, technology and administrative personnel from De Pere, Sheboygan, Spooner and Viroqua attended the first Institute for Educators' Technocamp (a VITAL Project), July 8-10 at the Holiday Inn in Eau Claire. During the successful three-day session, the teams learned about curriculum integration, worked on project concepts in lab sessions and returned to their districts with projects to implement. Mentors were assigned to work with each team on an ongoing basis. Team projects will be "showcased" in the Spring. Planning is now in process for a 1998 Institute.

UW-EXTENSION - Construction of the Pyle Center that will serve as the UW-Extension center for distance education is moving ahead on schedule. The move of the telecommunications cabling flowing through the Wisconsin Center building to serve the Alumni House and Lowell Hall has been coordinated with the Contractors, DoIT, the telecom consultant and UWEX. This move will take place in October.

UW-GREEN BAY - On August 26, 1997, Provost Howard Cohen announced the creation of a Division of Information Services within the Provost's area. Information Services will integrate the functions and activities of the Library, Computing and Information Technology, Learning Resources and Telecommunications. It will be guided by a common vision: to offer an integrated approach to access to information resources, technology tools, and instructional support services to further the mission and guiding principles of the University of Wisconsin- Green Bay and become a leader in the application of information technology resources to enhance learning and develop knowledge.

The mission of the division of Information Services will be:
- to provide access to high quality research and information services for students, faculty and staff;
- to provide appropriate technology in support of student learning and information literacy;
- to enable the campus community to use technology effectively; and
- to provide administrative support in pursuit of efficient and effective communication and resource management.

The division of Information Services will be created from existing units on campus. A team process will produce an implementation plan no later than November 1, 1997. Merging of these units into a single division will accomplish a number of purposes: 1) converge information technologies of storage, retrieval and communication; 2) facilitate improved communication between those who are responsible for making information accessible and those who maintain the systems through which that information is accessed; 3) maximize coordination and cooperation in the allocation and distribution of campus resources devoted to information content, services and technology and 4) enable the campus to be in a position to develop a clearer vision of the use of information technology and resources in support of the academic mission.

Functional responsibilities of Information Services will include the following: Access to Information, Management of Information Systems, Communication Infrastructure and User Support. In making this change, UW-Green Bay will join a number of other campuses in the UW System that have accomplished this integration. These include: Eau Claire, LaCrosse, Oshkosh, Parkside, Platteville, Stout, Superior and Whitewater.

UW-MADISON - UW-Madison's Dept. of Information Technology (DoIT) has scheduled a series of Informative Technology Brown Bags for Sept. 9 - Dec 9. The sessions will be held from Noon-1:00 pm on designated days . For further information see: http://www.wisc.edu/pte/ or call 608-262-3605.

UW-OSHKOSH - Prof. William Wresch, former Chair of the Dept. of Math and Computing, UW-Stevens Point recently accepted a position with UW-Oshkosh as Associate Vice Chancellor of Instructional Technology.

UW-PLATTEVILLE - Prof. Sally Standiford, formerly Director of the Educational Technology Center, School of Education, UW-River Falls recently accepted a position with UW-Platteville as Dean of the School of Education. Sally is also Director of the VITAL Project.

UW-SUPERIOR - UW-Superior has coordinated several September Compressed Video Training Workshops with Instructional Communications Systems (ICS) for faculty and trainers. The workshops are designed to help faculty and trainers adapt their classroom courses and programs for teaching via videoconferencing. (See FYI for more information on the ICS Compressed Video Workshops)

FUNDING UPDATE - The Wisconsin Advanced Telecommunications Foundation (WATF) Grant Application Guidelines and Forms have been distributed for the 1997-1998 Funding Cycles. Application Deadlines for proposals are Nov. 14, 1997 and Mar. 20, July 24 and Nov. 20, 1998.

The WATF is a public-private partnership and non-stock/non-profit corporation developed to raise private sector, government and foundation funds to build an endowment to support advanced telecommunications-based projects and efforts to educate Wisconsin's residents, businesses and institutions about the benefits of advanced telecommunications applications.

Nine workshops are being offered at several locations in Sept. to acquaint prospective applicants with the grant program. For complete information consult the WATF Website at: http://www.watf-etb.state.wi.us or call Tod Penske at 608-266-7878.

