ALTP News January 27, 2001
Edited by Richard Brincefield

Recent ALTP News

Reminder: ALTP BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING (OPEN)

Wednesday, February 28, 2001
7:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. 

• Phoenix: US WEST, 3033 N. Third St., Room 208.09
• Tucson: US WEST, 333 E. Wetmore, Room 323

Dial-in attendance: contact tkraver@qwest.net

ACTION AGENDA         Saturday,  January 27, 2001

Arizona Learning Technology Partnership, Inc.
Governors Strategic Partnership for Economic Development

I. ALTP BOARD MEETING – You all come.

II. NEW YORK SCHOOL WEB SITE

III. TALKS INTERACTIVE INTERNET AUDIO SYSTEM

VI ATF: "DISTANCE EDUCATION GUIDELINES FOR GOOD PRACTICE,"

10. WISDOM BYTES

I. ALTP BOARD MEETING – You all come.

QUEST, with high appreciation from ALTP, continues to host our board-associates video conferenced meeting on the last Wednesday of each month. We have set the start time forward to 8:00 to bring more harmony into the waking up of the Tucson-Phoenix system. December 21^st , 2000.

January 31, 2001 from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.

Phoenix: Quest 3033 N 3^rd St. (Third and Earle ) Steve Peterson 520-321-1309

Tucson: Quest 333 E. Wetmore, room 323 Ted Kraver 602-944-8557

The Agenda will have a single topic. ALTP’s position-participation in the GSPED, APNE, and CEDC generated new entity called the Arizona Economic Partnership. AEP may become a board of directors for the Arizona Department of Commerce and ADOC will redefine itself along New Economy policy and goals. With E-Learning a huge part of the New Economy, with significant ramifications for Arizona, ALTP has a significant, new, emerging and yet undefined role.

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II. NEW YORK SCHOOL WEB SITE

The New York City Board of Education yesterday authorized the building of what could be the Internet's largest education site. The Board also agreed that teachers and every student above the fourth grade be supplied with an Internet device or computer for use at school and at home. A consultant estimated the project would cost $900 million over 10 years and could easily be paid for by advertising and partnership revenues of nearly $4 billion over the same period. However, there are concerns about whether the project will be self-sufficient, in light of the severe setbacks the Internet industry has suffered lately. One Board member has questioned how the Internet project would be incorporated into classrooms and whether it would help promote the attainment of the state's rigorous learning standards. If implemented, the technology venture would allow the board to combine instruction and technology in new ways -- for example, by letting students proceed at their own pace through online lesson plans rather than being captive to the delivery of instruction in a classroom.

[SOURCE: New York Times (11/25), AUTHOR: Edward Wyatt]

(http://www.nytimes.com/2001/01/25/technology/25LAPT.html)

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III. TALKS INTERACTIVE INTERNET AUDIO SYSTEM

The Scottsdale company has developed Internet Audio that significantly improves the capabilities and delivery of web-based audio applications. www.talksaudio.com. This system that has major benefits in educating pre-school, blind and visually impaired students.

E-learning applications can include broadcast-quality professional voiceovers, streaming video and moving graphic images AND interactive keyboard response down to the 56K Internet connection level.

The TALKS Internet Audio System offers many significant advantages in delivering rich multimedia content. These include:

1. Broadcast-quality audio in small bandwidth files,
2. access to audio from almost all Internet connections,
3. ability to access from ONE server,
4. Flexible and updateable,
5. on-line testing using computer keyboards,
6. immediate feedback to user,
7. password protection,
8. interactive navigation for the blind and visually impaired and
9. if needed, hosting from TALKS..

TALKS works in ALL Windows operating systems and ALL Internet browser applications… reaching over 98% of the Internet audience. Its open architecture structure overlays onto existing Internet programming seamlessly.

TALKS provides all the necessary audio programming structure and offers clients the choice of having audio recorded in their recording studio using their stable of professional male and female voiceover talent or using audio supplied by clients. Samples of voice talent are on www.talksaudio.com. The web site also presents examples of on On-line testing, Course Lecture and Market Research Survey. Examples on Audio Order Form, Audio e-mail with moving images and streaming video an excellent gauge of their complete multimedia delivery capabilities over the Internet.

