Searching for "emergency teaching"

bio lab in emergency teaching

https://www.facebook.com/groups/onlinelearningcollective/permalink/599387467358622/

Hi everyone- my mom has been teaching Bio 101 with a lab for 39 years. I’m working with her to get ready for the fall semester online but Science isn’t my field. Any recommendations for online bio labs?

Stephanie Edelmann I’m still working on my lab, but here is an extensive list of online resources that was shared with faculty at our school.

https://docs.google.com/…/1Mv0EyCw2QeFIpW5P5qNR5EW…/edit

Rebecca Westphal Carolina has kits…. but they are mostly on back order and hard to get for fall (in US?). You could think of putting together your own kits for students to pick up. There are also many labs using “household” materials such as this spinach photosynthesis lab http://www2.nau.edu/…/photosynthesis/photosynthesis.html.

For introducing basic chemistry I really like the “Build an Atom” simulation on the PhET website, although it’s more of an activity than a “lab”. HHMI biointeractive has lots of free resources and data sets that you could build on, including lots for natural selection — try searching “rock pocket mouse natural selection” on the biointeractive website.

Rachel Scherer https://phet.colorado.edu/_m/ is one of my go to favorites. I have some instructors testing labster out this summer. I haven’t heard anything back so I am guessing it is working well for them. Also

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18iVSIeOqKjj58xcR8dYJS5rYvzZ4X1UGLWhl3brRzCM/htmlview?fbclid=IwAR2h4vyLqHtXW6M80CXTHZ4eUrv-TY8ljCMMZ52zMRGCqqgxwNt6Qq8zpF0#gid=0

Cheryl DeWyer Lindeman https://www.biointeractive.org

Cheryl DeWyer Lindeman https://www.shapeoflife.org/

Sondra LoRe https://qubeshub.org/community/groups/quant_bio_online

+++++++++++++++++
more on emergency teaching in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=emergency+teaching

Emergency Remote Teaching and Online Learning

The Difference Between Emergency Remote Teaching and Online Learning

 Published:

https://er.educause.edu/articles/2020/3/the-difference-between-emergency-remote-teaching-and-online-learning

Moving instruction online can enable the flexibility of teaching and learning anywhere, anytime, but the speed with which this move to online instruction is expected to happen is unprecedented and staggering.

“Online learning” will become a politicized term that can take on any number of meanings depending on the argument someone wants to advance.

Online learning carries a stigma of being lower quality than face-to-face learning, despite research showing otherwise. These hurried moves online by so many institutions at once could seal the perception of online learning as a weak option

Researchers in educational technology, specifically in the subdiscipline of online and distance learning, have carefully defined terms over the years to distinguish between the highly variable design solutions that have been developed and implemented: distance learning, distributed learning, blended learning, online learning, mobile learning, and others. Yet an understanding of the important differences has mostly not diffused beyond the insular world of educational technology and instructional design researchers and professionals.

Online learning design options (moderating variables)

  • Modality
    • Fully online
    • Blended (over 50% online)
    • Blended (25–50% online)
    • Web-enabled F2F

    Pacing

    • Self-paced (open entry, open exit)
    • Class-paced
    • Class-paced with some self-paced

    Student-Instructor Ratio

    • < 35 to 1
    • 36–99 to 1
    • 100–999 to 1
    • > 1,000 to 1

    Pedagogy

    • Expository
    • Practice
    • Exploratory
    • Collaborative

    Role of Online Assessments

    • Determine if student is ready for new content
    • Tell system how to support the student (adaptive instruction)
    • Provide student or teacher with information about learning state
    • Input to grade
    • Identify students at risk of failure
  • Instructor Role Online
    • Active instruction online
    • Small presence online
    • None

    Student Role Online

    • Listen or read
    • Complete problems or answer questions
    • Explore simulation and resources
    • Collaborate with peers

