WOW. And I call myself a blogger? Really? Shame shame.

So my last post was back in May, and a LOT has happened since then! Not only was June spent wrapping up another wonderful school year at TechBoston Academy, but the summer was spent making some big personal and professional changes! I went on vacation in July (so you probably only saw me on Facebook then!), and moved and changed jobs in August…and returned my 2 laptops (sigh!) to BPS in September. So I hope you can forgive me…but yeah yeah I know, I couldve just mobile blogged. ( ;

Ill make the long story super short and far less personal than the decision-making process actually was, but I left the Boston Public School system and packed up my 7 years of teaching at TechBoston to become the Director of Instructional Technology at the Boston Renaissance Charter Public School…sort of. I mean once you have committed yourself to public education, the friends you make, the students you teach (I remember my first class!), the lessons you learn, the mistakes you make…they go everywhere with you. I am so very grateful to TechBoston for every one of these experiences. I am very excited to move forward and learn new things and apply my experiences to my new role here.

BRCPS is an amaaaazing place! I have spent most of my first 2 months here listening, observing, troubleshooting, putting the already successful tech programs in place, and asking LOTS of questions (maybe too many??). Everyone here has been welcoming and informative and understanding and - most excitingly - curious about and supportive of educational technology. BRCPS boasts 3 computer labs, 2 mobile labs, and an assortment of A/V equipment, software, and accessories to integrate into the classroom and administration here in an effort to meet our assessment goals and curriculum standards. My goal is to look at how it is currently being used and if it can and then how it can be used more effectively and creatively - and then which innovations can we add into the mix? There are a LOT of ideas bobbing around in my head (and the staff here too have so much to offer!) and there are definitely opportunities to explore them (with a budget in mind of course!).

Soooo…stay tuned, folks! Ill continue to post what I can publicly of the things going on at work (there have been some super sweet moments and funny conversations with these K-6 kids already!), but mostly I will continue to explore current topics in educational technologies here that interest me…on deck is the topic of e-bokos and the role of the library in the digital age…Im off to a soccer game (yes, to play in this frigid weather)!

- Lisa

(oh yes the title of this post IS my favorite Counting Crows album)

If my mom asks me that ONE more time…well, actually, it’s a necessary reminder, because in less than 1 week from today, I will be in Germany with 24 high school seniors and 7 other staff members for a 12 day adventure!!

I set up the blog so you can track our journey through history : http://tbafhao.edublogs.org

I’ll be posting there as well!

I’m obviously posting some news way after the fact, but I needed a wee time out from my computer screen every evening after work!

I managed to get my research paper in on time, and I just found out today that I got an A- in the class! Whoopee! I learned how to conduct qualitative research and analysis…and that I have soooo much more data to collect and literature to review before I can even propose my thesis. I was aiming to have it proposed by Feb 1 and done by Nov 1, but I’ve got further refinement of the topic to do and I want to keep my sanity during the study, so it looks like it will be instead a March 1 2009 graduation date. Sigh. The Neverending Story of the Masters continues! I did talk to my advisor at Harvard for over 2 hours last Thursday and left feeling inspired and focused on the journey ahead of me.

In other news, I turned 30. I joined the 20-10 age bracket last Sunday at the Patriots game. And well last Saturday too at Ole in Cambridge over gourmet Mexican food and margaritas! I was so touched by the support and appreciation by my loving friends and family!!

Lastly, I am finishing up Term 2 at TBA, which means it’s September all over again for me next week.  I am super excited about the Media Seminar videos…the kids are taking so much pride in their work and polishing the PSAs up in the edit room with voice-overs and beats (which often results in free-style raps about class and Spice Girls dance routines, both much to my delight). My mantra is “work hard, play hard”, so if students are able to get the work done, they can and should have fun too. My freshman work so well together in web design class - there are at least 3 in each section who walk around and help their classmates out. And the advanced web students were reportedly “sad” and “gonna miss you miss” when they realized they had just 2 classes left before the final launch of their client’s web site. I am so proud of how every student has found a way to contribute, to listen, to trust, to manage, to creatively solve a problem, to help, and to take pride in and have fun with their work.

