The Archives have gotten so
big they moved here
Older information is here Page 3
The June 7th, 2010 meeting of the NW Education Cluster was hosted by the Ulum Group (www.ulum.com) and DeVry University Portland Campus.
Patrick Riccards - CEO of Exemplar Strategic Communications, a consulting firm that specializes in strategic planning, public affairs, and advocacy in the education space -- gave an overview about education tech funding landscape in Washington DC, provided his analysis, and answered questions.
Patrick is the founder of Educommunicators (www.educommunicators.com), a social network for education communications professionals as well as the author of http://blog.eduflack.com, a 3 year-old blog covering education policy issues.
-----------------------------
The February 4th, 2010 Cluster meeting was hosted by Casio Education Technology M.R.D. Center (www.casioeducation.com) at the Lincoln center located on the second floor of Tower 2 in the Lincoln Center business complex in the Washington Square area of Portland Oregon.
There was an introduction of Casio products and a presentation on what Casio does in the Beaverton/Portland office and a discussion/conversation on Race to the Top, i3 Grants and other grant opportunities that smaller education companies can take advantage
-----------------------------
The Wednesday, November 18th 2009 cluster meeting was held at the Lucky Lab Beer Hall – 1945 NW Quimby and was hosted by Clarity Innovations (www.clarity-innovations.com)
Agenda – discussions on many topics including…
1. How well are folks doing in this economy?
2. What strategies have you found to get by?
3. What signs do they see of the economy turning around?
4. Anyone seen the stimulus dollars yet?
5. What are the biggest challenges are cluster firms facing operating an education business here in Oregon in the next 12 months?
6. What makes Oregon (and/or Portland) an attractive place for your business?
7. What could make Portland even better for firms in the education industry?
8. What additional companies and services would you wish to attract to Portland?
9. What can local and state governments do to help drive economic development of the educational industries in the next 12 months?
-----------------------------
The Wednesday, May 20th 2009 meeting was hosted by Learning.com (www.learning.com) and featured a discussion on what Learning.com is up to, how they partner with other organizations in the Portland area and how they are working with schools in this new economy. Bill Kelly, CEO of Learning.com talked about many of the product offerings Learning.com has released lately and how they are positioned in the market place. One highlight was their Digital Learning Environment that was just named a SIIA CODIE Award finalist.
-----------------------------
The February 19th 2009 meeting of the NW Education Cluster was hosted by Schoolhouse Supplies (www.schoolhousesupplies.org) and featured a discussion on the how the education sector is seeking innovative partnerships and creative solutions to persevere in this rough economy. Schoolhouse Supplies highlighted how they are growing their newest program called Schoolhouse Supplies Online to encourage more parents to buy their children’s supplies through Schoolhouse Supplies as a convenience for the parents and earned revenue stream for the organization.
There was a great round table discussion with Gayle Kellman – Executive Director of Schoolhouse Supplies – where she kick started the conversation with Schoolhouse Supplies’ own example.
------------------------------
Also check out the April 2008 column "Northwest Education Cluster: A Continuing Saga" on the meeting about Accelerate Oregon and the January 2008 column on "Consider the Northwest Education Cluster" as well as the blog entry by Fred Phillips, one of the founders of the cluster, titled cluster bucks.
Also, read about the April 17th 2008 meeting about Accelerate Oregon
-----------------------------------------
The November 12th 2008 meeting of the NW Education Cluster was hosted by Inspiration Software (www.inspiration.com) and featured a panel discussion on the current state of hiring and recruiting in the education market here in the northwest. The panel will include members from Inspiration Software, Insight Schools (www.insightschools.net) and Jack Farrell & Associates (www.jackfarrell.com). All three of these organizations have a local presence and can speak about their hiring and recruiting practices. The panel was moderated by Alia Jackson.
Here are the details
When: November 12th from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Hosted by Inspiration Software
Address is 9400 SW Beaverton-Hillsdale Hwy
Suite 300
Beaverton, OR 97005-3300
http://www.inspiration.com/contact-us
Why: In this uncertain economy, hiring and retaining talent in any industry is becoming more important. Will HR departments have to change their approach in the way they recruit and retain employees in the coming months? In the past 2 years Insight School has hired over 450 in over a dozen states, Inspiration Software has also been hiring and retaining valuable employees and Deb Postlewait of Jack Farrell has worked to bring educational recruitment to the northwest. This is a great opportunity to learn about what 2 great local educational organizations have been up to as well as how recruitment can be a part of either a hiring or job seeking decision.
