![UCEA 2006](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-images\/ucea_stage.jpg?w=584\")
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Here’s a podcast of my presentation last Sunday<\/a> at the “E-Learning Futures” pre-conference workshop<\/a> for the 2006 University Continuing Education Association<\/a> conference. The occasion represented a number of firsts for me. It was my first presentation for this organization<\/a>. I hope it won’t be my last, as I found my colleages at the conference to be focused very intensely on what colleges and universities must do to address our mission of providing opportunities for life-long learning to our world. It was my first time presenting from a wiki<\/a>. Thanks (as ever) to Brian<\/a> and Bryan<\/a> for inspiration and guidance in all things webby, and thanks to Alan <\/a>for Levine’s Law: start with the demo. It was my first time learning of Berkleeshares<\/a> (where have I been?), and of the many fascinating models of online education at the Berklee College of Music, where Debbie Cavalier is Dean of Continuing Education<\/a>. Debbie organized the session I was part of, superbly. I look forward to what I will continue to learn from her. I was also very impressed by her presentation on “Collaborations,” in which she was joined by two other fine presenters, Barbara Macaulay of UMassOnline<\/a> and Linda Behrens of UC-Davis Extension<\/a>. And coming to us from Adobe Systems and the Learnativity Alliance, Ellen Wagner<\/a>‘s lunch presentation on “Mobile Learning Comes of Age?” was a great capstone to the session: funny, informative, pointed, thoughtful.<\/p>\n One other first: I had never before asked attendees to take a survey before the presentation. Inspired by the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative<\/a>, I decided to give it a try. I used phpSurveyor to whip up a fast thirteen-question survey. Along the way, it occurred to me that it would be interesting to survey my students before a course begins, for several reasons: it would communicate to them that I want to know them and want to help them know each other, it would give me useful information for my own planning, and (this was the stealth realization, the a-ha for me) it would allow me to plant seeds for our work together. For example, let’s say I ask them a question about their familiarity with this or that, and their answer is “no, don’t know that.” By even asking the question, I’ve planted a seed in their minds that may help them later when the topic comes up. Some little bit of scaffolding, a little bit of prep.<\/p>\n phpSurveyor<\/a> is open source, and I run it on my Bluehost<\/a> account, which also hosts my blog and podcasts (among many other things). There’s a lot of power here for very little money. Best of all, I learned something valuable. Special thanks to Jerry<\/a> for the inspiration to try phpSurveyor.<\/p>\n