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FOR-PD Update

February 2003

The FOR-PD Project continues to grow:

Florida Online Reading Professional Development Counts!

There are currently

  • 60 FOR-PD sections
  • representing 29 school districts and
  • 4 universities
  • for a total of more than 2223 participants registered!

 

FLaRE Faculty Fellows
 
At their most recent meeting, the FLaRE Faculty Fellows praised the quality of the course and gave FOR-PD staff a standing ovation. FlaRE Faculty Fellows represent the reading experts at our state universities. FGCU, FIU, UWF, and UCF are currently offering the course for graduate credit. FAMU, UNF, FAU, FSU, and UF are in the process of finalizing plans for offering graduate credit for the summer.
 
New e-Newsletter for Facilitators
 
A new electronic newsletter will be emailed this week to FOR-PD facilitators to help them with their important work in supporting participants enrolled in the FOR-PD course. The newsletter, Facilitation with Felicity, will include course updates, ideas and suggestions, notable quotables, literacy levity and an advice column, Dear Felicity. The newsletter announcement and link will be sent automatically to all certified FOR-PD facilitators.
 
FOR-PD Technical Support
 
In anticipation of the course launch and with teachers' work schedule in mind, the FOR-PD project hired Carlos Ibanez to staff the FOR-PD help desk during evening and weekend hours. Carlos had several outstanding qualifications for the position: computer expertise, good written and oral communication skills, and infinite patience! To top it all off, he likes to help others and works well as a member of the FOR-PD team. Carlos will be staffing our special FOR-PD technical support hotline at (866) 863-READ (toll free, FL only) or (407) 882-READ on weekends and evenings-times when most teachers will be working on the course.

We have also added technical support availability through AOL Instant Messenger, screen name forpdhelp.

During regular office hours participants can still call (866) 227-7261 (FL only) or (407) 207-4962 and ask for FOR-PD technical help.
 
Hats Off!
 
We would like to extend a special thanks from all of us at FOR-PD to district and school technology coordinators for readying teachers with the hardware and software they need for the FOR-PD course. These specifications are provided online with the course overview at http://www.itrc.ucf.edu/register/overview.html

Thanks, too, to district staff who have collected registration data and worked with FOR-PD to make registration easy for participants. The process seems to be working quite smoothly!

Notable Quotable

Tim Harper, Online Professional Development Support for Seminole County, reports that:

"Seminole County Public Schools is very excited about the new FOR-PD course. We have approximately 330 individuals taking the course at this time and over 150 employees registered for another course in late February. It would be physically and financially impossible to deliver training of this magnitude using traditional training venues. Many educators are excited about the option to become involved in Web-based professional development courses. Our district is encouraging all teachers to invest in these types of professional development opportunities in order to improve our abilities, as educators, to help all children become better readers."

Tim also states that "without the support for technology initiatives from Superintendent, Paul J. Hagerty, this would not have been possible."

So according to Tim, what is the most common question from educators in Seminole county about the FOR-PD course?

"When will the second FOR-PD course be developed?!"

FOR PD Presentations and Exhibits

FOR-PD staffed exhibit booths at the DOE Curriculum Conference in Daytona Beach in January and the Florida Educational Technology Conference last week in Orlando. Dr. Gail Choice participated in a panel discussion about online learning at the DOE conference, and Gina Long and Vicky Zygouris-Coe told an excited group of conference attendees all about FOR-PD at FETC. Hundreds of conference-goers stopped by the ITRC/FOR-PD booth to pick-up information about the project, and FOR-PD staff met some facilitators face-to-face for the first time during the three-day event.

Kudos

To FOR-PD advisory board member Gayle Cowley for her recent article in FETConnections. Read it at http://www.fetc.org/fetcon/0103/cowley.cfm.

To FOR-PD Advisory Board Member Eileen Pracek on being named Florida's Technology Leader of the Year by the Florida Association for Computers in Education and being presented with the coveted Making It Happen (pink jacket) award at the recent meeting of the Florida Council of Instructional Technology Leaders (FCITL).

Farewell

Dr. Gail Choice, Project Director, will be leaving the FOR-PD Project on Valentine's Day. Gail has worked closely with districts to make the FOR-PD dream a reality. We wish her well in future endeavors.