Each of the panel members spent about 20 minutes talking about their organization and their hiring and/or recruitment practice and then there was time for questions and answers.
Check out the new (10/1/08) job posting from Insight Schools in the jobs section
Hello NW Ed Cluster members and friends,
This message was prepared for an outside blog but since it is more introspective we felt it would be better if just the cluster saw it.
Members of the NW Ed Cluster head east to Boston to network
One of the main reasons the NW Education Cluster exists is to share ideas and network with other like minded companies and organizations that provide services to the K-20 market. Just last week many members of the NW Ed Cluster attended EdNet (http://www.qeddata.com/Conference/EdNet/YrCurrent/EdNet.aspx) – QED’s annual Education Networking Conference – that was held in Boston.
Companies in attendance from the cluster were:
NWEA (www.nwea.org),
Learning.com (www.learning.com)
Clarity Innovations (www.clarity-innovation.com)
Inspiration Software (www.inspiration.com)
Avant Assessment (www.avantassessment.com)
MemeSpark LLC (www.memespark.com)
FableVision (www.fablevision.com) and
Jack Farrell & Associates (www.jackfarrell.com)
The goal of EdNET is to share ideas and learn about what other organizations are doing in the K-12 space. The NW Education Cluster starts all of their meetings with short introductions from everyone in attendance and so did EdNET. Everyone had 30 seconds to go on-stage in front of 450 people to talk about their organization and what they hoped to get out of the event. I was impressed with the energy and the turnout. It was the same type of energy that I see every quarter from a NW Ed Cluster meeting – only our meetings don’t involve a plane ticket or hotel room or the $1,000 conference fee!
Two events from EdNET stood out in my mind as useful and impactful to our cluster.
One was Doug Stein of Memespark giving a 5 minute Foresight talk “How Can We Afford Differentiated Learning on a Mass Indoctrination Budget? Where could/should K-12 schools and the marketplace be in five years and how do we get there?” His talk on use of data and differentiated learning hit a chord with me – many of the products and services in the Cluster attempt to do just that in the K-20 market. Here is the outline of his presentation.
Opportunities for effective differentiated learning mediated through:
* adaptive authentic (formative) assessment
* interactive constructivist/connectionist instruction (individual and small group)
* project-based classroom design principles
...all working together in a virtuous cycle that empowers children to be creative agents (as opposed to passive receptacles or trained parrots).
One of the challenges in current practice is that it is more focused on homogeneous instruction for heterogeneous groups. We build one linear scope and sequence based on one set of standards (per state), buy one set of materials correlated to the same standards, and then hope we create a complete 'coverage' in a student's mind - but measure this indirectly with uniform directed-response testing.
Instead, we should seek the construction and *direct* measurement of 'effective' concept maps within each child. Materials and experiences should be chosen for their 'scope and composability' instead of scope and sequence. They should be adaptive and active instead of uniform and passive. Assessment should be an ongoing process of measuring each child's emerging coverage of a nonlinear coverage map and progress along a psychometrically-valid linear scale.
Finally, the effectiveness of the school, teacher, class, and student's year should be measured by 'growth' (educational value-add). The techniques of data-mining (especially segmentation and prediction) and social networking should be used to assist the student and teacher in identifying how to navigate a concept map in a way that supports both individual learning and group collaboration.
The second was a conversation I had at an evening networking party with Deb Postlewait of Jack Farrell & Associates and Andrea Sutherland of Inspiration Software on what the topic of the next Education Cluster meeting could be. With so many organizations and recruiters in the mix at EdNET there was some energy around how do companies and recruiters work together and each can leverage the other most effectively. This gave us the idea to potentially reserve our next cluster meeting talk about it. We thought there could be three things discussed.
The role of the recruiter
The role of HR
The partnership and cooperation of the two groups plus the hiring manager
Inspiration Software does not currently include recruiters in most of their hiring situations but other cluster member organizations do. This was the topic of the NW Education Cluster November 2008 meeting
EdBizBuzz column
I was a guest columnist for http://www.edbizbuzz.com/, a daily online Education Forum by Marc Dean Millot that is covered in EdWeek. I wrote about the NW Education Cluster (Northwest Education Cluster: SY 2008 Goals and Progress ) and the meeting is progress towards our 2008 goals. This is part of a quarterly guest column will help bring us more exposure going forward. Let me know what you think.