SYSTEM UPDATE - Based on a review and discussion among the vice chancellors, the 1995 two-year pilot distance education funding policies designed to promote flexibility and foster experimentation, will remain in effect. The policies enable UW institutions to charge special non-resident tuition for distance education courses, assess a distance education delivery fee and use fund 104-02 for distance education courses to high schools and between UW institutions. A two-year rolling horizon for these policies will provide institutions with two years to prepare for any major changes to the policies. This decision also allows more time for data gathering and analysis. Through the development of pilot policies, UW System is continuing to demonstrate leadership and set national models in distance education policy development.

FAIR USE UPDATE - Fourteen scholarly and educational groups, including the American Council on Education, the American Library Association and the National Humanities Alliance, have issued a statement formally announcing their opposition to the proposals recently developed by the Conference on Fair Use. The Conference adjourned in May for at least a year, with participants acknowledging the lack of consensus among the academic organizations, publishers, software developers, and music and video producers that took part. The dissenting groups pledged their efforts to ensure that fair use rights would continue to apply to educational and scholarly uses of copyrighted material on computer networks and in other digital formats. (Chronicle of Higher Education 13 Jun 97)

AECT has posted a Fair Use Guidelines page on its Web Site for those who might be interested in downloading information in this area. The URL is: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/avs/ fairuse/default.html. If you have trouble locating this page, go to: http://www.aect.org and click the appropriate button.

NEW VIDEO SERIES - "Distance Learning Today: Legal Issues - The Video Series" is a new series of four programs available on video from: dlittle@rmimedia.com. This video series addresses some common questions and concerns shared by many, regarding: intellectual property, copyright, fair use, assignments, licenses, and other relevant topics. Real world examples from business and education are woven throughout the programs to help explain the material.

IN PERSPECTIVE - PCWEEK AUTHORING SOFTWARE PICKS - In partnership with the Wisconsin Technical College System, PCWeek recently invited multimedia courseware authoring system vendors to participate in a Labs On Site evaluation. Each participating vendor was required to create an on-the-spot training module on retail security measures that could be used via the Internet or a corporate intranet. Eighteen judges and PC Week then graded the entries. The winning vendor was WBT Systems' TopClass, followed by Lotus Development Corp.'s LearningSpace and Macromedia's Authorware. The other vendors in order of evaluation were: Allen Communications Quest, Asymetrix, ToolBook, Pathlore Phoenix and Aimtech IconAuthor. Real Education, a vendor of "a process", rather than a software package, was rated separately.

Nine of the 18 judges were from the UW-System: Paul Ansfield- Psychology, UW-Oshkosh; Byron Glick-DoIT, UW-Madison; Bill Kirby-School of Education, UW-Stevens Pt.; James LaBarre-InfoSys, UW-Eau Claire; Rosemary Lehman-ICS, UWEX; Martha Mealy- Continuing Education, UWEX; Mark Salzman-InfoSys, UWEX and Pam Scheibel-Nursing, UW-Madison.

The Wisconsin Technical College System is now negotiating with several of the top vendors to build their own training modules to meet the employee skills needs of the state.

FYI - NEWS AND REMINDERS

ICS COMPRESSED VIDEO WORKSHOPS - The training unit of ICS offers a variety of workshops for instructors who have, or will have, responsibilities for teaching via compressed video. Workshops vary in length and content. Costs also vary depending on available funding. Contact Rosemary Lehman at ICS, 608-262-7524 for more information on planning and scheduling workshops for your faculty.

THE JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SERVICES FOR DISTANCE EDUCATION devotes its first issue to considerations on the future of library services to distance education. The Journal is now available at: http://www.westga.edu/library/jlsde/

THE VIRTUAL UNIVERSITY GOES INTERNATIONAL - The Western Governors University, a so-called "virtual" university that plans to begin offering courses electronically next year, reports "explosive" interest from students in foreign countries and has announced collaborations with institutions in Great Britain, Canada and Japan. Britain's Open University, the Open Learning Center in British Columbia, Canada, and Japan's Suwun and Tokai Universities all are working with WGU. University administrators are discussing collaborative efforts with officials in Mexico and China.

