Jul 01 2011
Exciting news for elearning in Ontario!
I am doing a happy dance thanks to the memo we received on the last day of school – yesterday, that is. The Ministry of Ed is providing access to D2L, our e-learning LMS, to ALL students in Ontario so that blended learning can take place in ALL classrooms! We have been a pilot board for the last 3 years and it has been so exciting to see 350 of our Grade 7-11 students and teachers enjoy the use of online learning as a complement to their face-to-face instruction. Teachers who could not participate due to the limitation of 350 students, begged to be considered for this project next year. So this announcement is making waves in Ontario!
To add to my joy, they are including funding for a full-time e-learning support teacher who will provide assistance to us in this initiative AND additional funds to cover expenses such as mileage! The reason I am so happy is – we just eliminated the position of e-learning/software specialist in our board to cut costs and I was in a panic as to how I was going to support the e-learning teachers and the blended learning teachers next year. So I am looking forward to having him return to the fold at central office!! Manna from heaven, I tell you!!
That’s 100x awesome news!!!