Saltire Software meeting – August 5th 2008
This NW Education Cluster meeting was hosted by cluster member company Saltire Software. Phil Todd of Saltire Software has for a long time offered to host a meeting but due to the space configuration of his building/office it has been difficult to set up. We have come up with a neat solution of having 3 presenters do round-robin presentations in three rooms in his building. This would be a "speed-dating" kind of presentation where the presenters would end up doing their presentation 3 times to 3 different audiences.
When: August 5th from 6:30 - 8:30 pm
Where: Hosted by Saltire Software
Address is 12700 SW Hall Blvd
Tigard, OR 97223
Agenda
There will be networking (and pizza) from about 6:30 to 7:00.
Introductions and announcements from 7:00 to 7:20
The presentations and questions/answers will last until around 8:30 (20 minutes per presentations)
The three presentation are:
1) A representative of one of the local business schools (Willamette University’s downtown Portland MBA program) talking about the work they do, and more generally, how to work with academics.
2) Joyce Cresswell from Saturday Academy talking about the Academy and its goals
3) Phil Todd talking about Saltire Software with a presentation by their own Saturday Academy intern on the work they are doing.
·
Portland Schools
Foundation and The Chalkboard Project – January 8th 2008
The
next meeting of the NW Education Cluster will be January 8th 2008
hosted by NWEA (www.nwea.org)
and featuring information from The Chalkboard Project (www.chalkboardproject.org) and
Portland Schools Foundation (http://www.thinkschools.org/), 2 great local organizations.
Here
are the details:
When: January 8th from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Hosted by NWEA
Address is 5885 SW
Meadows Road, Suite
200
Lake Oswego, Oregon 97035
http://www.nwea.org/forms/contact.asp
Why: The NW Education Cluster in the past year
or so has become more outward looking, with the New York Times article this
summer to meetings with The Portland Development Commission, The Chalkboard
Project, The Oregon Leadership Summit and the AESA. This is a great
opportunity to learn more about 2 unique organizations located here in Portland
that can potential work with not only the NW Education Cluster but with each
member organization.
Agenda
There
will be networking (and pizza) from about 6:00 to 6:30.
Introductions
and announcements from 6:30 to 6:50
The
Portland Schools Foundation and The Chalkboard Project will each spend about
20-30 minutes talking about their organization and then there will be questions
and answers.
Please
RSVP to me.
The space is limited to about 35 people. Look forward to seeing you
there!
·
Oregon
Leadership Summit
– held December 3rd 2007
It
was great to see many of you at the Oregon Leadership Summit on
12/3/07. Don Spear (BlueTech), Deme Clainos (StudyDog), Brian Rose
(InsightSchools), Stephen Peters (Opensourcery) and I represented the NW
Education Cluster at the breakout lunchtime roundtable. Also at the
roundtable were Susan Castillo (Oregon State Superintendent), Senator Richard
Devlin (Senate Majority Leader), Kristin Bryant (Chalkboardproject), someone
from the OEA and the Governors’ Office as well as our facilitator Sam Brooks. It
was a tight table and we covered a few topics in the short hour we
had. There were about 60 people in the audience and it was a lively
discussion.
There
is a goal of the cluster to get business and government to work together are
you interested in either of the two ideas shared at the Oregon Leadership
breakout session
An
Oregon X-Prize for education in the area of technology
Education
Week just this month came out with report ranking Oregon low in technology and staff
development. How can we all work together to focus the energy in Oregon to support
specific goals using local companies’ expertise?
A
summer Education Summit where educational companies could share their ideas and
technology with state education leaders.
·
Discovery
collaborative meeting on September 26
In building a strong brand,
how do you craft a single story that is equally appealing to a 17-year old
soccer player as it is to a 53-year old CEO?
Join us next month to learn
about the challenges the University
of Portland faced when
wanting to increase awareness of the University and its strengths. The secret
to their success has been in conducting solid research with all the right
audiences.
In this session, you will
learn how the University
of Portland and The
Discovery Collaborative designed a comprehensive research program that resulted
in a single framework for the positioning of the University with a broad range
of audiences.