Ray Evtuch President, TALKS Audio 602-667-0775 info@talksaudio.com

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VI ATF: "DISTANCE EDUCATION GUIDELINES FOR GOOD PRACTICE,"

A New AFT Report Proposes Standards for Online Colleges. Declaring that "educational quality, not financial gain, should guide where, when and how distance education is employed," the American Federation of Teachers today released a set of quality standards for college-based Distance education programs. The report is based on a survey of AFT members who teach distance learning classes, previous studies by the union and a convention resolution at AFT's last convention.

The guidelines call for clear standards for content support, technical support and counseling for students, protection of intellectual property rights and proper training for faculty. The guidelines also state that "full undergraduate degree programs should include same-time same-place course work."

In AFT's survey of distance learning practitioners, the overwhelming majority enjoyed teaching through distance learning. Eighty-four percent of respondents indicated they would readily teach another distance education course. However, 70 percent felt that no more than 50 percent of the classes offered in a degree program should be delivered through distance learning. Half of those polled received no additional compensation or release time for the additional time necessary to develop an online course, despite the fact that 90 percent of those surveyed found a significant difference in preparation time necessary for the distance learning environment.

Last month, a congressional panel, The Commission on Web-based Education, called for a full review of the regulatory barriers that impede the Internet. One of

the barriers the commission referred to in its report is what is known as "the 50 percent rule" that prohibits the granting of federal student aid to students who are not in a classroom seat at least 50 percent of their academic program.

The Commission's vice chairman Rep. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), who has called

The 50 percent rule "archaic," said "seat time is sort of irrelevant The class-time requirement has effectively barred online colleges from arranging federally backed financial aid for enrolled students. Said Feldman, President of AFT, "While we might favor some changes in the class-time requirement, we strongly oppose its wholesale elimination. This law is on the books for a reason, besides the obvious education argument that education takes time, and time in class is beneficial. We, as a nation, experienced terrible scandals with trade and technical schools and correspondence courses before this law was enacted. An Internet-based degree program, like a correspondence school, is much harder to audit than a traditional program, and the chances for abuse are greater." Congress will likely consider the elimination of the student 50 percent rule and

similar regulations later this session.

Distance education is one of the fastest-growing trends in higher education. In addition to for-profit online businesses such as eCollege, Jones and the University of Phoenix Online, the nation's top universities are increasingly adding their names to the list of for-profit online ventures. Columbia, Stanford, the University of Chicago, New York University and Temple are among those offering online degree programs. Some have partnered with former junk bond king Michael Miliken's online higher education venture UNext.com. I n fact, 70 percent of the nation's more than 4,000 two- and four-year colleges offered online courses last year, up from 48 percent in 1998, according to Market Retrieval Service. During 2002 it is expected that 42 million courses will be taken online.

AFT's guidelines for distance learning contain the following general

principles:

-- Distance education students should be given advance information, training and support and distance education must not be the only opportunity to obtain a public college education.

-- Close personal interaction should to be maintained through electronic means, and same-time same-place interaction.

-- Equivalent library materials and research opportunities should be available.

-- Assessment of student knowledge, skills and performance should be as

rigorous.

-- Academic counseling and advising should be available.

-- Academic faculty should create and deliver online courses with added compensation and support were necessary, and keep all control and property rights.

-- Undergraduate degree programs should include classroom-based

courseware.

AFT also intends to use these standards as a guidepost for evaluating online programs and courses designed for elementary and secondary education. Recently, online charter schools such as Ohio's eCOT and companies such as Apex Learning Inc., Class.com and K12 have begun offering courses for the lower grades. Said Feldman, "For example, it's important to know if there is a knowledgeable teacher on the other end of the phone or at a computer terminal who can promptly answer questions. Technical support is important as well. If the software or hardware doesn't operate - no school."

The entire report and the practitioner survey, can be found on the American Federation of Teachers Web-site at http://www.aft.org/higher_ed/technology. Hard copies cost for $2.00 by writing to the American Federation of Teachers Higher Education Department, 555 New Jersey Avenue N.W., Washington, D.C. 20001.

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X. WISDOM BYTES:

It is best to read the weather forecasts before we pray for rain.

-- Mark Twain

Don't ever take a fence down until you know the reason it was put up.

-- Gilbert Keith Chesterton

The crash of the whole solar and stellar systems could only kill you once.

• Thomas Carlyle

I don’t quite understand Carlyle, but maybe he thinks the universe is hisself, you know, I think and therefore I am, but I know you don’t think, therefore I am everything? Ted the Ed.

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The ALTP News/Action Agenda is produced by the Arizona Learning Technology
Partnership http://altp.org, and edited by Richard Brincefield rbrincefield@softrain.com.

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