Professional Development

Annual Conference

The WCET 17th Annual Conference, originally scheduled to take place in New Orleans, was relocated to San Francisco after Hurricane Katrina. Attendees were pleasantly surprised by the seamless transition. Three hundred and ninety-six attendees participated in 63 sessions covering a wide range of topics in each of the six strands. The theme of the program developed by the 2005 planning committee was E-Learning E-Llusions & Triumphs: Re-imagining the Academic Ecosystem.

On Friday evening, WCET member Macromedia hosted a special reception at its headquarters in honor of the Louisiana members. Conference attendees brought items to include in a silent auction, which raised $2,500 for higher education institutions affected by the storm.

The WCET 18th Annual Conference, Blazing the E-Learning Trail… Forging New Ways to Learn, will be held in Portland, OR, on November 1 to 4.

Webcast Series

In response to the Executive Council’s recommendation, WCET formed a Webcast Committee in the fall of 2005 to explore ways to extend the value of the annual conference via webcasts of selected program topics. The chairs and vice chairs of the 2005 planning committee recommended topics for consideration. The webcast committee, consisting of steering committee representatives Hae Okimoto, Ed Klonoski, and Mike Abbiatti worked with Pat Shea to set the goals and recommended a pricing structure for the webcast program. In fall 2006, WCET will pilot a webcast series of four topics using the WCET member Horizon Wimba platform. For more information about the webcast series, see http://wcet.info/pd/webcasts/

Visiting Scholars Program/Postdoc

WCET did not place any visiting scholars or postdocs during this fiscal year.

The WCET visiting scholars program is designed to give experienced staff at WCET member institutions, as well as doctoral students, an opportunity to learn about e-learning policies and practices at state, regional, national, and international levels.

These positions can vary in length. Usually, they last from six months to a full year, depending on the project and the scholar’s expertise. In most cases, these are unpaid positions. Some positions may be located in the WCET offices in Boulder, CO, but most are designed to allow scholars to work with the WCET staff and committees from their remote location.