Below
is a quick synopsis of the event:
When: September 26,
Wednesday, from 6:30 - 8:30 pm
Where: University of Portland
Address is 5000 N. Willamette Blvd, Portland, OR 97203
Terrace Room located in the University Commons
Building (downstairs from
the student cafeteria).
There will be socializing
starting at 6:30 and the meeting will be starting at 7:00. We will also share some highlights about the
Cluster and the Oregon Business Plan.
- Industry
Meet and Greet Opportunity – with the SAO
The Software Association of Oregon’s
educational foundation, TechStart, is
underwriting advanced teacher training at Western Oregon University next week (July 30th
through August 3rd) and has approached the Northwest Education
Cluster about a sales and marketing opportunity.
This
training, called “SuperQuest”, is a highly acclaimed training series for K-12
technology educators who are seeking to develop and sharpen skills in teaching
robotics and computer science.
On
Thursday, August 2nd, from 4-6PM, there will be an “Industry Meet
and Greet Resource Fair”. This is an opportunity for members of the
Northwest Education Cluster to meet with the 40 participating teachers in order
to teach them about the latest products available for their classrooms and
school districts.
The
event will occur after class on Thursday and includes a casual reception with
appetizers. This year, ITT and Microsoft are among the resource fair
sponsors.
Below
is a quick synopsis of the event:
When? Thursday, August 2nd, 4pm – 6pm
Where?
Western Oregon University, Monmouth,
Oregon
Who? About 40 technology (computer science, robotics,
engineering) teachers from Oregon and SW Washington who are attending a
week-long training and conference about using the latest technology in their
K-12 classrooms.
Cost? $200 to the TechStart Education Foundation, a
501 C-3 (if this price represents a challenge for your company’s budget, please
contact John)
Sign
up or Ask Questions?
If
you have any questions, feel free to call John Ossowski, TechStart Program and
Advancement Manager directly at 503-802-5211 or email
him at john.ossowski@sao.org
·
Panel Discussion
on Grants and the Education Community– May 22nd 2Hosted by BlueTech
This meeting
was a panel discussion on grant searching and writing experience. The
panel shared stories and tips on what they look for and how they have both won
and lost grants,
PANEL:
David Roy, Director - Grants and Corporate Giving
Knowledge Learning Corporation www.knowledgelearning.com
Mark Fulop, MA,
MPH – An experienced grant writer for the nonprofit sector.
Phil Todd - Founder and VP for Research and Development
Saltire Software www.saltire.com
Deborah "Sunny" Cohen, PhD – President
Cognition Ignition - An
experienced grant writer for educational media.
MODERATOR:
Lisa
Bordeaux, Director of Partner Development
BlueTech,
LLC www.bluetechllc.com
·
Panel discussion
at the February 15th 2007 NW Ed Cluster meeting
This meeting was hosted by Willamette University’s
downtown MBA program. It was a panel
discussion titled “Getting from here to there – motivation or luck?”
It featured three CEO's from Portland Education
companies/organization, all at different business stages, discussing how they
move forward to meet goals, over come setbacks and what motivates them.
Panelists Included:: Bill Kelly - CEO of Learning.com
Elia Freedman - CEO of Infinity Softworks Matt Chapman - CEO of NWEA
·
October
26th 2006 Panel Discussion
“Impact of new Internet based strategies on the education
community and companies”
This
meeting was sponsored jointly by Knowledge Learning Corporation and their
subsidiary KC Distance Learning.
This
event included a panel discussion to talk about the Internet and its impact on
traditional business models and education.
The panel included members of the education business community using the
web in unique ways to build its education business, members of the open source
technology to discuss its impact, and members from a local school district that
addressed how schools' look at various technologies and their integration. Also
on hand were members from Knowledge Learning to talk about what they have been
up to the last few months.
When: Oct 26th from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: 650
NE Holladay Street
14th
Floor, Portland, OR
Moderator:
Cheryl Vandemore
Panelists:
Nate
Angell - Director for Web Communications, Portland State
University
Pamela
Kislak- Vice President of Marketing, KCDistanceLearning
Kurt
Gazow - Manager of Network Services, Evergreen
School District 114
Introducing a NW Education Cluster tri-fold brochure
For
the May 16th 2006 Tech Fair we showcased a new tri-fold brochure
highlighting the cluster and providing
people
with more information. The brochure was
created by Levi Ness of TwentyTwo38.
He
had designed our logo and offered to help again with the brochure. It looks great!
