NDLW Award Nominees: Collaborative Projects

Name of Nominee: Orange County (California) Animation Project
Nominee’s Organization: Orange County Department of Education

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
The last 10 years have seen major growth in the animation industry. The need for animators in a wide cross section of industries led the Orange County Department of Education (California), in cooperation with school districts throughout the county, Regional Occupational Programs, local colleges, Vital Link, the Orange County Business Council and the ACME Network to create a partnership to support the creation of animation programs in K-12 learning environments. The Orange County Animation Project (OCAP) is developing the necessary pathways to prepare students for careers in animation, game production and many other industries where these skills are used.

The OCAP (http://animation.ocde.us/Home.htm) incorporates teacher collaboration and professional mentoring in an online and OnAir videoconferencing environment along with teacher training, monthly forums and showcase opportunities for student work through exhibitions, online venues and conferences. The OCAP has grown from five high schools in 2004 to 36 high and middle schools in 17 districts today. Classes participate online, with students posting their work for peer and professional review and feedback in a password protected, safe environment. Beginning to advanced animation challenges are created by professional animators designed to give students an engaging, creative task which focuses their thinking and work on fundamental principles of animation.

Eleven schools participate each week in a live videoconference with professional animators. Wednesday telecasts are dedicated to beginning animators (primarily high schools); Tuesdays and Thursdays are reserved for advanced students (primarily college). Each session covers a specific area of animation including the principles of animation (squash and stretch), making of a short film (process, timing, layout, character design, storyboarding, etc.) or elements of a basic walk (mechanics and kinetics). The OnAir telecasts provide students with one on one, real time interaction with professional animators working for major studios including Pixar, Disney, Sony Picture Imageworks, and Dreamworks.

Vivian Goldschmidt
OCAP Project Director
Orange County Department of Education
200 Kalmus Drive
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
ringob@pacbell.net

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Name of Nominee: Edye Caine
Nominee’s Organization: Eastchester UFSD

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
For the past four years, Edye has organized and led a project that focuses on genocide and human rights. This project features a series of four videoconferences on genocides (Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur), each with a recognized expert in the human rights field and four classes of high school students (two in Europe - either the UK or Poland and two in the U.S.). In addition, the students collaborate online to build a wiki on genocide and human rights. The project culminates with students presenting action projects that they are going to undertake to impact on the problem. For instance, last year students in Edye's high school organized and presented a schoolwide assembly that featured a survivor of the Rwandan genocide, a videoconference with an expert on Darfur. The students' efforts included a variety of fundraising events to aid the victims in Darfur and the establishment of a human rights club.

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Name of Nominee: Angela Conrad
Nominee’s Organization: Humble Independent School District

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
Angela Conrad is an Instructional Technology Specialist for the Humble Independent School district in Northeast Houston, Texas.

During her two years as Instructional Technology Specialist , Conrad has implemented numerous collaborative student projects such as Monster Exchange, Holiday Traditions, Cheers, 100th Day of School, and the Texas History Mystery.

The Monster Exchange project grew from 18 classes participating last school year to 54 classes this year.

The Texas History Mystery project, modeled after the MysteryQuest project, involved 54 sites from 24 Texas school districts participating in 13 sessions during the three-day event. 1,456 students and teachers participated in presenting mysteries and solving them to learn about and/or review important events, locations, and persons in Texas History.

Conrad also began the Cheers collaborative project which Joined classes across the country with a first grade class in Humble ISD in Northeast Houston, Texas to learn about their Cheer Box and how they are using class cheers to build self esteem and promote a positive environment for student learning.

Last school year Humble ISD had over 650 hours of connection time for both instructional and administrative usage including connections with 23 other states as well as Canada, England, Spain, and Germany.

This year, not only has Conrad implemented a staff development program delivered exclusively through videoconferencing, but through the support of the Humble Education Foundation, she has also started a Field Trip Friday program that connects Humble classrooms to experts and content providers all over the country.

