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Recommendations

1. Develop and implement a new learning paradigm for employee development which recognizes continual learning as a natural part of work.

   This recommendation has its source in the need for continual technology updating. However, it also recognizes that more is changing than just technology. We need to develop many more ways to enable learning, to recognize learning, and to reward learning. See pp 30-32 for further discussion of this issue.

2. Support and encourage faculty who are preparing to relearn their art of teaching by utilizing new tools and techniques.

   During the last decade, many faculty have experimented with technology in their courses. During the next decade, many faculty will make commitments to change curricula, delivery style and outcome expectations for courses they teach. Faculty will need institutional support for these retooling efforts. We'll need to direct resources into creative ways of restructuring instructor time, encouraging collaborative efforts, and providing implementation support.

3. Continue to explore new technologies' impact on teaching and learning, especially in time of budget cut backs.

   The technology mainstream is continually shifting. We need to continue to probe new technologies--to discover what doesn't work as well as what does.

4. Increase funding for instructional technology development for innovative projects.

   Fund those who wish to learn more about specific technologies and their applications to teaching and learning, as well as those who wish to develop technology-based materials for their courses.

5. Increase funding for Ocotillo, so that it can undertake a wider variety of activities which will involve even more faculty and staff in its discussions.

   The Ocotillo groups offer a superlative medium for generating and growing ideas related to improving learning through technology. Ocotillo remains the forum for investigating district-wide issues relating to technology and instruction. An enormous number of different employees have been involved in Ocotillo and efforts should be made to increase this number.

6. Begin to describe and assess the effects of technology on student learning.

   What additional benefits have occurred? Any negative side-effects? We need to learn more about both, as we use technology more. Through FIPSE, a project called Flashlight is planning to address this issue.

7. Develop a change model for MCCCD to give us a common vocabulary for describing how innovations flow through our organizations.

   Every aspect of MCCCD will continue to experience change. We'll communicate much better with each other regarding those changes if we share a common vocabulary about the process of change. An Ocotillo group is currently working to accomplish this.

8. Provide a base level of capital funding for technology.

   Course fees and user fees for technology, as well as external funding sources, should simply supplement a base allocation for technology. Technology resources need to be renewed continually.

9. Begin a thorough study of organizational structural reform of MCCCD.

   The way we are currently organized both encourages and discourages efforts to respond responsibly and creatively to change. We can't afford an organizational structure that gets in our way. So we need to change those structures and systems that impede rather than propel the flow.

URL: http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/river/river17.html