A link
to the pdf version is here.
Thanks
Levi!
Other
News
Slides
from the Renaissance Learning meeting on Feb 21st, 2006 are posted
here powerpoint
Read the article Clustering,
Competing Globally and the Northwest Education Cluster
By Geraldine M. Power that was written for the
SAO. It gives a great background into
how the cluster started
Also check out the new Job offering
·
June 28th 2006, meeting was on “Content is the Converstation”
Curiosity's
founders, Steve Klinetobe and Wendi Spiess, presented "Content
is
the Conversation: How your content can create a relationship with your
customers."
It
is never too early to start thinking about Fall - which can be a busy time for
everyone.
Where:
Hosted by Curiosity Group
Address
is 119 SE Main Street, Suite 101
Portland, Oregon
97214
www.curiositygroup.com
Content is the Conversation
How your content can create a relationship with your customers
About the Topic
So your web presence or email program has become one of the most important
marketing vehicles for your brand. Now what? You need content. Powerful, amazing
content to facilitate the conversation and engage your customers in a
long-term, mutually beneficial relationship. This open discussion will examine
the common mistake companies make in developing content and show you how to
delight your customers in order to promote loyalty, evangelism, acquisition
and, ultimately, sales.
About the Speakers
Circa 1998. Wendi Flores-Spiess and Steve Klinetobe combined their superpowers
and created Curiosity, a nimble, strategic, and smartly creative agency in the
business of developing amazing user experiences. Now, many late nights and
several disgruntled office managers later, they employ over 30 strategic
thinkers, designers, writers, and marketing professionals from a variety of
backgrounds. The place buzzes and the people fly.
Curiosity does all the things you’d expect for an marketing agency to do:
websites, e-mail campaigns, interactive experiences, direct mail, and so on.
But there is something different—a slight, but powerful, variation. They are
driven by a belief that everyone deserves to be treated like an individual,
like a human. There is no Mass Market; there are only individuals. Curiosity
delivers an experience rich with emotion, truth, and relevance, and in return,
our clients get conversion and loyalty.
Curiosity’s clients include the likes of Apple, HP, NWEA, Paramount Television,
Disney, Vesta, LightScribe, MacForce and Bonfire Snowboarding.
·
NEC Tech Fair at PSU May 16th 2006 from 11:00 – 4:30
The
Tech Fair will be in rooms 294/296/298 in the Smith Memorial Student Union
building located
on
the corner of Harrison and Broadway on the PSU campus in Portland. There are parking garages
around
the area and metered street parking.
Featured
Speaker at 3:30 (Room 294)
Duncan
Wyse - President of the Oregon Business Council - will talk about education,
clusters, his
work
at the State Board of Education, the OregonBusinssPlan and how companies can
work to create
a
showcase lab school here in Oregon.
Featured Vendors
Target Audience
Local
college students and staff, Local area K-12 faculty and staff, NW
Education
Cluster members and others have all informed about the Tech Fair.
Much of the work for the Tech Fair has been facilitated
by Julie Chappelle from OETC
Thanks!
·
February 2006 Meeting sponsored by Renaissance Learning – invitation
Here is
information about the next education cluster meeting that is happening on
February 21st from 6-8pm.this meeting is sponsored by Renaissance
Learning.
Greg
Smith from Renaissance Learning will be leading the discussion. In the presentation he will be covering among
other things:
1.
History of Renaissance Learning and what the corporate office does
2.
What in more detail the Vancouver
office does and what they are working on now
3.
New products
4.
How could and how does Renaissance Learning interface within the
Education and student community?
5.
How can we as a cluster help Renaissance Learning further their
objectives?
6.
How can Renaissance help other cluster members to further their
objectives?
7.
This could then progress into more about the differences between the Washington education climate and Oregon's and their respective business
climates.
Finally
leading into a discussion as to how entrepreneurs could exploit opportunities
within that framework as well as Q&A.
Detailed
information:
When: Feb 21st from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Renaissance Corporate Services, Inc.
12115
NE 99th Street, Suite 1880
Vancouver,
WA 98682
Driving directions are here directions
Here
are two websites about Renaissance:
www.rencorporate.com
for info regarding some of Vancouver
operations
www.renlearn.com
for info about Renaissance Learning
Please
RSVP to me. The space is limited to
about 35 people. Look forwardto seeing
you there!
