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The New York State Distance Learning Consortium

www.nysdlc.org

Meeting Minutes

For

October 4 and 5, 200l

Binghamton, NY

 

The following is a summary of our most recent meeting.  Please let Steve Smith know as soon as possible if there are has been anything omitted or reported in error.

 

1.          Review and Approval of May 3 and 4, 2001 Meeting Minutes

 

There were no changes to be made to these minutes.  A motion was made by Rodger Oesterle and seconded by John Barry to approve the minutes.  All were in favor.

 

2.    Roundtable Discussion-

 

·        Current Mailing List : Mike Sylofski sent around a print out of the current mailing list.  All were asked to review and make changes to it.  Mike has revised the mailing list and emailed Steve and changes have been made on our consortium website.

·        SED Report:Teh-yuan Wan was at our meeting to discuss state level issues that he is involved with.  He indicated he had worked on a technology plan framework, which will be available for review hopefully by 12/31/01. He also indicated that by April 2002 the finalized technology plan outline would be ready for distribution.  We will be sent the URL of the framework that Teh-yuan is working on.  He also said that NYS technically receives between $60 million and $80 million from federal grants annually.  The state distributes these funds through an open competitive process. Another initiative that he is working on for SED is how to sustain success of technology through funding statewide.  They are thinking about making it an open competitive process amongst school districts.  He sees BOCES as a gateway or integral partner in helping schools to achieve these types of grants. A question asked of Teh-yuan was “Can the state help to get us all connected onto a single network?” He indicated to achieve this we must act as one by putting resources together.  We should check with the Public Service Commission to see if there is something they can do in helping with this technology connection around the state for distance learning. We need to design an RFI as a group to outline how we perceive the BOCES around the state and their distance learning consortium being all tied together.  This will include what types of technology need to be acquired to make this happen.

·         Post Secondary Education Programs: John Barry indicated that he had some post secondary education programs starting with University of Buffalo in the following areas: Masters of Art and Teaching, Applied Economics, and Adult Education.

·        It was suggested that we add to our website a list of colleges that offer graduate programs over distance learning. 

·        “For Profit” Agencies Use Our Distance Learning Rooms: At Broome BOCES there is a form that companies need to fill out in our central office detailing what purpose you would like to use the room for.  Based on review by Central Administration the decision is made whether the room can be used or not and if there is a fee involved. No other comments.

·        International Distance Learning Conference: Bonnie Nizamis shared with us her experience this past summer in Coopenhagen, Denmark.  This was a conference of computers and education that she attended.  She thought we were way ahead of other countries with distance learning.  Bonnie indicated the conference is held every 5 years.

·        Distance Learning Conference in Wisconsin: Carol Brown shared her experience from this summer at a distance learning conference in Wisconsin.  She indicated that many of the workshops were dedicated to online learning.  Many of the colleges are interested in video conferencing.  Carol has a book on the conference she attended if anyone would like to look at it.  It appeared to her that colleges are dominating this conference with an online distance learning approach.  Carol also told us that in Wisconsin all the institutions are connected to each other with a network called “badger net”. In this network the state pays a majority of the cost.

·        Consortium Listserv: Several people commented that it appears that our consortium listserv is not working properly.  Tracy Clark indicated that she would follow up at her BOCES to see what the problem might be.

·        Barbara Buonanno indicated she is looking for an expert on bio-terrorism.

·        Consortium Flyer: We discussed the concept of developing a tri-folded flyer that would have information promoting the consortium.  Bonnie Nizamis offered to do a draft of the flyer to review at our January meeting.  Jennifer Lawless will send Bonnie a sample of the flyer that she has created.

·        Two programs that may be advantageous to others to participate in are: November 15 there will be a satellite program titled “Smart Budgeting for Technology” and starts at 4:30 pm. Eastern standard time.  Satellite coordinates can be obtained from the SERC website at www.serc.org or by calling 1-800-476-5001 for more information.  Also on February 7 there is a program titled “Copyright in Distance Learning”.

·        Framework for our Meetings:  It was suggested we try at our next meeting to have breakout sessions of interested groups right at the consortium meeting.  The sessions would be technical, instructional, and non-instructional issues.  Topics for these sessions need to be forwarded to Steve as soon as possible so it can be planned for our next meeting.

·        Teacher Listserv: Shelley Rossitto was asked if the teacher listserv was available. It is and it can be used.

·        Distance Learning Site Directory: Andy Verdon asked that anyone who has changes to the database to please submit them to him as soon as possible so changes can be made and linked back to our consortium website.

·        Diffusion Project: Roger Oesterle indicated that this project was continuing to look at ATM connections.  There are additional slots on the switches, which is part of an OC3 environment that is available.  Some districts that are currently not a part of this project may be able to take advantage of these vacant slots.

 

3.         School Boards-(NYSSBA):

 

·        Mike Bayba indicated that we were ready for the October 8-20 conference in Buffalo.  The plan is to have one double sized booth. We will have set up monitors, microphone, and camera so people can watch distance learning go around between classrooms and talk to people.

·        Reviewed the scheduled events and who was to be on which day at the booth.

·        Roxanne will hang up our consortium banner. Bonnie Nizamis will collect all of the handouts for the table.  Additionally, she will have copies of the bookmark made up for distribution.  Bonnie will bring these items to the NYSCATE’s Conference.

·        Roxanne will send our banner to Bonnie for NYSCATE’s.

 

4.                  NYSCATE’s Conference Planning:

 

·    Mike Sylofski continues to work with his vendor to plan for implementation in the distance learning room at the capital.  Mike was working with Verizon on network connections. We are in Room 7 at the conference and we will have a booth outside the room as well.   Mike Sylofski, John Barry, Steve Smith, and Tony Abbatiello will be there to manage the booth. If anyone else can make it there to help out at the booth, it would be greatly appreciated.

·    All of the assignments for the breakout sessions in the distance learning rooms have been received by the NYSCATE’s people and approved.  The agenda or timeframe for these presentations have also been approved.  I have also requested a$200 Internet connection at the booth.

 

5.                  Video Conferencing:

 

Carol Brown, Chris Staats, Roxanne Warren, Rita Wissinger, and JoAnn Schlachter are on a subcommittee to develop a conference on videoconferencing.  They will outline their plan at the January meeting. Carol Brown volunteered to be the group leader.


6.                  Technical Committee Update:

 

Steve indicated that the technical subcommittee met prior to the consortium meeting this morning to discuss issues related to the NYSSBA and NYSCATE’s conference.  In the future we will be looking at additional topics to be covered regarding upgrading technology in the classrooms, state wide connections, perhaps a common bid on our listserv or on our website, invitations to vendors at an appropriate time to come and discuss new products that they have to review with us.  Steve asked that anyone desiring to be on the technical subcommittee should send him an email so he can create the mailing list for that.  The technical committee needs to decide if they want to meet again the morning of the consortium meetings or at a more convenient time.  

 

7.                  Next Meeting:

 

Shelley invited us to have our next meeting at her location in January so she can show us some of the new technology that she has.  After the meeting several members indicated they would prefer to keep the meeting in Binghamton at least for this next meeting. The format for the next meeting will include our bringing technical people to the meeting and try to get them involved in a breakout session.  It was suggested we encourage principals and teachers to come to our consortium meetings.  We need the input of these people and how they feel about distance learning.  Date: January 10/11, 2002 at the Binghamton Regency in Binghamton.

 

8.                  Agenda:

 

Please submit agenda items to Steve by January 4, 2001.