OK so I am still in the process of separating myself from my old blog, the Dope, on blogger.com ( I have been importing and exporting and updating Flickr and installing new widgets…SIGH! Who even reads this thing?! ). At the blogger brunch, we had a brief discussion about the separation of the professional self with the personal self online - is it necessary to create 2 separate identities for work and for play, or can the two be blurred in the Web 2.0 world? For Jeremiah, web marketer and analyst, well, its his job to use the web tools out there, so he feels his personal life and professional are one on the net. Len from EMC, on the other hand, didn’t hire someone who was well-qualified on paper, after googling and finding her rather suspect Facebook postings.

I have struggled over the last few months as to whether to continue posting publicly about personal events and opinions. For the most part, the students I teach are interested in my personal life…they ask me about my culture, my family, what high school was like for me, college life, and if I have a boyfriend and if not why not, and where do I shop, and just normal getting-to-know-you kinds of questions. But it just takes that one student who for whatever reason, even as a harmless joke, finds the goofy picture of their teacher, or pulls a quote from her blog out of context and…front page news?! Am I saying that I really have that exciting of a life that I would make front page news?! Ah these days, especially, not so much. But I knew I was posting with caution before, and at times that kindof took the fun out it.

SO for the followers from blogspot, the Dope does indeed live on, albeit repurposed and refocused. No more commentary on Britney’s bad behavior, or weak attempts at explaining away the IRISH’s pathetic record on Gamedays this season, or especially the hopeless single scene in Boston…There is much more hope in education - especially with technology! And the Boss. OK that’s a stretch BUT since the theme of hope prevails here, I can not NOT post about him, as he is the inspiration behind it. Especially since I just caught the live feed of 3 songs from his “Radio Nowhere” concert in New Jersey. I’ll be attending in November in Boston. Both nights. Very excited.

So welcome back!

Wow so I haven’t written in ages - no kidding! - and now I have all the time in the world to blog…well, at least until Monday! The last 2 months of school were pretty crazy. I was managing 3 sections of 40 students and 11 clients in the Advanced Web class of sophomores….wrapping up PSAs with the juniors…planning the Senior Portfolio Exhibition and Evaluations… and grading, grading, grading until ( sigh ) it was all over. I will post separately my reflections on those projects, along with pix from the field trip to Cloud Place.

“So what are you doing for the summer?”, you ask? Relaxing…and I have 4 jobs! Seriously, I ramped up the freelance web design, am teaching a 4 day PD for BATEC next week, am consulting for Facing History and Ourselves on their documentary project from July 16 - Aug 2, and am once again “Professor Radden” by teaching the Intro to Computers class at Bunker Hill twice a week. Phew. And so when I complained yesterday of being bored, well, I reminded myself of the weeks ahead. But seriously, I am looking forward to all of the micellaneous projects I am involved in this summer! Last summer, I did not do a thing - but I needed the rest after a tumultuous school year. But I really needed the money more! Learned that lesson…and that I can still be a beach bum and get work done. Although, now that I am only steps away from the beach…actually it gets easier to do both since I can quickly transition from sand to sufing…the web, that is!

I have finally moved to a new host, dreamhost, re-uploaded my web sites, upgraded to this blog to WORDPress, and posted a new entry to this blog! It’s been too long!!

I’m off to the IT forum sponsored by BATEC tomorrow, but I am not feeling well so I hope my head is not too foggy to take it all in!

I finally used the RSS feed reader to generate the script I needed to insert into my web site.

Now instead of just a link to my blog from the “news” button, the latest three posts on my blog are listed and always updated. Additionally, I updated the “clients” page to reflect my work with the Marblehead Public Schools.

Next, I think the photos on my site need some updating! And Korgee needs a new animation…I should steal back from Yahoo! Music and make her dance!

Related Links :
http://www.landmark-project.com/feed2js/build.php
http://www.lkrdesign.com/

I am happy to announce the “Extreme Makeover” of the Marblehead Public Schools web site, my latest client (it’s been a while - I gotta stop giving my students all the jobs out there!!) I spent the summer working with a team of stakeholders in Marblehead to develop the new look of their web site. We went through a series of mockups, and then I built templates and populated pages with content. The site itself is “live”, but on a testing server until all of the content is ready, so the links below will hopefully get updated soon :

Check out the “before” : http://marblehead.com/schools/
And the “after” : http://mvmslatin.webstrikesolutions.com/