I’m organizing (and teaching part of) a workshop series on using technology in the classroom. We’re doing this at the end of the year for a few reasons. We want to let people know that Adelphi has a Manhattan campus, located on Canal Street and Varick. I realize that many people only know about the main campus in Garden City. I want the Manhattan center to be part of the Educational Technology program…so workshops in Manhattan.

More generally, I don’t think of our (the university, the program) mission as only to offer courses, degrees, and research. I think that we need to find a variety of formal and informal ways to engage with the local communities. I hope that we can offer ongoing low-cost or free workshops, on a regular basis. Ideally, these will be student led, in areas where students are passionate. This is a trial for what those might look like.

As a trial, we’re targeting areas that I think will garner the most immediate interest amongst classroom teachers, of various levels. This time around we’re going to offer workshops on SMARTBoards, iPads & Android tablets, shooting/editing video, building websites with WordPress, and teaching with Wikipedia. I’m doing the iPad and Wikipedia sessions. Gus Andrews of the Media Show is doing the video and WordPress sessions, and Vania Duarte, a very experienced Math teacher and adjunct faculty member is leading SMARTboards.