Comments on Info discussed at EET meeting . . .

One more post before I send the link out to remind all of you to read . . . .

One of the things we talked about at the EET meeting last week was the changing focus within our department as we respond to the needs of instructors, programs and institutional initiatives. This is a good place for us to be, as we can jump on opportunities when they arise. Few more comments . . .

• We have allocated all of our course development funds for this year; this means we will be limiting the number of new contracts we initiate and making fewer payments to our subject matter experts / writers before the end of June. We still need to complete our course development projects for May and Sept delivery, so there is still a lot of work to do.
  

• We're focusing more on Professional Development (PD) initiatives. This is primarily in response to the end goal of the DL Strategy: All courses will have a blended component by June 2013. This involves two things - supporting instructors and developing resources. We're also developing a PD plan around the DL Strategy implementation.

• The media specialists also have some research and development (R&D) projects underway on mobile technology, augmented reality, html5, virtual spaces . . . Lots of very exciting stuff happening here. We are investing resources in this area for two purposes - to enable our media specialists to stay current, as well as to enable us to be innovative and responsive to other departments with innovative requests. See related links in a previous posting.

• Balance: We'll have to work on balancing our regular work with innovative requests and projects, our focus on course development and curriculum reviews with professional development . . . This may be a challenge at times.
  

• Staffing changes: As you know, several EET staff will be moving on to other opportunities at the end of June. Connie, Julie, and Ian are all transitioning back to full-time teaching, so we'll be planning celebrations for their contributions to EET. And Stacey will start her mat leave around the middle of April. We'll celebrate babies too (including Mark and Laura's new baby, and Lyle and Ellie's (due in May)!
  

• We'll also be hiring for several new positions in the next couple of months. If all goes according to plan, this will include a Course Development Coordinator / Lead Instructional Designer, a Curriculum Consultant, and a half-time Online Learning /DL Coordinator. I'll let you know when these are posted.

• And I'm still on a mission to go paperless. Sorry to say I've been working on this since the fall; it's been slower than planned, and some days are better than others, but it's still been a successful journey. Good thing I have this big monitor!
  

Thanks to all of you for the effort you are putting into your work! It's making a difference in ways that we may not realize until some time in the future.