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Name of Nominee: Roxanne Glaser
Nominee’s Organization: Education Service Center Region 12, Waco, TX

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
PROJECT NAME: Monster Match: Reading and Writing and Math, Oh My!

Exchange projects are one of the simplest, most effective classroom projects that teachers can implement into their curriculum. Monster Match takes reading, writing, and math to a new level. Classes create 3-dimensional monsters from common classroom materials. They will then write a description of their monster including math formulas, angles, colors, shapes, and other grade level appropriate math skills.

This project has expanded from a basic K-3 event into K-8 with upper elementary and middle school classes using math to measure, create, and describe their creations. Teachers comment that participating in Monster Match helps students see that math is a language for communicating.

ESC Region 12 participation began with 22 classes in 2005, 76 in 2006 and grew to almost 100 classes in 2007.

View the website at www.edlink12.net/monstermatch for a sample video, pictures, and to view the project wiki.

New for Monster Match 2007-classes in Texas are matched with classes in Michigan to expand our connections. Also, teachers post their descriptions to a wiki instead of emailing them to each other. This enables teachers to learn a new supportive, collaborative technology which will be more effective than email. All sessions will be moderated to ensure success for all teachers. Spin-offs of this project are occurring in Humble ISD and El Paso ISD in Texas.

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Name of Nominee: Jody Kennedy
Nominee’s Organization: White Plains Schools, NY

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
Jody has been a champion for the use of videoconferencing in K-12 schools for many years. She founded the Global Run project which is an international collaborative project that has expanded to dozens of schools across the world. An annual, year-long project, the students use video to collaborate with each other to learn about and help solve real-world problems, such as the diminishing freshwater supply. Jody has proactively sought out and received several grant sources to grow this project. She is a highly sought after speaker on an international level, has been featured on television many times, has written many articles but continues to devote herself to the kids at White Plains Middle School. Her passion for spreading the word through numberous professional activities is to be commended and should be recognized by all of us in the IVC community.

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Name of Nominee: Mary Schlegelmilch
Nominee’s Organization: Omaha Public Schools

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
Omaha Public Schools with ESU 19 developed an interlocal agreement to provide access to the National Repository of Online Courses (NROC). This access brings educational multimedia rich course content via a learning management system to classrooms across the state. This project is open to Educational Service Units and their associated school districts within Nebraska for the 2007/2008 school year. Participating ESUs have unlimited access to NROC through the ESU 19 host site or through the NROC web access site for the duration of this project.

In addition, ESU 19 is providing opportunities through the interlocal agreement to contract for professional development and training. Access to OPS developed courses, may be available to participating school districts within the state of Nebraska. A social authoring component provides sharing and collaboration of staff from across the state to create courses that are rigorous and relevant to the learning experience of the learner.

This is made possible through a 2006 legislative initiative, LB 1208, that interconnects districts across the state via Network Nebraska, a statewide backbone for educational and government connectivity. The main thrust of LB 1208 was designed for the sharing and collaborative teaching of distance education resources.

Mary Schlegelmilch has been vital to the development of online content within the Omaha Public Schools. The subsequent outreach to districts and Educational Service Units across the state has been made possible through her dedication to quality curriculum content and the use of online resources that can reach all learning needs. These needs include: credit recovery courses, AP content, career and vocational education. Mary deserves this award for her dedication to distance education and her leadership in providing quality online learning to the students of Nebraska. Mary hopes that data collected from this project will provide meaning to the utilization and viability of online learning.