"The Western Governors University is essential to a strong international economy," says a spokeswoman for Mike Leavitt, governor of Utah and one of the project's co-founders, "because it provides an unprecedented access to higher education that students in remote locations just haven't had." (Chronicle of Higher Education 3 July 97) http://chronicle.com

THE GLOBAL ALLIANCE FOR TRANSNATIONAL EDUCATION (GATE) will hold its conference on The Future of Transnational Education: Human Resource Development and the Quality Imperative, October 8-11 at the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Washington, D.C. Participants will meet in general sessions as well as in special groups. More than 15 international speakers will be featured. For further information call the GATE Secretariat at 202-293-6104 or visit the Website at: http://www.edugate.org/conferences.html

THE 18th ANNUAL INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNOLOGY CONFERENCE AND THE EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY INSTITUTE are being held concurrently on November 6th, 7th and 8th, 1997 at the Tyee Hotel, Olympia, Washington. For program and registration information, visit the ET&T website at: http://web.ctc.edu/CTC_cust_svcs/et&t/ or call 425-803-9775.

THE INSTITUTE FOR POSTSECONDARY PEDAGOGY at State University of New York at New Paltz invites proposals for presentations at the seventh annual conference scheduled for Nov. 21 & 22, 1997. The conference topic is "Redefining Literacy in the Information Age." To receive more information and answer a Call for Proposals call 914-257-3589 or fax: 914-257-3555 . The Call for Proposals is also available at the Institute's homepage address: http://www.newpaltz.edu/ispp

THE FIFTH ANNUAL DISTANCE EDUCATION CONFERENCE will be held in Austin, Texas at the Sheraton Austin Hotel January 27-30, 1998. The event is sponsored by The Center for Distance Learning Research at Texas A&M University and GTE.

A Call for Papers notes that proposals should address the theme, "Net- working Now", which emphasizes the importance of both human and electronic networking as a means of exchanging ideas, experiences and strategies in the field of Distance Education. Topic areas should fall into the following categories: K-12 Education, Higher Education, Community Colleges/Technical Institutes, Corporate Training, Health Care Training and Government Training. Only submissions that have not been previously published or presented at another professional meeting are eligible. Submission date is no later than September 30. Notification of acceptance will be no later than October 31. Submit proposals to: Dr. Larry M. Dooley - fax: 409/862-7127; e-mail: dooley@tamu.edu; WWW address: http://www.cdlr.tamu.edu

NEW ON THE LIST THIS MONTH - Welcome to new subscribers: Robert Pitt, Darryl Pieber, Barb Utley, Jerry Aschermann, Shakeel Bhatti, Susan Simkowski and Robert Peñaloza.

ENDNOTE - "Proving That It Works: A Symposium on Assessing and Evaluating Information Technology for Learning", is the theme for the PK-20 Distance Education Symposium to be held November 12 and 13 at the new Ramada Inn in Madison. Participants will include teams comprised of teachers, technology and administrative personnel from the 20 school districts recently awarded the FY 1997 Technology Literacy Challenge Grants, along with teams from the UW System institutions and districts of the Planning Committee.

A Keynote Speaker and 18 presentations/panels will help: create a vision for PK-20 technology integration into teaching and learning; self-organize educational leaders in Wisconsin for major state investments in instructional technology and encourage collaborative efforts between the UW and PK-12 statewide and locally. The Keynote Speaker will be John C. Belland, Professor Emeritus, The Ohio State University and administrator of the Ohio SchoolNet Telecommunity. The Ohio SchoolNet Telecommunity is a six-year project that is funding $26 million in state administered educational grants. It's purpose is to expand access to technology for school children in support of Ohio's comprehensive improvement plan for schools.

SEPTEMBER ISSUE: FOCUS - "Successful Curriculum Writing for Learning Space" - Martha Mealy of Flexible Learning

DESIEN ARCHIVE: An Archive has been created for past issues and interaction comments. Locate at: http://www.uwex.edu/disted/desien.html

DESIEN has been created to encourage information exchange and discussion of distance education issues concerned with: 1) UW System- wide distance education progress and institution course/program development, 2) faculty/team development, 3) technology, 4) policy, 5) funding and 6) research. List recipients outside of the UW System are also welcome to join in with information contributions and discussion.

Each monthly issue will focus on an "area of interest", feature a regular column on the Distance Education Clearinghouse by Michele Jacques, contain an FYI section, and list future areas of focus. Your continuous input through updates, FOCUS articles, questions and dialog are instrumental in helping DESIEN evolve and grow.

The coordinators of DESIEN are Rosemary Lehman and Pat Takemoto. The owner of DESIEN is Rosemary Lehman, lehman@ics.uwex.edu. Please contact Rosemary if you have concerns or problems. ListServ: DESIEN-List@uwex.edu