AGENDA ITEMS:

• Current Action Items:
• Data Workshop- Face to Face
• Agenda items to be discussed
• Meeting with CARP group 9am CST on 9/11
• Meeting with Jerad Bales Tuesday 9/9 maybe
• More ideas
• Alan
• RFP process
• NTC facility
  
• Need to evaluate courses that would be be good for redevelopment using blended learning (TEL and/or ILT)
• George to talk to Joe N about advanced WebEx.
• TEAM needs to review website weekly- check links especially since new STED page with auto-updating course list on right side of page
• Monies to fund ADOBE CONNECT- done

MEMBERSHIP AND ROTATION:

• Introduce Stan Skrobialowski (replaced Franceska Wilde).
• OWQ Representative.
• Coordinating “Field Techniques” classes OWQ for last 5 years,
• Been involved for last 20 years, worked with Alan quite a bit,
• Office is contracting so very busy
• Yes, attending Data Workshop & F2F
• Pat Lambert to rotate off. A Big THANK YOU to Pat for his loyal contribution to the team!! WestFast?
• Mike needs to rotate off and make sure web site can be taken care of the STED web site.
  Needs to talk to Terri Moore-
  Mike any news on this? Mike is good for another 2 years.
  
• Jerad sent out an email for a replacement.
• We have 3 people interested.
• Steve Anthony from the Pacific Islands
• Jim Morris from the MI - OH WSC - project management courses (tel-course) - training & development
• Kevin Richards from the Iowa WSC

Email: Sent Friday 8/15/14
Colleagues:
I am soliciting for a WSC Director to serve on the STED Committee.
The STED is an active group which plays a key role in facilitating the development of new training courses, sharing information about currently available training, and providing recommendations to Water Mission Area Leadership on all aspects of USGS employee development. With Pat Lambert's upcoming assignment to WestFAST, there is a vacancy for a WSC Director on STED. I hope you will seriously consider this opportunity and let me know of your interest.
The STED Charter and membership is attached.
=================================
Dr. Jerad Bales
Chief Scientist for Water
U.S. Geological Survey 12201 Sunrise Valley Drive, MS 436
Reston, VA 20192
jdbales@usgs.gov
703-648-5044
https://profile.usgs.gov/jdbales/
=================================

DATA CONFERENCE (WORKSHOP)- Week of Sept 8-12, 2014 in Kansas
City, National data workshop hosted by CRACD.

LET'S DISCUSS:

• STED's presence at the conference??
• Brochure
  
• Plenary session presentation: Jennifer Dansie 9:15am Tuesday 9/9 (15 minute slot)
  I will send out a copy of the presentation for the group to review.
  Highlight Streaming and blended learning. Money Saved.
• CARP team meeting / collaboration
• Thursday 9am 9/11
• Booth- we will be combining efforts with the Mentoring program and OED.
• Pamphlet/handout & bookmarks
• Candy to lure attendees!
• Laptop & large monitor (with access to STED pages, interactive)
• Highlight class that are online now (top 3)
• Votes on what classes they want to see online (for future STED discussions)

STREAMING ISSUES
1. Remote students may not feel as “involved / isolated” as those physically in classroom.
2. Hard to hear questions of students (can be overcome)
3. Missing networking with other students (social media to help resolve? virtual networking, photo contest)
4. Supervisors misconception, “if my person is not in the class it is not worth it”
5. two weeks of class (sitting in class room can be a little much, more hands on, learn by doing)
6. Embrace “live streaming” classes (uses WebEx: solid technically, cost already paid for via enterprise licenses)
- encourage feedback esp from streamers

• Molly and Kevin's handling chat screen questions (improve acoustics/ microphone) good at addressing technical pieces
• More effective way to market classes?
• Money and travel / per diem costs … tel-classes make sense from a financial point of view (pay tuition, save travel costs)
• Calling students by name at start of day & after lunch
• Preloaded software (preventing local IT issues) imaged locally (can also use remote-desktop access to give remote student login on a local machine) … potential use Bomgar for instructor to help students is they get lost in the labs, etc
• Aquarius and other cloud based solutions will provide a big shift towards new ways of doing our work. Opportunity to shift people towards online help & training as the old software evolves.
• Community forums, bulletin boards, facebook page, etc -- find out what we could make use of
• *Cindy Brown and Alan Ward have volunteered to manage the booth.
• Other STED members present at workshop have volunteered to help out as well.