    Online Communication Synchrony

    • Asynchronous only
    • Synchronous only
    • Some blend of both

    Source of Feedback

    • Automated
    • Teacher
    • Peers
Source: Content adapted from Barbara Means, Marianne Bakia, and Robert Murphy, Learning Online: What Research Tells Us about Whether, When and How (New York: Routledge, 2014).
Typical planning, preparation, and development time for a fully online university course is six to nine months before the course is delivered. Faculty are usually more comfortable teaching online by the second or third iteration of their online courses.
In contrast to experiences that are planned from the beginning and designed to be online, emergency remote teaching (ERT) is a temporary shift of instructional delivery to an alternate delivery mode due to crisis circumstances. It involves the use of fully remote teaching solutions for instruction or education that would otherwise be delivered face-to-face or as blended or hybrid courses and that will return to that format once the crisis or emergency has abated.
A full-course development project can take months when done properly. The need to “just get it online” is in direct contradiction to the time and effort normally dedicated to developing a quality course. Online courses created in this way should not be mistaken for long-term solutions but accepted as a temporary solution to an immediate problem.

+++++++++++++++++
More on online learning in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=online+learning

Faculty Learn New Teaching Methods

Survey: Emergency Move Online Forced More than Half of Faculty to Learn New Teaching Methods

Rhea Kelly 04/22/20

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2020/04/22/survey-emergency-move-online-forced-more-than-half-of-faculty-to-learn-new-teaching-methods.aspx

56 percent of faculty who moved courses online were using teaching methods they had never used before. That’s according to “Digital Learning Pulse Survey: Immediate Priorities,” a study conducted by Bay View Analytics

+++++++++++++

Free and Discounted Ed Tech Tools for Online Learning During the Coronavirus Pandemic

Dian Schaffhauser  03/16/20

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2020/03/16/free-and-discounted-ed-tech-tools-for-online-learning-during-the-coronavirus-pandemic.aspx

here some examples from a long list of free services:

Addigy, a cloud-based Apple device management platform, has announced free 60-day access for colleges and universities. The program helps organizations deploy, manage, and track new and existing Apple devices from a single console; automate IT tasks and implement IT policies related to deploying software, updating security settings, running scripts, managing groups of users, and distributing and updating software; and troubleshoot problems for users remotely and in real-time. https://addigy.com/covid-19-addigy-60/?utm_content=covid-19-addigy-60

Arizona State University’s EdPlus is working with Complexly’s Crash Course on a series of entry-level course videos, starting with English composition. (Complexly and Crash Course are an initiative of the Green brothers, hosts of a popular vlog and best-selling fiction.) The new content in “Study Hall,” won’t offer credit or replace any degree programs, but rather will serve as a supplement for high school or college learners. Each subject will be the focus of about 15 videos 15 minutes long, covering major points in the topic. Those are being hosted on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNrrxHpJhC8mNXjrAL3Ey1Q6iI35cymzl

Babbel is offering three months of free language learning to U.S. students through mid-June 2020 in any of its languages: Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Polish, Russian, Dutch, Turkish, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, Indonesian, and English. https://welcome.babbel.com/en/student-discount/

Gale is offering educators and librarians free access to digital content and resources to enhance instruction and learning. Resources include: interdisciplinary, curriculum-aligned resources to support online learning; live and on-demand training materials; e-books on virtual learning; and more. https://www.gale.com/covid19support.

Through July 1, Google is allowing G Suite for Education customers to use the Hangouts Meet premium functionality for free. People can host virtual meetings with up to 250 people and live streams with up to 100,000 viewers. Additionally, they’ll be able to save recordings of their meetings to Google Drive. https://support.google.com/meet/answer/9760270?hl=en

++++++++++++
more on online teaching in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=online+teaching

does this semester alter college

Will this semester forever alter college? No, but some virtual tools will stick around

when we talk about online education is using digital technologies to transform the learning experience,” said Vijay Govindarajan, a professor at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business. “That is not what is happening right now. What is happening now is we had eight days to put everything we do in class onto Zoom.”

Conceiving, planning, designing and developing a genuine online course or program can consume as much as a year of faculty training and collaboration with instructional designers, and often requires student orientation and support and a complex technological infrastructure.

