F-LIGHT

E-Newsletter for the Flashlight Program
For the Study and Improvement of
Educational Uses of Technology

September 2001-Special Edition

SUMMARY OF THIS ISSUE
In this issue of F-LIGHT, the free Flashlight newsletter:

Job Opening: Evaluator with skills using Flashlight Skills to work for Indiana University and the Flashlight Program

Flashlight Online Upgrade Coming Soon but Get It for No Extra Charge by Subscribing Now

WebCT starts the ball rolling: Selecting, Using, and Studying Web Course Management Systems

New Flashlight subscribers - Total now over 200 inst'ns!

Have a Question about Educational Uses of Technology?

Learning More About Flashlight( free demo accounts), The TLT Group and F-LIGHT

Goal#1 of F-LIGHT: Gather and share examples of studies and of other evaluation-related activity that are making a difference in their institutions. If you've done something of this sort, whether or not you used Flashlight tools or methods, we'd like to hear about it and have the opportunity to report on it here.

E-mail is wonderful: please send the URL of this issue to everyone who needs this information! For information about starting or ending a subscription, sending us announcements, etc., see the bottom of this message.

Indiana University and the Flashlight Program Seek an Evaluator

We've reached the next step in our development as a program. The Indiana University system is seeking a research associate with Flashlight skills to do, and support, studies of educational uses of technology. They will use this staff member half-time. The other half of the position is funded by the international Flashlight Program (us); this half will involve significant responsibilities for Flashlight evaluation contracts and consulting for Flashlight Network members. Click here for a copy of the position description, including details on salary and how to apply.

Good News - Flashlight Prices Will Increase Soon (read on)

The Flashlight Program has not raised prices on any of its products or services since the program began in 1998 but we can see a price increase on the horizon and, actually, it's good news.

Flashlight Online runs on the CTLSilhouette system, developed and administered for us by Washington State University. WSU is working now on a major system upgrade that will give our users some exciting new capabilities. Naturally, WSU is increasing the price it charges us for using the system. Because Flashlight is supported almost entirely by user fees, we need to pass that increase along, but we're waiting until the system upgrade is ready for release. We don't know yet when that will be but we're guessing late October. Because Flashlight Online is run from WSU, there will be nothing for users or their institutions to install; you'll just wake up one morning, use Flashlight Online and discover it's even better.

So institutions that have not yet subscribed to Flashlight services an opportunity. When you subscribe to a Flashlight program (e.g., Flashlight Network or Tool Series Plus) you get all new tools, resources, and upgrades for nothing as they appear, at no extra price. If you subscribe before the upgrade is released, in other words, you'll save hundreds of dollars.

Just thought you'd like to know. Click here to see what we offer, and what it costs.

P.S. Not to be mysterious - if your institution wants only tools and resources without support, coaching or consulting, subscribe to Tool Series Plus. If, on the other hand, you want our help for any of a number of reasons (attracting interest of staff to doing studies, helping you do a study, doing a study for you, etc.) and especially if you would like a voice in the direction of the Flashlight Program, join the Flashlight Network.

WebCT Funds Flashlight to Develop Evaluation Tools to Assess and Improve the Use of All Course Management Systems: Case Studies Sought

Thanks to a generous grant from WebCT, Flashlight is about to accelerate its development of a study package to help institutions assess and improve their use of course management systems. The study package will be useful for all such products, commercial and home-grown. Initial work will focus on a study package that can be used to improve faculty development, course development services, and technology support.

We continue to collect studies that colleges, universities, corporations, schools and others may have done of their uses of such Course Management Systems (CMSs), especially studies at the departmental or institutional levels. We've begun to assemble and annotate the studies we've found. Not many so far: we need your help!

Here are the kinds of studies and instruments in which we are most interested:

Studies and instruments designed to document how an institution's system has been used, how it hasn't been used, what kinds of support and training were successful or unsuccessful, and what factors affect the system's use for different purposes.
Surveys, focus groups, data collection by the WCMS's themselves, and other means of investigation.
Studies that produced findings that were seen as useful by the institution (e.g., helped to confirm or alter arrangements for training or support; helped confirm or alter decisions about what WCMS to use).
Studies that helped document whether the system was of educational benefit to students, departments or the institution as a whole.
Studies of the obvious and hidden costs (including time) of maintaining such systems.

If you have done such a study could you please send us a copy or a URL? We'd also like to talk with you about whether or how you might improve the study design. If you know of such a study, could you tell us how we can find it?

Please send your information and suggestions to Helen Parke or Steve Ehrmann.

P.S. The TLT Group also has other resources helpful in choosing a Web Course Management System.

New Flashlight Subscribers - A Record!

As we announced earlier this month, institutions joining the Flashlight Network recently include: Vanderbilt University, Washington and Lee University, and Pomona College. What's also exciting is that, thanks to generous support from the Ameritech/SBC Faculty Development Technology Program, 94 institutions were subscribed to the Flashlight Tool Series! That's a record for one consortium or system subscribing all at once and we gave them an even more generous discount than usual.

For an almost-current list of the approximately 350 institutions and projects around the world that are Network members, Tool Series subscribers, or licensees of Flashlight tools, please visit our list of participating institutions.

Top of Page

Have a Question about Educational Uses of Technology?

Sometimes you just need a bit of help - a contact, an idea, a reaction. We try to be as helpful as we can, so drop us an e-mail and let us know what's on your mind.

About Flashlight (including free demonstration accounts), the TLT Group, and F-LIGHT

The Flashlight Program for the Study and Improvement of Educational Uses of Technology is part of the non-profit TLT Group, Inc., an affiliate of the American Association for Higher Education.

If your institution needs to get a better look at the Flashlight Current Student Inventory, or at Flashlight Online (the Web-based system that lets you use the CSI, among other utilities), the best way is for someone at your institution to request a temporary, free demonstration account. Send e-mail to Flashlight@tltgroup.org with the header "Free Demo Account" to ask for details. One account per institution, please.

The TLT Group publishes F-LIGHT every few weeks. You can see the name of the author-editor at the bottom of this message; please feel free to send me mail about issues of evaluation or research on teaching, learning and technology. Recent issues are posted on our Web site.

Our thanks to Washington State University for their many ways of supporting Flashlight, including providing the listproc for distribution of F-LIGHT. We are also grateful to St. Edward's University and the Rochester Institute of Technology for extensive support for Flashlight; to the founding corporate sponsors of the TLT Group (Applied Theory, Blackboard, Compaq Computer Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, the SCT Corporation, Student Online, and WebCT); the TLT Group's other corporate sponsors; key public sector funders of the TLT Group's work such as the Annenberg/CPB Projects, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE), and the National Science Foundation.

If you know someone else who would like to be alerted to new issues of F-LIGHT, please suggest that they send e-mail to LISTPROC@LISTPROC.WSU.EDU with the one line message
SUBSCRIBE F-LIGHT (the subscriber's first and last name)

To stop receiving the bulletin about F-LIGHT, please send e-mail to LISTPROC@LISTPROC.WSU.EDU with the one line message
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