• FACE to FACE
• Attendance, as I recall. Let me know if there are any changes/discrepancies.
• *Attending workshop- Jen, George, Rod, Joe, Stan?, Jerad.
• *Booth volunteers not attending conference and will be participating in the F2F- Cindy and Alan.
• *NOT attending workshop, but WILL BE joining F2F meeting via WEBEX on Thursday 9/11- David, Jim, and Mike
• *UNAVAILABLE to participate- Greg

• Joe Nielsen (Maine) OWI - will be taking on duties as new NWIS Chief, responsibilities beyond Aquarius to include all discrete (GW, QW) data as well
• Regional Water Data Workshop has 433 attendees registered on obis.usgs.gov right now.
• Jerad has approved some funding ($750) for the non-headquarters representatives towards travel (So, that would be $750 each for: Jen, George, Greg, Pat, and Joe.,
• *Looks like all persons that were not originally going to conference will have to be on separate travel to the face to face.
• PLEASE CONTINUE TO REVIEW Updated website- course list on right side of page automatically updates. Please review- http://water.usgs.gov/usgs/STED/learncoursesform.html
• Web pages: self-sufficient / dynamic as new class come online & old pages roll off
• COURSE CATALOG has been added to the STED page-
• Formatting is a little off.
• When I downloaded it I could not see all the descriptions?

• Alan- update on RFP process.
• What is the status of a training needs assessment?? supervisors were giving push back, too much time to fill out. Add TEL into training needs assessment, streaming, remote learning 30% response
• STED vote:
• $5K to awarded WMA proposal
• $10K to Aquarius for TEL development that may be used in WY14/WY15
• Able to fund 8 proposals- WMA proposals chosen
• 1. Project management
• 2. Index Velocity
• 3. Aquarius

NTC streaming: from 8 rooms to a single training room, phased plan give up a couple rooms in FY14 (building 44, FPS group in this building)
overlapping classes, going to be tough to operate solely out of one class room, plan is in flux (why? save $ GSA rent, shrink footprint (usable space / person) biggest impact scheduling

• Oceans classroom (take down wall = more space) still single classroom
• NWIS group would be impacted (already looking at how to restructure training/testing)
Adobe Presenter
• Adobe Connect license
• Alan: lost two staff member, no replacements authorized
• Getting time with Jared important (leaving Wednesday)either early morning or late >5 PM ... and/or Bill Werkheiser
• Have a room all day Thursday, meet at 8:30AM
• Money was requested from headquarters to cover the annual ADOBE costs to develop and maintain TEL classes- done

_________________

STED REQUEST FOR SOFTWARE FUNDING IN SUPPORT OF TECHNOLOGY ENABLED LEARNING:

Water has traditionally supported technology enabled learning (TEL) by funding the annual licensing and maintenance costs for Adobe Connect software (formerly Breeze). This software allows subject matter experts to develop multiple courses for online delivery which improves access to critical training. This year the annual maintenance costs have actually dropped by more than 60% due to a change in software bundling options by the vendor. The STED strongly supports continuation of this funding. The cost for the next 12 months is $11,468.00.

• Water-Quality Principles
• Using ADCPs in Moving Bed Conditions
• Surface-Water Procedures and Policies
• Radiation Safety Data Aging in NWIS 4.6
• Editing and Estimating Unit Values in the Automated Data Processing System (ADAPS)
• Motorboat Operator Certification Course (MOCC) Blended Learning
• Bear Spray--Defense Against Dangerous Animals
• Procedures for Running Levels at Gaging Stations
• Introduction to Streamgaging

• "Surface-Water Procedures
• Policies" and "Procedures for Running Levels at Gaging Stations."
• Refresher for Defense Against Wild Animals
• Finding and using scientific literature and data from the USGS Library
• Editing and Estimating Unit Values in ADAPS
• Procedures for Running Levels at Gaging Station

• Project Management
• Science Data Management
• Aquarius
• The National Map<
• Speciman Collection<
• Index-Velocity Streamgages

• Scientific Integrity (DOI course) GRSAT Processing Realtime Data Properties of Water and Sediment
• Animal Awareness in the Southeast (SAF1679)
• Sediment Transport Principles and Estimation (ID1684)
• Prerequisite Material for the (SW1321) Streamflow Measurements Using
• ADCP's Training Course
• Field Contractible Diseases
• Principle Investigator Training

STED TEAM:
Need input as far as continued webpage promotion and other ideas to promote new technology and learning.

WEB PAGES:
Suggestion: Go through the website every few weeks and click on links to ensure quality.
If you find any mistakes or outdated information, please send an email to Mike and Jen

• Please share ideas
• OSW (Jim K)
• OWQ (Stan)
• OGW (David)
• OWI/NWIS (JimC)
• WSC Director (VACANT)
• Cindy (NRP)
• George
• Greg
• Rod
• Joe
• Jim C
• Jen
• Alan

• Think about other TEL development?
• What classes need to be re-developed in TEL… revisit top 5 or 10 classes?
• Streaming Memo- Sent by Jared to Water Mission Area leads (technical office chiefs, NRP, etc). Sent May 9, 2013 and resent 9/25/13. What has been the response?
• Top 5-10 courses for redevelopment? (possible tele component); training needs analysis 70 water mission area
• As we move into Aquarius classes going to need to be redeveloped, Surface Water Records Computation: well suited for blended (after Aquarius roll out ~2016), webcast/podcast during curricula development release date May/June 2015
• ✲ Next meeting: Sept 11th, 8:30 AM CST