In my first post on the OET discussion board I mentioned one of my nouns being VideoConferencing.
Having worked in education in the remote Pilbara region of WA I became well aware of the tyranny of distance and its effect on provision of educational services. The Pilbara is a vast area of 500,000 sq km and my town of Karratha is 1600 kms north of Perth which is often regarded as the most remote capital city on the planet. The main towns within the region are hundreds of Kms apart. Whilst working as a District Curriculm ICT consultant for the WA Dept of Education and Training I was involved in providing professional development, training and consultancy services to the 30 Pilbara schools. I was fortunate to be asked by the District Director at the time to investigate the feasibility and use of videoconferencing in K-12 education and come up with a strategic plan for implementation. As a result of that work we set up VC units in all our senior highs schools and remote community schools in conjunction with the state telecentre network which resulted in 13 sites being established throughout the Pilbara. In addition to the provision of PD to education staff, the network has been used for job interviews, psychological counselling, meetings and most importantly learning activities for students such as the WA Flexible Learning in Schools Project. Although I have now left education, I am pleased to see the legacy of my work continue and develop as we initialled envisaged. This early work in technology enabled education spurred my subsequent interest and enrolment in the MITED.
Since that time the emergence of web enabled technologies has mushroomed and I look forward to investigating them throughout this course.
John
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Welcome to my Online Education Blog
I have been a participant in a videoconference for educational purposes
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About Me
- John Verbeek
- Karratha, Western Australia
- I am a former primary school teacher specialising in ICT and music. I have also taught IT as a sessional lecturer for Pilbara TAFE and lectured in B.Ed for Curtin University's Centre for Remote and Rural Education. I am currently working as a Senior Project Officer Infrastructure and Economic Development for the Pilbara Development Commission. Within this new role I have continued my interest in education though project work in two of our regional high schools updating their video conferencing equipment and fostering development of an online learning website.
5 comments:
John, do you know anything about the famous "School of the air"? Does it still exist? I am assuming they have moved on from the days when it was all done by 2way radio.
Sounds great John, hopefully what you set up does continue.
Joanne
School of the air is still going strong in WA and other parts of Australia.
Here is an excerpt from a media release from DCITA describing a project in the eastern states launched in 2003 -
"Students of the famed School of the Air entered the digital age today with the launch in Alice Springs of the $17 million Optus Interactive Distance eLearning Initiative by Senator Richard Alston, Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts.
School of the Air lessons that have operated in many remote areas of Australia since the 1920s have traditionally been delivered via radio - but will now be channelled through an innovative two-way broadband satellite network.
The network is supported by $8 million from the Commonwealth Government's National Communications Fund and $9 million from the New South Wales and NT Governments and Optus. It will cover some of the most remote regions in the country, including the whole of the NT and parts of NSW.
This state-of-the-art broadband system will deliver lessons over the School of the Air - as well as distance education, TAFE outreach and vocational training - allowing much greater interaction between teachers and students.
The network comprises a satellite hub in Sydney and five teaching studios in Alice Springs, Darwin, Broken Hill, Dubbo and Port Macquarie. Satellite dishes and computers will complete the network with 547 sites across New South Wales and the Northern Territory, including remote homesteads and properties, isolated schools and Indigenous settlements.
Using this network, Optus will provide an Interactive Distance Learning software package capable of supporting a variety of services, including multicast, two-way audio, email between students and teachers, an interactive whiteboard, controlled Internet access and pop-up questions.
http://www.dcita.gov.au/Article/0,,0_1-2_3-4_114750,00.html
Wow
Thats really interesting John. We are a long way off Video conferencing- and don't know that it will ever be within the budget BUT it would be interesting to see if we could combine with a local Secondary school -using their resources to experience this!
Good to hear of your education experience in WA. Most of my (many) years in the game have been in country areas - SA, NthQ & NSW - and your 'story' evokes many memories. Whilst all students can benefit and no doubt enjoy ICT, the advances and advantages for isolated kids are, in a way, more real. Thanks again.
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