Fact Checking...

http://www2.districtadministration.com/viewArticle.aspx?articleid=135

Nice interview in District Administration. Will and I are quoted throughout and I think for the most part it was well written and a positive piece about using technology as a communication tool within school districts. However, they sure didn't follow through on their fact checking-- they missed some basics with this one!

For example, I am cited as being a Professor of Instructional Technology at the College of William and Mary. YIKES! I am a lowly full time adjunct instructor. I have been so for two years. And while I identified myself as such, I assume the author heard instructor and equated it with professor. I cringed as I read it, fearing my colleagues will assume I am probably just arrogant enough to call myself a professor. I finish my PhD course work in the Fall-- not quite a prof.

Then if that wasn't enough, I was also credited with creating a listserv and implementing several initiatives associated with the listserv I created. To begin with, as anyone in central office knows... nothing in central office happens in a vacuum or solo. We purchased a listserv product (Lyris) and I simply was the admin of the various district lists and oversaw the roll out and implementation of the project. I also did training for all the school sites to implement the next year.

We did talk about YOURVIEW, an employee opinion board that I helped launched and moderated-- I am assuming she got the two confused.

Of course it wasn't just me, the author referred to Will Robinson (instead of Will Richardson) at one point -- Will tells me this is probably a reference to the "Will Robinson" character he made famous in "Lost in Space." (wink)

We decided we could probably blame all of this, of course, on the fact that blogs are lowering the standard for published writing. <rolling of eyes>

Comments

[Gene]

I assume the author heard instructor and equated it with professor.

I don't think most of the world is as hung up on the titles as those of us who work in the academy. Communicating about technology is tough work. We want to get our ideas out to as wide an office as possible, which means working with journalists who are always on deadline, don't have specific knowledge of our field and have to find ways to boil down complex knowledge to few well-chosen quotes and anecdotes.

I thought the article was good and that your points were right on target.