More than 75 percent [of undergraduate students ] said they don’t think they’re receiving a quality learning experience, according to a survey of nearly 1,300 students by the online exam-prep provider OneClass. In a separate poll of 14,000 college and graduate students in early April by the website niche.com, which rates schools and colleges, 67 percent said they didn’t find online classes as effective as in-person ones.

if there’s a silver lining in this situation for residential colleges and universities, it’s that students no longer take for granted the everyday realities of campus life: low-tech face-to-face classes, cultural diversions, libraries, athletics, extracurricular activities, in-person office hours and social interaction with their classmates.

Online higher education “is a thin diet for the typical 18-year-old,” said Richard Garrett, chief research officer at Eduventures. “But today’s 18-year-olds are tomorrow’s 28-year-olds with families and jobs, who then realize that online can be useful.”

Along with their students, faculty were “thrown into the deep end of the pool for digital learning and asked to swim,” Moe said. “Some will sink, some will crawl to the edge of the pool and climb out and they’ll never go back in the pool ever again. But many will figure out what to do and how to kick and how to stay afloat.”

++++++++++++
more on online education in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=online+education

more on emergency teaching in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=emergency+teaching

What is Online Learning

https://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/page.cgi?post=70701

Online learning is planned, deliberate and thoughtful in the sense that online courses often take months or even years to develop, not days or weeks.

Online learning is far more than online courses and programs. It always has been. While inside the institution it has been difficult to imagine learning as anything other than courses and programs, outside the institution, over the last three or four decades, online learning has been something very different.

the wider internet to introduce educators to things like learning communities, blogs, social software, MOOCs, personal learning environments, and most recently, decentralized technology.

Online learning should be fast, fun, crazy, unplanned, and inspirational. It should be provided by people who are more like DJs than television producers. It should move and swim, be ad hoc and on the fly. I wish educators could get out of their classroom mindsets and actually go out and look at how the rest of the world is doing online learning. Watch a dance craze spread through TikTok, follow through-hikers on YouTube, organize a community in a Facebook group, discuss economic policy in Slack. All of that is online learning – and (resolutely) not the carefully planned courses that are over-engineered, over-produced, over-priced and over-wrought.

I quite agree with what Jim Groom said, that this is not “the time for wild experimentation.” I also recognize that a lot of what is happening today is an emergency response to an unprecedented situation. As Clint Lalonde says, “What is happening right now at many institutions as they are scrambling is grasping at life preservers trying to stay afloat

++++++++++++++++++
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2020/04/01/emergency-remote-teaching-and-online-learning/

online synchronous or asynchronous

Teaching synchronously? Asynchronously? Which is really better?

https://thesocietypages.org/teaching/2020/04/10/teaching-synchronously-asynchronously-which-is-really-better/
Are you going to teach synchronously or asynchronously? What’s better for your students? What’s better for you?
in the synchronous online classroom you can readily help students remember why they registered for your course to begin with, which can be very grounding. 
The most popular reason for choosing this option for your teaching is flexibility regarding when work is done. Asynchronous classes have pedagogical benefits too. They allow students to literally “pause” your class when they are confused or need a break, something only possible in their dreams for in-person and synchronous online classes, which go at a pace not set by them at all. Also, the technology requirements to take in an asynchronous class are lower, and this is therefore more accessible to more students.

An example of “doing both”

++++++++++++++

How to Reconnect With Students and Strengthen Your Remote Course

APRIL 09, 2020

https://www.chronicle.com/article/How-to-Reconnect-With-Students/248461

how to structure a supportive learning environment, and how that might apply to an emergency situation such as this, where many students struggle to stay focused, or find it difficult to learn with unfamiliar systems and technologies.

  • Normalize the abnormal.
  • Create an online presence.
  • Explain, and then explain some more.
  • Take advantage of the technology.
  • Foster community.