Regards,
Jim
Snyder
jlouiset@msn.com
503-702-7420
·
2006
Email
Hope
everyone is getting ready for the holiday season and can take at least a few
days off.
First from the last meeting on Nov 30th hosted by
OETC and StudyDog there was a bunch of information presented that I wanted to
update people on.
-
Here are the two web addresses for the two conferences that Kurt Gazow
recommended at the Nov 30th meeting.
http://www.acpenw.org
http://itsc.oetc.org
These
might be of interest for companies to attend in the future.
-
Elizabeth Redman spoke about the Oregon Leadership Summit happening on Jan
9th. Registration and more information
can be found at http://www.oregonbusinessplan.org/. The Education Cluster will be represented
through the Software breakout session and Mona Westhaver from Inspiration
Software will be participating in the panel discussion. I will be in attendance and hope that you
will be there, since the focus on education is relevant to all of us.
-
We are still in the planning stages for the next meeting with more information
to follow after the 1st of the year. If
your company or organization would be willing to host the next event as well as
talk about your product or service please let me know. Hosting is easy and a good way to get your
message out about what you are doing and how you are growing.
Jim
Snyder
503-702-7420
jlouiset@msn.com
- Details
about the November 30th Event
Here is the invitation to the next education cluster
meeting that is happening on
November 30th from 6-8pm. This meeting is sponsored jointly by OETC and
StudyDog.
RSVP information is at the bottom.
This event will be a repeat of the panel format from
our August meeting and will feature (more) guests panelists from the education
community. There
are a list of the questions at our sister website (http://portlandedcluster.amz.com/wiki/wiki.cgi?PanelQuestionsDraft)
that we will be asking the panel to address. These questions build on the
last two meetings.
You may want to think about these questions and any others you
would want to ask the panel as you start a business
or are looking for ways
to gain more access into the K-12 education
community.
OETC in the spirit of K-12 education community has
secured space at a local middle school.
StudyDog has offered to provide the food and refreshments.
When: Nov
30th from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Jackson Middle School - Library
10625 SW
35th Ave. in Portland
Just off I-5 -- north of PCC Sylvania
Moderator: Aaron Munter – Executive Director, OETC
Panelists: Invited and scheduled to attend
Kelvin Webster - Multnomah ESD
Claire Hertz - Newberg School District
Jay Keuter - Portland Public Schools
Linda Turner - Vancouver School District
Lin Reeves - North Marion
School District
Kurt Gazow - Evergreen School District
Plus some possible others. This is an exciting group of people and
should
make for a lively discussion.
Please RSVP to me before Thanksgiving. The space is limited to about 35
people. Look
forward to seeing you there! We are also
looking into having
the event available via a teleconference line. Please let me know if you
cannot attend but would like that option.
Regards,
Jim Snyder
jlouiset@msn.com
503-702-7420
·
Invitation to the August 23rd – Panel Meeting hosted by NWEA
(www.nwea.org)
Greetings
Portland Education Cluster members and friends
Here
is the final invitation to the next education cluster meeting that is happening
on August 23th from 6-8pm. If you have
already RSVP'ed no need to do it again.
We have over 25 people confirmed in attendance.
Here
are some sample Panel Questions:
*
What are the top 3 purchasing priorities for your school or organization in the
2005/2006 school year?
*
What types of added benefits does your organization prefer? (site license, free
shipping, free samples, professional development, trial periods, etc.)
*
How do you or your organization prefer to be approached by vendors? (email,
conferences, face to face meetings, telephone calls)
* What
is one piece of advice you can give to these business leaders about developing
or marketing products for the education field?
NWEA
has graciously offered their space for the event. Here are the details:
When: Aug 23rd from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: NWEA.
Address is 5885 SW Meadows
Road, Suite 200 Lake Oswego, Oregon 97035
http://www.nwea.org/forms/contact.asp
Moderator:
Daylene Long - Director of Marketing, Vernier Software & Technology
Panelists:
(2 are confirmed)
Aaron
Munter - Director, OETC, an organization dedicated to maximizing the value of
educational technology to its members by working with software and hardware
vendors to procure the most effective and appropriate technological resources
at the lowest possible price.
Carla
Wade - Title I Lead and Technology Education Specialist from the Oregon
Department of Education
A
third mystery panelist - check the website for more details!
Please
RSVP to me or Kelvin (kelvin.n.ng@msdw.com.)