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Name of Nominee: Gail Wheatley (COSI)
Nominee’s Organization: COSI Columbus

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
COSI Columbus partnered with the Ohio State University Pathology Department and 20 teachers to create the In Depth: Autopsy program. This program allows students to learn about pathology and autopsies prior to the videoconference. During the videoconference, students watch a taped autopsy which is narrated by a forensic pathologist. Students can ask questions of the pathologist during the videoconference, pursuing the topics that most interest them. After the videoconference, students are required to determine cause of death by conducting toxicology tests on (simulated) blood and urine, interpreting the results of a toxicology report and examining histology slides. Students are never provided the answer to the 'mystery' but rather are required to write a final autopsy report supporting their conclusions with data and evidence. There is an additional activity in the kit that refutes much of the misinformation about autopsies perpetuated by popular television programs.

In addition to collaborating closely with OSU Pathology, COSI also collaborated with 20 high school teachers in seven different states to develop the program. These teachers helped guide development and offered opinions and concerns via email and videoconference meetings. They reviewed all teacher materials and tried all activities before they were finalized. The teachers that were within an hour's driving distance of COSI also allowed the COSI team to observe their students testing the program and all its activities, further strengthening the activities. In Depth: Autopsy was created through strong collaborations with professionals in the fields of both pathology and education. The result is a program that thoroughly engages students, has won the American Association of Museum's Gold Muse Award and was highlighted in a National Science Teacher's Association publication Exemplary Science in Informal Education Settings. The strength and synergy of collaboration are clearly evident in the program and the interest students take in it.

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Name of Nominee: Janine Lim
Nominee’s Organization: Berrien County ISD

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
Janine Lim has championed collaborative videoconference projects in many ways. Specifically the MysteryQuest World Geography videoconference project started in 2002 has spun off many similar type projects and modeled quality interactive projects to many organizations. MysteryQuest World Geography has had 1500 students participate each year; and most of the classes have participated from across the United States. In 2004, she started coordinating MysteryQuest USA, with similar participation annually. These projects have always been offered to schools outside of her service area free of cost. Since then, many spin off projects have started, including Texas History Mystery, Wisconsin History Mystery, MysteryQuest USA for Pennsylvania schools, Landmark Challenge, LiteratureQuest and more. The format has been adapted for many other point-to-point collaborative projects as well.

Janine also shared her Videoconference Projects Booklet, now in it's second edition, freely online.

Many schools have downloaded and printed it for teacher training. It has spawned unnumbered collaborative projects and made it easy for teachers and coordinators to effectively integrate videoconference projects within their curriculum.

As an advocate for collaborative projects, Janine also shares experiences from successful projects on her blog. Blog posts include sample posters that work, ways to effective plan and manage projects, and even an analysis of why projects sometimes fail. These resources and sample projects continue to be an inspiration to videoconference coordinators around the world.

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Name of Nominee: Terry Godwaldt
Nominee’s Organization: Queen Elizabeth High School

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
Terry has a vision and a passion for Distance Education, on the local, national and international level. He has created a number of unique learning opportunities for students while building a system of support and promotion for new and interested teachers.

Two of these unique initiatives are:

Video Conference for Hope

In response to student desire to make a difference in Afghanistan, Terry initiated the now annual Video Conference for Hope. This program brings together 25 schools from around the world, 5 International NGO's, representatives from the United Nations, the Canadian government and NATO forces in Afghanistan to help raise awareness and funds for the education of girls at the Godah School for Girls in Afghanistan. Students listen to experts, debate issues, share personal stories, sing, dance, and promote the opportunity to have an education, free of persecution and hardship. This next year, the program will be working with a prison school in Peru.

The Four Nations Classroom

Terry had a vision to create a program that broke down the traditional barriers of school, language and even nation state, to create a truly global classroom. Out of this vision, in September 2007, was born the Four Nations Classroom. Canada, the United States, Pakistan and Mexico meet over four months to examine each other's cultures, develop relationships and challenge their preconceptions of the world. It is based on the integration of multiple technologies (LMS's to Video Conferencing, Social Networking tools to V-Cam technology.)

Among the many other unique initiatives Terry has brought forward, is a passion to open up the world for his students. Serving a student body of 40% Special Needs, with ethnic representation from 56 countries, 20% of whom have lived in the country for less than 3 years, Terry has truly brought the world into their classroom.

