This post is an assignment for ETEC 524:
I started my career in education teaching overseas in Sweden. The experience had a major impact on me personally and professionally. I learned a lot about myself and made life-long friends. It also confirmed for me that I just don’t have the interest or passion to be a classroom teacher. I did well during my time there but I never really felt passionate about it in the same way I saw other teachers. When I came home I was ready for something different.
I started working in the non-profit sector when I returned to Canada. I worked in the field of Public Legal Education. This was when I discovered the aspects of education that I found rewarding: being creative, experimenting with technology and design, and making a difference. I was hired because of my willingness to try new things and experiment. A big first was creating the organization’s first mobile app. The app was a collection of FAQs for landlords and tenants regarding the Alberta Residential Tenancies Act. It was flashy and got a lot of attention from our funders but ultimately the investment of resources was not worth it. A mobile website was probably better suited for the project and would have been easier to maintain. A lot of my work during this time was trial and error. Unknowingly I was developing my own framework for
evaluating new technology intuitively, although probably not very efficiently. It was interesting because there are competing demands that have to factor into decisions about technology. First of all pedagogy but other contextual factors like what excites the funder, what can grab the attention of the end-user, and how scalable is the solution. During this time I attended a workshop on creating mobile content that gave the valuable advice if you are waiting to create a perfect video you will never publish a thing. Aim for high but not for perfection or you will never achieve anything. This has really stuck with me and has influenced my approach to incorporating technology into education.
When I had to move for my partner’s work I ended up working at the University of Manitoba. I started in instructional design but since then my work has shifted to program evaluation. During this time I also started my MET program. I started being quite optimistic about technology and now as I complete this final course in my MET program I find myself pretty skeptical about the role of technology in education. In particular I’ve been a bit disillusioned by witnessing a lot of technological flash without substance professionally. I have been frustrated as an online learner in the MET program that I feel like I didn’t get much out of. As I near completion of my masters I wonder if I would have had a more fulfilling experience in a F2F or blended environment. So my skepticism probably makes me well-suited for my career transition into evaluation. I hope to get more experience thinking critically about technology through this course. I think the group as a whole is going to be very eager and excited about introducing technology to different aspects of education. I hope though that we have discussions where we are critical about technology.