++++++++++++
more on synchronous vs asynchronous in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=synchronous

remote class

Remote teaching literature:
breaking up synchronous sessions with hands-on. This requires strong skills for virtual presenting. A nice little simple book on this: https://www.amazon.com/Exceptional-Presenter-Goes-Virtual-Person/dp/1608320464:
Koegel, T. (2010). The exceptional presenter goes virtual (1st ed.). Austin, Tex: Greenleaf Book Group Press.
The book, unfortunately, is available through ILL and ILL is suspended.
about analytics and the length of attention is evidence-based findings from a paper by Guo on giant Moocs. https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/effective-educational-videos/
This Black Swan event means we are doing something in a few weeks it should take five months to complete. Call it “Remote Teaching” Nice resources: https://umaine.edu/citl/emergency-remote-teaching/
by Jeremy Kemp <jwkemp@SCU.EDU> from the Educause Blended Learning

++++++++++++

Keep Teaching During Campus Emergencies

calming strategies against stress

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2018-12-26-teaching-is-as-stressful-as-an-er-these-calming-strategies-can-help

researchers from Penn State say can be as stress-inducing as an emergency room. Teachers enter such an an environment every day, which sometimes feels like life-or-death.

nonprofit program Cultivating Awareness and Resilience in Education (CARE)

half of the students in schools across America have experienced some form of trauma, violence or chronic stress.

After collecting data on those educators’ well-being, observations of classrooms and student behavioral reports over the course of a year, we found that teachers who received emotional regulation training were more emotionally supportive, demonstrated greater sensitivity to student needs, and provided more positive and productive classroom environments. Furthermore, when assessing teachers’ stress levels, those teachers noted considerably less distress, and an improved ability to manage their emotions.

In the face of stressful situations, I instead used techniques like deep breathing and mindful walking to calm my body and mind, gaining that heightened self-awareness to thoughtfully respond to the issue at hand.

+++++++++++++

+++++++++++++
more on stress in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=stress

LRS drone

REPORT

Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), AKA drones

August 15, 2016

Sources:

  • This report is based on a DVD “Drones on Campus. UAS Issues for the Higher Education Community” of February 2, 2016. The DVD contains a PDF file and flattened media file with a voice-narrated PPT based on the information from the PDF.
  • The report takes into consideration the opulence of materials gathered during the last 4-5 years in the IMS blog: https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=drones

Narrative / synopsis:

The DVD is a commercial product for sale for the Higher Ed. It is the recoding of a commercial seminar for Higher Ed, led by a lawyer (Lisa Ellman, lisa.ellman@hoganlovells.com, Twitter handle @leelellman) from the legal practice Hogan Lovells and by employee from FAA.

The information below represents the main points from the PDF / PPT presentation, as well as additional information with clarifications, which I added while working with the PDF and PPT files.

Discussion topics:

  1. How and when UAS can be approved for flying at SCSU
  2. The effect on SCSU of the domestic UAS legal framework
  3. Protection against rogue drones on campus
  4. Policymaking around UAS

FAA Modernization and Reform Act (P.L. 112-095) Reports and Plans Integration of Civil Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in the National Airspace System (NAS) Roadmap https://www.faa.gov/about/plans_reports/modernization/media/Sec.332(a).pdf
Unmanned Aircraft Systems Comprehensive Plan (Section 332 (a)(5))
https://www.faa.gov/about/plans_reports/modernization/media/Sec.332(a)(5)2.pdf
Unmanned Aircraft Systems Privacy Requirements (Section 332 (a)(5))
https://www.faa.gov/about/plans_reports/modernization/media/Sec.332(a)(5).pdf
section 333 exemptions
http://www.faa.gov/uas/getting_started/fly_for_work_business/beyond_the_basics/section_333/333_authorizations/
Small UAS Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM)
http://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/rulemaking/media/021515_suas_summary.pdf
The term “unmanned aircraft system” means an unmanned aircraft and associated elements (including communication links and components that control the unmanned aircraft) that are required for the pilot in command to operate safely and efficiently in the national airspace system.
Federal Gov’t UAS Policymaking. FAA Reauthorization Act of 2012, FAA Rulemaking process, Federal Interagency Process, Agency-Specific Processes
UAS categorization:

