From a Distance...

 
Online Newsletter for Arkansas Distance Learning

       .

Dawson Center for Distance Learning Named 2008 ARDLA Outstanding Distance Learning Program
by Marty Watson

The Arkansas Distance Learning Association has named the Dawson Center for Distance Learning the Outstanding Distance Learning Provider for the 2008 school year. The Dawson Center for Distance Learning focuses on national career clusters to provide students with the essential knowledge for transitioning successfully into a post-secondary school and/or occupational training program. According to April Shepherd, Dawson’s Distance Learning Coordinator, “Our mission is to provide students with a career focused strategy that supports workforce preparation, economic development, and educational expansion.”

Dawson Center for Distance Learning provides classes in the following national career clusters: Arts, Audio Visual Technologies and Communication, Finance, Health Science, Human Services, Law, Public Safety and Security, Marketing Sales and Service, and Foreign Language studies in Spanish. The program began in the 2005-2006 school year with one teacher, two schools, and nine students. In the 2007-2008 school year there were ten teachers, thirty schools, and 900 students. The current enrollment for 2007-2008 reflects a student enrollment of 1300 students and thirty-five schools.

Dawson follows the five layers of course maturity by Charlotte Neuhauser, Ph.D., at Madonna University, which proposes a five step maturity model for online course design. Teachers are evaluated according to the model’s rubric. For each year a teacher delivers a specific course, he or she is expected to have integrated the next level of course development. The five levels are Initial, Exploring, Awakening, Synergizing Strategies, and Integrating Best Practices. Following this model, each course gradually implements new course components, an improved course appearance, individualized and personal interactivity, increasing use of technology and interactivity, and more complex forms of multiple assessments. Teachers are evaluated each semester according to Neuhauser's and other rubrics focusing on traditional instructional strategies and classroom management.

In the fall of 2009 Dawson integrated Moodle into the program.  Moodle provides a single entry point which allows all teachers, facilitators, parents, professional guests, and students to work collaboratively and efficiently. Moodle allows parent and facilitator access to the online gradebooks, assignments, and allows them to monitor student files, communications, and activities within the course.

Courses are selected according the statewide Kuder’s report of student career interest and career studies that fall into the high skill, high wage, and high demand categories defined by Perkins IV legislation regarding CTE programs. Students are provided with courses which help prepare them for their future careers. Marty Watson, Instructional Technology Specialist, reports that “Professionals from various career clusters routinely visit the class for interviews and instruction in the area of study. For example, one of our former students from the AAVTC career cluster has worked with AETN as a cameraman and has returned as a guest speaker to class. Other professionals who have served as guests in class have been physicians, lawyers, correction and safety officers, and even television producers.”

Dawson Center for Distance Learning is honored to have received this award from the Arkansas Distance Learning Association. It is an accomplishment achieved through the great efforts of its teachers and staff in their dedication to help prepare students for future occupations. As stated by Sydney Smith, “The real object of education is to give children resources that will endure as long as life endures; habits that time will ameliorate, not destroy; occupation that will render life more dignified and useful.”

Dawson Staff in Picture Above

About the Author

Marty Watson is the Instructional Technology Specialist for the Dawson Center for Distance Learning.  She is also an adjunct professor of Instructional Technology at National Park Community College and Henderson State University.  Her courses focus on educating future teachers in technology for both distance learning and the traditional classroom.

In 2002 she helped create a charter school in Las Vegas, NV, for foster children which allowed students to complete their high school diploma online.  In 2005 she was the pilot instructor at Dawson's new distance learning program.  She hopes to eventually assist third world countries in developing distance learning programs for secondary education.

Marty received her Master’s Degree in Instructional Resources and Technologies from UALR in 2001 and is completing her school administrator’s licensure program through Henderson State University.  In Fall 2009, she will begin the new Ed.S. in Technology Management program at Henderson via distance education.

ARDLA Home | Current Issue | About Us | Archives | Writer's Guidelines | Editorial Calendar