From a Distance...

 
Online Newsletter for Arkansas Distance Learning

Caption This
by Liz Stover

The Global Campus at the University of Arkansas has recently revamped the instructor and student support sections for its learning management system (Blackboard). One of the most intensive and time-consuming tasks was to create new movie tutorials for the variety of tools used in Blackboard. To meet section 508 requirements, we selected to use synchronized captions for the movies. Having captions available also provides users with a script to read if a user’s audio is not functioning or if they are in a location where they cannot use the audio feature on their computer.

UAMS Rural Hospital Program Reaching out Through TELEHEALTH
by Carol Ann Bynum

For the past seventeen years the outreach mission of the Rural Hospital Program (RHP) at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) has been to strengthen hospitals in Arkansas by sharing resources from UAMS.  The program has used technology to redistribute knowledge and expertise throughout the state.  RHP led the state’s efforts in telehealth in 1995 when it established two telehealth sites.  Today, those two sites have expanded to include 50 rural hospitals, Area Health Education Centers (AHECs), and clinic sites across the state.   RHP has extended telehealth services into some of the most rural and needy regions of Arkansas. 

ARNEC Helping Solve the Rural Nursing Shortage
by Jill Hasley

The Arkansas Rural Nursing Education Consortium (ARNEC) was created in order to address the critical shortage of registered nurses (RNs) and nursing educators rural Arkansas. It provides a nontraditional career path for Licensed Practical Nurses and Licensed Psychiatric Technical Nurses (LPN/LPTN) who aspire to achieve an Associate of Applied Science (AAS) degree in Nursing. It also prepares them to sit for the national Registered Nursing examination known as the NCLEX-RN. The program was also created in an effort to keep RNs in the rural communities. The consortium is composed of six two-year colleges: Arkansas State University in Newport; Black River Technical College in Pocahontas; Cossatot Community College of the University of Arkansas servicing DeQueen, Nashville, and Ashdown; Ozarka College in Melbourne; South Arkansas Community College – El Dorado; University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton (UACCM).

ODE Increasing Educational Opportunities
by Paula Andrea Rentería

The Office of Distance Education (ODE) at the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts (ASMSA) began in July of 1998. From its simple beginning to today, the goal has always been to increase educational opportunities for students in Arkansas and, more recently, for students around the world.

From the ARDLA President...
by Valerie Wilson

Greetings…I must say that I am honored to have been asked to fill the shoes of Chris Boyett as your ARDLA president.  It is my desire to do the Association the best job that I can and not to disappoint you.  Chris had some very specific goals as your entering president and it is not my intent to deviate from that in any way.  One of his goals was to start an ARDLA newsletter and that has happened already!  This is actually the second issue.  Hats off to Karen Liebhaber for the excellent job and for all the hard work that she obviously put into publishing our newsletter.

From the Editor...
by Karen Liebhaber

Welcome back, Everyone!!

I am so thrilled to be able to bring you another issue of the ARDLA newsletter. Congratulations to Marty Watson for coming up with the fabulous title: From a Distance… I think it exhibits all that distance education stands for.

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