Awards & Recognition:

Since it's inception in the summer of 1998, the CTO program has received the following, as well as the funding it received from the W. K. Kellogg Foundation.

Honorable Mention in the First Annual Foothill College Center for Innovation In Education / Smart Valley Award Competition [November 1999]

E-Mail message about the award:

"Dear Tom, Sterling, Kathy, and Wendi,

I am pleased to report that our Classroom Technology Officers Project was awarded an Honorable Mention in the first annual Foothill College Center for Innovation in Education/Smart Valley Innovation Award competition. Our
award was presented by Seth Fearey at an awards dinner held at the Stanford Faculty Club Wednesday evening, who went into considerable detail about the specific skill sets learned by students in grades 3-4, and so on.

We had proposed a CTO project "add-on" to the Smart Valley Innovation Awards, specifically in hopes of continuing our support of three high school interns at Bayshore School District for the duration of the academic year. Smart Valley said that, while the project did not quite fit their profile (since they were looking for more of a curriculum-oriented activity), it stood out as sufficiently meritorious for them to create the unplanned "Honorable Mention" category to recognize it. The winning project (a $5,000 award) was a K-12 web site called Poetry Pals -- definitely a great project -- http://www.geocities.com/EnchantedForest/5165. Many other proposals were received by Foothill/Smart Valley, but no others received special recognition.

Congrats especially to Don Peck (Tech Coordinator at Bayshore) for "leading the charge" this time (I was so busy that I made only minor editorial contributions to the add-on proposal). Bayshore has received a nice plaque to display in their trophy case, as well as a new scanner. Perhaps more importantly, we had numerous people (Smart Valley Board Members, retired high-tech CEOs, etc.) coming up afterwards to express their enthusiasm for our efforts and their interest in helping us find ways to expand our program.

More soon. Thanks for your continued interest and support. Regards, Mark"

The CTO Program was featured in "eTeach Project Spotlight", Foothill College's online newsletter [April 2000]

Since its inception, the concept and successes of the Classroom Technology Officer Program have been shared at the following:

• 1998 & 1999 Mini I-CUE Conferences, sponsored by I-CUE Silicon Valley, the San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties affiliate to CUE (Computer Using Educatiors).

• January 2000 Technology Forum, sponsored by ENMUG (Educational Network Managers' User Group), CTAP (Region 5), I-CUE Silicon Valley, Foothill College Center for Innovation, and the County Offices of Education for the counties of Monterey, San Benito, Santa Clara, and Santa Cruz.

Presentation Title: Recipes for Classroom Technology Officer Programs

The authors will describe their experiences implementing programs to involve students (grades 3-12) in school technology support. The purposes of these programs are twofold: (a) to help schools deal with their ever-expanding technological infrastructure, when hiring full-time MIS managers is not feasible; and (b) to help interested youth learn about computers and communications in an apprenticeship-oriented, hands-on setting. In some cases, the CTO program might be a student's first academically successful experience. We will explore several models for implementing such programs, ranging from summer workshops, to school-day electives, to after-school enrichment programs. Participants will be directed to resources to help them implement similar programs at their own schools.