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Name of Nominee: Jason Kopp and Cambridge-Isanti High School
Nominee’s Organization: Cambridge-Isanti Schools

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
I feel Jason Kopp and Cambridge-Isanti High School is very deserving of this award because of their passion and vision of using network based video conferencing to enhance the learning of students around the world.

Students at Cambridge-Isanti High School regularly connect to their sister school in Japan to learn about cultural awareness, language, and discuss world events. Because of their passion for giving students a world view, they sought to create connections with other cultures and bi-weekly connect with students at National Dali High School in Taiwan where geography students from Cambridge-Isanti and English language students from Taiwan hold regular symposiums discussing topics such as climate change, social and political world issues, world economic issues and together they all brainstorm solutions to these and other topics.

Recently students at Cambridge-Isanti were given an opportunity by Jason Kopp to connect with several National Guard members stationed in Afghanistan to ask questions about the war in Afghanistan and talk to an Afgan-Canadian National and his family.

Several other connections include creating a unique partnership with The College of William & Mary and Cambridge-Isanti Chemistry students. Dr. Robert Pike and his team at William & Mary collaborated on a joint research project with students at Cambridge-Isanti using video conferencing equipment.

Coming up next month, students taking a Chinese language course will use network based video conferencing to enhance their lessons by talking to students at National Dali High School in Taiwan and be taught Chinese by students living in Taiwan and learn about their customs and traditions. This will become an ongoing part of this language class and is quite innovative for a High School.

Jason Kopp and Cambridge-Isanti high School are always pushing the envelope brainstorming new ways students can gain an international understanding and promote innovative methods to education and are much deserving of this award.

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Name of Nominee: Gary Brown
Nominee’s Organization: Broward County School District

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:

Broward County’s Education Technology Services (ETS) department provides technical training, installation, equipment selection (including peripherals) repair/relocation/configuration of equipment, conferencing scheduling, line and test calling, warranty work, recording and redistribution of digital video-content and soon……streaming video

In Broward it is evident that videoconferencing applications provide effective unique live visual communication methodologies for multiple end users in various locations in real time. Administrators use these essential tools in their daily routines that assist them with making important decisions. Videoconferencing technology is a valuable tool available at all district locations that enhances student achievement, teacher training, administrative functions, and provides additional communication links for community outreach programs.

Studies tend to indicate videoconferencing meetings are shorter than in-person meetings, and can be more effective, and with minimal workflow disruption leading to less wasted time. District administrators use these collaborative communication tools to assist them in responding quickly to their customer demands, solve issues and react in a timely manner. Soft benefits that accrue from the use of electronic meeting tools are extremely important, though they are often fuzzy or difficult to provide or measure with absolute precision. For example, how does one factor executive stress reduction into a spreadsheet formula, or assign a dollar value to the ability to attend a child’s soccer game instead of being on an airplane?

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Name of Nominee: Bob Dixon
Nominee’s Organization: Ohio Academic Resources Network and Ohio State University

Description of why this nominee should receive the NDLW Award:
Dr. Bob Dixon is the Operations director for the Internet2 Commons and the Chief Research Engineer for Ohio Academic Resources Network (OARNet) and Ohio State University, Office of the CIO.

He has been active in the field of Internet video conferencing since 1997. He coordinates the annual Megaconference events (world's largest video conference). He also organized yearly Internet2 Commons training program, which helped about 500 videoconference site coordinators to obtain fundamental and practical skills in successfully supporting distance learning classes and videoconference events. His dedicated work on earth satellite-based video brings the Internet and videoconferencing to the schools in remote areas.

I nominate Dr. Bob Dixon for his hard work and great achievements on the Collaborative Projects of Megaconference events, earth satellite-based video, and Internet2 Commons training program.

Please vote for Dr. Bob Dixon!

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