Education Advocates:
A Value At Any Price
What are Education Advocates?
Linda Uhrenholt, Beth Bustamante, Jackie Siminitus, Mike Guerena,
and Deena Aerenson are the current "Education Advocates."
They share their experiences and techniques with teachers and librarians
throughout the state of California by providing customized training,
hands-on workshops and timely presentations. They can provide free
inservice training, staff development, conference presentations, technology
planning assistance, or "in-kind" donations for grant proposals.
They work closely with SBC account teams to put you in touch with
someone who can help you make informed decisions about telecommunications
and technology. As of early 2002, the Advocates have provided training
and support to almost 80,000 teachers and librarians within the state
of California. Visiting that many facilities and talking with that
many people gives the Advocates invaluable insight.
These are some of the things
the advocates have been up to lately. To take advantage of the free
services advocates have to offer, contact your area's education advocate
or SBC account manager.
From Greater SF Bay
Area Advocate Linda Urhenholt
Linda has developed a new
presentation titled "Creative Funding for School Technology."
With tough budget cuts, school districts around the country are considering
unique funding ideas to support technology. Her presentation focuses
on those creative (or sometimes crazy depending on how you look at
it) solutions that districts have incorporated from using eBay to
corporate sponsorships and more. A grants writing workshop can be
integrated into this presentation.
Linda recently attended
Homeland Security's Emergency Management Institute in Maryland. This
Institute focused on emergency management and response strategies
for the total community (schools, first responders, city officials).
The Department of Homeland Security does have a number of free classes
and institutes that can be found at http://www.fema.org/tab_education.shtm.
Many of the strategies she learned has a direct impact on school districts.
For more about Linda,
see her website at http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/linda.
From Statewide Library
Advocate Jackie Siminitus
Especially for high schools
or school districts: check out SBC's 2003 report on California Community
Colleges at http://www.kn.sbc.com/survey/ccclibraries.pdf
to see how college educational technology issues compare with your
own school or district issues. Many issues are the same, but from
a curriculum perspective it is interesting to hear that information
competency is a concern at the college level. Is there a way for college
and high schools can coordinate or collaborate on basic information
literacy instruction so college level courses can focus on discipline-specific
information literacy skills? See other SBC research at http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/jackie
"For each and every
program you write a grant for, there needs to be a line item in the
budget for technology." This statement was repeated several times
at a Foundation Center panel presentation on Educational Technology
funding. With this in mind, make sure that your institution's lead
grant writer works closely with your IT Director and Library Media
Teacher. Also, be sure to share SBC's "California LIBRARY News"
with your district grant writer, IT Director, and Library Media Teacher
because it is full of grant and network applications news. See http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/jackie/LibraryNewsFall2003.pdf
Jackie heard at a recent
CTAP Region 4 Council Meeting: "In times of low funding, training
and research are more important than ever." Training budgets
might be low, but training should still take high priority. Consider
inviting SBC Education Advocates to your district for workshops --
or host a webconference for your teachers throughout the district.
If your district doesn't yet use 1-800-CONFERENCE or a similar web
conferencing service, SBC Education Advocates can demonstrate simple
web conferencing for you -- it is an effective way to reach many administrators
or teachers to brief them on new programs and policies. Learn more
about FREE training support from your SBC Education or Library Advocate
at http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/support.html
From Northern California
Counties Advocate Deena Aerenson
Deena has
been immersed in the world of grants for the past 2 months searching
for grant opportunities to send to SBC customers. She also has been
completing a grant workshop which focuses on a team approach to grant
writing: "Panic first and then what….a team approach to
writing a grant." The Education Advocates will be offering this
workshop to our customers soon. She has been attending Erate seminars
throughout my territory and speaking with customers about workshop
opportunities. For more about Deena, see her website at http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/deena.
From Greater Los
Angeles Area Advocate Beth Bustamante
This month Beth traveled
around the state co-presenting at E-rate conferences. She also was
seen delivering "Especially Espanol for the Internet" and
"Filamentality" in the Central Valley's "Small Schools
Conference". Next week she'll present "Filamentality"
at Hillside Middle School in Simi Valley. For more about Beth, see
her website at http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/beth.
From Southern California
Counties Advocate Mike Guerena
Mike has been working with
districts in San Diego, Orange and Riverside on projects to help teachers
better integrate technology into the curriculum. He also continues
to lead trainings on effectively using the Internet in the classroom.
Mike is currently developing a series of guides for the Knowledge
Network on integrating technology into the core curriculum. For more
about Mike, see his website at http://www.kn.sbc.com/support/mike.
