About

I have been teaching high school computer/business/media arts courses in the adult system of the Vancouver School Board for 17 years and have taught and built complete digital media arts programs that include about 12 courses in graphic design, website design, animation, video, marketing, programming and online business skills.  I am currently working at Roberts Education Centre in downtown Vancouver, building a new computer program (http://www.robertsdigital.info).  My courses focus on teaching the Digital Media Arts courses as a true art form, complete with colour theory, art history and more. They are taught in a true mixed-mode model, with in-class workshops, online support through Moodle, and self-paced learning options. I also run http://www.ferviddesigns.com , a complete web solutions firm and manage 40 company websites from around the world. My newest project is an art-travel school- http://www.luxembourgacademy.com – in which I am a director and program developer in a business partnership with a fine artist/teacher.  My current areas of focus for both my teaching and my corporate realities include social media, crowdsourcing, smart technology, mobile learning and design, as well as online training. I would like to find a smooth integration of the fine arts and the digital arts in the quest to develop a new level of artistic existence. (As you can imagine, I don’t really like to sleep J )

I use Moodle to support my classes, offer self-directed and specialized programming for students with career or business ideas.  My classes are filled with students of all educational backgrounds (including engineers, artists, business people) aged 17-75 from every corner of the world.  We work on building real world skills and take on non-profit projects to develop a portfolio of professional work as well as participate in community support.  For example, we are currently building the website, graphic design items, marketing strategy etc for a women’s health charity.  Students also can put their businesses online through a special program designed to assist with employment re-integration and technology applications to current businesses.  I support the projects with workshops on particular elements of the Digital Media Arts.  Everything is project-based, self-directed and mixed mode utilizing many different learning strategies to accommodate all student learning styles and needs.  Creativity workshops and inspiration are built into every session.  We continually follow trends online through the blogosphere including top notch blogs such as http://www.mashable.com, andhttp://www.smashingmagazine.com/.  All students set up Twitter accounts and projects are posted to blogs, complete with critical inquiry as the class moves forward.  Ideas such as the loss of privacy, copyright and keeping the interior artist inspired all factor into our learning journey.

In building the new Digital Media Arts program at Roberts Ed. Centre, I want to completely integrate the arts and technology.  My goals include utilizing social media to enhance the learning community as an adjunct to building the Community of Practice (a la Wenger), develop my Digital Media Arts program based on the concept of crowdsourcing and personalized learning opportunities and find a way to integrate open-source and proprietary software so that students can learn, have access to technology, yet also be prepared to step out into the workforce.  The challenge of building in social media into any learning community will be that I will also have to build in the physical community as well, through field trips, community projects and integration of work from other classes.  One of the troubles many of my students have is that they find it difficult to traverse the digital and ephemeral worlds easily.  So if they are able to participate in the physical community of the school, and city, and then post their work and insights online, following course material through Moodle, and using Twitter and WordPress to blog and share knowledge, this may be a possible way to teach this skill, as well as to build pride in their artistic endeavours and become comfortable with giving life to their interior artists.  It is easy to integrate different cultures, languages and other standard challenges of the classroom and online learning community, but working with differing levels of student technological and artistic ability and interest will be challenging as well.  If my students can learn to swim in the virtual seas of data in the timeless time of cyberspace, and still find artistic inspiration and fulfillment, while also building practical life/art skills, I will consider my program successful.