  • Model aircraft
  • Public – UAS owned and operated by government agencies and organizations, such as public university
    a public COA (certificate of waiver of authorization) is issued by the FAA to a public agency/organization for public aircraft operations
    most aspects of public aircraft operations are not subject to FAA oversight
    If we are a public university… can we operate UAS under a public COA?
    in order to operate under a public COA< the UAS must be operated by the university for a “core governmental function, which is defined as:
    “… and activity undertaken by a government, such as national defense, intelligence missions, firefighting, search and rescue, law enforcement (including transport of prisoners, detainees, and illegal aliens), aeronautical research, or biological or geological resource management.
    In an FAA Office, it was clarified that “aeronautical research” must be focused on the development and testing of the UAS itself, rather than the thing being observed and monitored using the UAS.
  • Civil
  • Any private sector (non-governmental) operation of a drone for purposes other than recreation or hobby is considered a “civil” operation
  • This category covers all commercial use of UAS, including use by private universities and colleges

Summary Grant Exemption / Blanket COA conditions and COA conditions and limitations:

  • Below 200 feet
  • Within visual line-of-sight of the pilot and visual observer
  • At least 500 feet from nonparticipating persons, vessels, vehicles, or structures, unless certain conditions met
  • Over private or controlled access property with consent
  • Visual observer required
  • Pilot must have an FAA issues pilot certificate and a medical certificate or DL
  • Mussed give a way to all manned aircraft

SCSU must apply for section 333 exemption – FAA has granted 3.129 out of 4500 applications. FAA current goal: 50+ exemption grants per week

QA regarding exemption / blanket COA requirements

Small UAS Rule: June 2016 (IMS blog)

  • Must be < 55 lbs
  • Max altitude speed 500 feet / 100 mph
  • Minimum visibility 3 miles
  • UAS always yield right-of-way to other aircraft
  • UAS cannot be operated recklessly
  • Registration and marking required
  • Hobbyist operators: December 21, 2015
  • All UAS >.55 pounds and less than 55 pounds must be registered either using the new online system or the FAAs existing paper-based registration system before the UAS can be operated outdoors
  • UAS within that right range purchased prior to December 21, 2015 must be registered by February 19, 2016
  • Hobbies required to submit basic contact info, such as name, address email. Costs $5 to register hobbyist owner’s entire fleet of UAS. The FAA will issue a single CAR (certificate of aircraft registration) with one registration number that can be used for and should be put on each UAS. Every 3 years, renewal.

Boggs v Meredith. How high do airspace rights extend over private property

  • Up to 83 feet in the air
  • Other legal liability issues:
    • Trespass
    • Nuisance

Mitigating UAS Legal Liabilities

  • When hiring a UAS server provider
    • Seek to shift and limit liability through contract
    • Vendors operating UAS on university property should sing a written agreement
    • Ensure the UAS service provider has adequate insurance
  • When selecting a UAS model:

Who is in charge

  • University should have a UAS operations manual with policies and procedures
    • Permission to fly on campus (who, how and when)
    • UAS operation, maintenance and inspection procedures
    • Emergency procedures, accident / incident notification, reporting
    • FAA recordkeeping requirements
      • UAS flight activity (when, where, duration)
      • Incidents/accidents involving personal injury or property damage
      • Lost-link events (AKA fly-aways)
      • UAS maintenance and inspection
      • UAS flight crew training / qualifications
      • Participant / property owner consent
    • Faculty/staff/student qualifications and training
    • Privacy policies, data management, retention
    • Consent and notification requirements for operating near people and structures

 

Outline of immediate tasks:

Based on the information above:

  • SCSU, LRS in particular, must decide what drone’s certificate to apply for: a. model; b. public; c.civil; or d. hobbies
  • After selection of certificate type, SCSU, LRS in particular, must register the drone[s].
  • SCSU, LRS in particular, must develop policies for service, operation and maintenance.
  • SCSU, LRS in particular, must assign person[s] in charge of the training, maintenance and operation.

