Basic Requirements for the Research Channel:

• Ease of access to ResearchChannel program content
• Training teachers:  how to find and use ResearchChannel programs
• Models of use of ResearchChannel content, in the form of pilot projects and, ultimately, lesson plans
• Links to national content standards and related materials

Ease of access to ResearchChannel program content

Action:   Develop an enhanced search capability that would enable teachers to find portions of presentations they may want to use.

 The ResearchChannel consortium has grown to over 70 member research and higher education institutions offering over 3000 streaming on-demand programs ranging from science and medicine to arts and the humanities with an additional 400 new programs being added each year.  But how does the ResearchChannel viewing population, which ranges from lay people to research scientists, discover programs they might find interesting?  Traditionally, the program creator populates a few descriptive elements such as title, creator, subject, and description using a metadata standard such as Dublin Core.   These elements define the media object from the perspective of a program creator, which may differ from how the user population at large describes the object, thus either enhancing or hindering its “discoverability”. 

 We envision a system that, in addition to using the standard descriptive metadata elements, would allow the broad range of ResearchChannel program viewers to directly assign informal keywords, or tags, to programs they found interesting.  With time and with a large enough number of people actively tagging content, a descriptive consensus could be reached which more closely approximates how the majority of people see the world and the media objects in it.  Such a system would help eliminate the descriptive disconnect that exists between ResearchChannel programs and its eclectic mix of viewers thus making the programs increasingly easier for everyone to search and discover over time.  While this strategy is not specifically targeted towards the K-12 community, it would, ultimately, serve both formal and informal education.  With support, it would be possible to stimulate the K-12 community toward a more systematic tagging effort. 

Using the sort of tagging above, along with p2mInfotech feed functionality, Research Channel program descriptions could more easily be ported to other websites frequented by highly desirable populations of potential K-12/K-20 viewers further increasing the discoverability of programming.  For instance, the Internet2 K20 Initiative is developing a social networking website designed to help the K-12/K-20 education community connect with a wide variety of advanced-networking-enabled experts, experiences, and content.  The ResearchChannel and the Internet2 K20 Initiative could initiate and develop pathways for content exchange between the two systems based upon tagging and p2minfotech feed technologies.

 Training for teachers:  how to find and use ResearchChannel programs

Action:  Create and pilot professional development programs around ResearchChannel programs.

 ResearchChannel resources might also be promoted as ongoing professional development assets to allow teachers to stay current in their specific fields of study (as opposed to professional development in the field of teaching, which is frequently the focus of professional development for K-12 teachers). The ResearchChannel has many extremely interesting sponsored lectures by internationally recognized content experts that could be of interest to teachers who majored in those areas. We've done some preliminary and informal surveying of teachers and have found their interest in such resources to be high. For example, someone who has a degree in creative writing, and who now teaches high school English courses, might appreciate watching a lecture or reading by a famous poet who as been invited to speak at a university. A biology teacher might be excited to view a talk on a recent breakthrough in biochemistry.  This experience would be even more powerful if it could be linked to university "extension" programs to provide continuing education credits to the teachers who view the lectures, and who might engage with one another in-person or on-line.

 Constitution Center, has volunteered to help develop workshops to pilot the concept above to create a professional development program.

Models of use of ResearchChannel content, in the form of pilot projects and, ultimately, lesson plans

Action:  Develop pilot projects that demonstrate effective uses of ResearchChannel content in diverse settings. 

 ResearchChannel assets might be used to provide supplemental lectures for high school level "honors” or advanced placement courses, especially in the hard sciences.  Often these materials are created for lower division college courses and re-purposed in a high school context, with input from high school teachers.  We could engage a small number of university-high school honors partnerships to select and pilot ResearchChannel content as supplemental materials in high school honors or advanced placement courses.

 Another approach would be to develop a pilot project be done with a small number (in diverse settings) of K-12 teachers to use ResearchChannel programs in their classrooms.  After the pilot, the testimonials and promising practices could be shared with K-12 web audiences with tips about how to best use ResearchChannel resources.  Once other teachers see how easily and effectively these resources can be used, they'll be more open to give them a try.  An example of this approach can be seen in The Sound Learning Program, an educational component of p2m Infote and Minnesota Public Radio.  They ran a pilot project and subsequently developed and run professional development programs, helping K-12 teachers use their materials.  They also developed user's guide. This may be the sort of next step that the ResearchChannel might want to take.  For more information from p2m Infotech. Several K-20 organizations have volunteered to help identify and support such a pilot.  Resources would be necessary to engage teachers in workshops, to support travel, and to support the later development of lesson plans around specific ResearchChannel content.

Links to national content standards and related materials

Action:  Begin by choosing a content area and hosting a workshop to align ResearchChannel content with national standards as a model process for other content areas.  Alternatively engage one of the commercial organizations that align content with national (and state) standards for a fee.

Many states have standards alignment practices, which engage teachers, content, professionals, and curriculum specialists.  This is an excellent way to engage some of the experts from ResearchChannel programs with talented and motivated teachers; such a process might go well beyond merely standards alignment and move into areas such as professional development for teachers and models of use of ResearchChannel content.

 Ideal Budget:

Four professional p2m Infotech – one with expertise in K-12 curriculum/content development (a talented K12 library leader might be ideal), one with expertise in teacher professional development, one to develop national partnerships (with universities, museums, science centers, K12 systems, other content organizations, text book publishers, etc.), and one to handle logistics and administration (workshops, timelines, contracts, budgets).