Suggestions and recommendations:

  • Hosting a drone in the library.
    If to adhere to the ALA call for the librarians to be the forefront of technology on campus, LRS can use the drone purchased in April 2014 to train and lend the drone for research on campus.
    If LRS continues the policy of the previous dean, further suggestions below can be waved off.
  • Training, maintenance and operation
    Shall LRS keep the drone, the best person to conduct the training and service of the drone will be an IMS faculty. As per email correspondence attached below, please have again the rational:
    – hosting the drone with Circulation (staff) does not provide the adequate academic/research services. It is expected that the foremost users will be faculty, students and then staff and the foremost use will be academic and then leisure activities. While IMS faculty can meet the “leisure activities” for all three constituency, as it has been provided by the Circulation staff until this point, the IMS faculty can also provide the research and academic service, which Circulation staff is not educated neither trained for. With that said, the point made is not against staff not participating in the effort to train and service campus with the drone; it just makes the point that charging staff with that task is limited and against the best interest of the faculty and students on campus.
    – blocking the effort of IMS faculty to lead technology-oriented services on campus, LRS in particular.
    Upon hiring of a “technology” librarian, previous dean Mark Vargas blocked any technology-related activities by IMS faculty: e.g. 3d printer AKA makerspace, gaming and gamification, drones, etc.
    If I am to understand well, the “technology” librarian’s charge must be toward automated library systems and similar, rather than educational use of multimedia and interactivity. Blocking IMS faculty to do what they do best by freezing any of their efforts and reserving “technology” for [unknown] future leadership of the “technology” librarian is a waste of IMS faculty expertise and knowledge.
    Gaming and Gamification (https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2015/03/19/recommendations-for-games-and-gaming-at-lrs/) charge by previous dean Mark Vargas to the first-year “technology” librarian revealed as obvious that giving the preference to junior faculty to “lead” an effort can become a dangerous tool in the hands of the administration to manipulate and slow down efforts of educational trends of time-sensitive character. While, as from the beginning, the collaboration of the “technology” librarian has been welcomed and appreciated, it does not make sense from any cultural or institutional perspective, to put in charge a new faculty, who does not have the knowledge and networking of the campus, less the experience and knowledge with multimedia and interactive tools as the rest of the seasoned IMS faculty. Decision and consequent refusal of the “technology” librarian to work with the IMS faculty did not contribute to improvement of the situation.
    A very important point, which goes against the “consensus” efforts of the previous dean, is the fact that now the library faculty is using the newly-hired “technology” librarian to hinder further the integration of the IMS faculty as part of LRS by using her as a focal point for any technology initiative in LRS, thus further excluding the IMS faculty from LRS activities. It will help: 1. delineate the expertise parameters of the “technology” librarian and 2. have the librarian faculty think about their work with the IMS faculty, which has been a thorny issue for more than 10 years now (pretty much since the hire of the bulk of the reference librarians).

If there are questions, or the need of more information, please do not hesitate to request.

Plamen Miltenoff, Ph.D., MLIS
Professor

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

From: Miltenoff, Plamen
Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2016 9:44 AM
To: Banaian, King <kbanaian@stcloudstate.edu>
Subject: request to release the library drone

 

Dr. Banaian,

 

My name is Plamen Miltenoff and I am faculty with the InforMedia Services of the SCSU Library. I have worked in the last 15+ years with faculty, students and staff on educational technology and instructional design. I hold two doctoral degrees in education and four master’s degrees in history and Library and Information Science.
I have extensive background in new educational technologies, which is amply reflected in the following blog: https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/. Shall more proof of my abilities is needed, here is detailed information about publications, presentations and projects, which I have accomplished: http://web.stcloudstate.edu/pmiltenoff/faculty/

In the spring of 2014, Mark Vargas purchased a drone. As per my job description and long experience working with faculty across campus with other technologies, I immediately alerted SCSU faculty who have strong interest in applying drone’s technology in their studies, research and teaching, assuming that the newly-appointed library director (Mark Vargas) will support my years-long efforts.

Due to complications with FAA regulations the drones across the country were grounded.

Mark Vargas “stationed” it with the library Access Services, a unit, which is comprised of staff only. When I approached the library staff from Access Services, they chose to not collaborate with me, but rather deflect me to Mark Vargas.
As per my email to Mark Vargas of July 21, 2015 (attachment 1), I requested an explanation and shared my feeling that SCSU faculty are being left in disadvantage after I witness the drone being used. I also asked my immediate supervisor Mark Vargas about the policies and release conditions. Unfortunately, my repeated requests remained unanswered.

As of yesterday, FAA has finally released the last version of the regulations:
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2016/06/22/faa-final-rules-drones/

Here is extensive information on how drones can be used in education, which I collected through the years: https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=drones

I am turning to you as the appointed administrator-in-charge of the library (attachment 2), with the request that you share the amounted paperwork regarding the drone. Mark Vargas did not share that information, despite numerous requests, e.g., if the drone is registered, etc.

I am seeking your administrative approval to pursue the completion of the paperwork and secure immediate usability of the drone, so it is available also to all interested SCSU faculty with or without my participation (as per regulations). The request is timely, since such technologies are aging quickly. Besides the depreciation of the technology, SCSU students and faculty deserves being kept with the times and explore a technology, which is rapidly becoming a mainstream, rather than novelty.

Please consider that I am the only library member with terminal degrees in education as well as extensive experience with technologies in general and educational technologies in particular.  I am also the only library member with extensive network among faculty across campus. I am perceived by colleagues across campus more often as a peer, collaborator and research partner, then merely a service provider, as most of the library staff and faculty consider themselves. I am the only library member, who sits on theses and doctoral committees and the invitations to these committees are greatly based on my experience in educational technologies and my research and publishing skills. Leaving the drone in the Access Services, as appointed by the previous administrator, will result in a dormancy of technology as it has happened with numerous other technologies on this campus. It is a waste of equipment, which this university cannot afford in the respective financial times. Letting me take the lead of the drone project will secure active promotion and better application of this technology and possibly other venues (e.g. grants) to pursue further endeavors.

Thank you and looking forward to your approval.

 

Plamen Miltenoff, Ph.D., MLIS

Professor

320-308-3072

pmiltenoff@stcloudstate.edu

http://web.stcloudstate.edu/pmiltenoff/faculty/

 

Attachment 1

 

From: Miltenoff, Plamen
Sent: Tuesday, July 21, 2015 5:09 PM
To: Vargas, Mark A. <mavargas@stcloudstate.edu>
Cc: Quinlan, Jennifer M. <jmquinlan@stcloudstate.edu>; Prescott, Melissa K. <mkprescott@stcloudstate.edu>; Hergert, Thomas R. <trhergert@stcloudstate.edu>
Subject: LRS drones

 

Mark,

Last week LRS staff was handling the LRS drones.

Did I miss email correspondence informing about the change in regulations? If so, I would like to have a copy of it.

If not, I would like to know your rational for your selective choice releasing this technology.

Per the IMS blog:

https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=drones&submit=Search

and direct oral and written communication with you, I have expressed strong academic interest in research of this technology for educational purposes. I have the educational background and experience for the aforementioned request.

I am asking you for access to this technology since early summer of 2014.

I would like to be informed what your plan for this technology is and when it will be open to the LRS faculty. I also would like to know when preference to LRS staff is given when technology is concerned, so I can plan accordingly.

Thank you and looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Plamen

—————-

Plamen Miltenoff, Ph.D., MLIS

 

Attachment 2

From: lrs_l-bounces@lists.stcloudstate.edu [mailto:lrs_l-bounces@lists.stcloudstate.edu] On Behalf Of Vaidya, Ashish K.
Sent: Monday, June 13, 2016 2:08 PM
To: lrs_l@stcloudstate.edu <lrs_l@lists.stcloudstate.edu>
Subject: [LRS_l] Interim Leadership for LRS

Dear LRS Faculty and Staff,

As you are aware, Mark Vargas has submitted his resignation as Dean of Learning Resources Services. Mark’s last day on campus was Friday, June 10, 2016.

I want to assure you that any decision about interim leadership will be made after careful consideration of the needs of the Library and the University. I will continue conversations with various individuals, including the President, to ensure we have strategic alignment in both support and oversight for LRS.  LRS is committed to providing excellent services to our students, faculty, and staff, creating opportunities for knowledge, and serving the public good. I look forward to working together with you to accomplish these goals.

I expect to identify an interim dean shortly and to begin a national search this fall with an appointment to begin July 1, 2017.  I have asked Greta to schedule a time for me to visit with faculty and staff in Learning Resource Service next week. In the meantime, Dean King Banaian will serve as the administrator-in-charge of LRS until June 30, 2016.

Sincerely yours,

Ashish

 

 

1 2