The space is limited to about 35 people.
Look
forward to seeing you there! You will
also have the chance to vote on our new cluster logo - thanks to the work of
Stephen Peters and his team at Amazing!
We have the selection down to 2 and need your help - must be present to
vote!
Regards,
Jim
Snyder
jlouiset@msn.com
503-702-7420
For
more information about the Education Cluster and details about the meeting
check it our website. http://www.portlandedcluster.com
·
About the May 05 meeting
First
off, thanks to Tina and Inspiration for hosting a very rewarding meeting of the
education cluster. It
was
a lively discussion and the [nicely cleaned up] notes that we generated are
attached. For those that did
and
did not attend these
notes should help serve as a road map as to where we hope the Cluster will
go in the near future.
People
can download a 30-day fully functioning trial of Inspiration at http://www.inspiration.com/freetrial/
Thanks
Tina!
It
was also very helpful to have Elizabeth Redman from the Oregon Business Council
present to let us know
that
the education cluster is not alone. The cluster idea is growing in Oregon via many
different industries. We
appreciated
all of her comments and suggestions -- keep them coming.
We
are now in the unique situation of having more ideas and plans for the next
meeting than we
know
what to do with. A committee consisting
of Bill Kelly, Kelvin Ng, Sara DeHoff, Dean Arrasmith, Daylene
Long, me,
and
Steve Peters will be meeting to plan it.
All ideas are welcome. Bill
closed this last meeting with the challenge
that
"if we are to continue to grow, each of us must not only continue to
attend these meetings but also invite a friend to come."
Well said!
Thanks
for the energy and continued interest in the Portland Education Cluster.
·
Email about the May 10th Meeting – sent 4/2005
Hello
Portland Education
Members;
With the rains returning it reminded me that the
next quarterly meeting of the Portland Education Cluster must be right around
the corner. Here are the details of the
upcoming meeting. We are going to have a
bit different format this time. We have
been meeting for the past two years now so it is a good time to take stock in
our future and see where we want to go.
When: May 10th, Tuesday, from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Hosted by Inspiration Software
Address
is 7412 SW Beaverton-Hillsdale Hwy (see below for directions)
Suite 102, Portland, OR 97225
http://www.inspirationsoftware.com/
There
will be refreshments starting at 6:00 and then starting at 6:45 we will have a roundtable
discussion about the Portland Education market and
where
we would like to have this Cluster head in the future. Everyone is welcome and expected to
participate.
Some
ideas to be thinking about before the meeting
1) what does an Education Cluster mean to
you?
2) what do you hope to leverage from these
events and what else would you like to see?
3) how can we all better interface within
the education and student community?
4) how can we as a cluster do more?
5) what is missing?
As
a preview, the following companies have offered to host future quarterly
Education Cluster meetings
- StudyDog [August]
- OETC [November]
- Saltire.com [Q1 2006]
- English, baby! [Q2 2006]
and Vernier Software &
Technology
We
are growing and thriving and it is thanks to all for the help and support.
I
know with all that has been happening there is a great deal to talk about and
this will be a great meeting with many ideas exchanged.
Please
RSVP to me or Kelvin (kelvin.n.ng@msdw.com.)
The space is limited to about 30 people.
Look forward to seeing you there!
Regards,
Jim
Snyder
jlouiset@msn.com
503-702-7420
·
Email sent to members 1/10/05:
“Hi
Portland
Education Cluster Members,
Here
is the official invitation to the next Education Cluster meeting:
When: February 1st, Tuesday, from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Hosted by BlueVolt
Address
is PSU Business Accelerator, 2828
SW Corbett Ave, 2nd Floor
Conference
room Portland, OR 97201 http://www.bluevolt.com/aboutus/
Here
is the agenda and some of the issues that will be presented:
1)
Quick overview of BlueVolt
2)
BlueVolt's partnership with PSU as a source of ideas/cost savings/talent
3)
What is BlueVolt's target for its next phase of growth
4)
More about BlueVolt's partnerships with public companies to create
universities
- like 3M University.
5)
How could and how does BlueVolt interface within the education and
Portland community?
6)
How can we as a cluster help you further your objectives?
7)
How does the lower cost of operating in Oregon
(wages, rent, etc) benefit
firms
like BlueVolt? After all these are the same reasons for companies to
outsource
from lower costs countries like India
and China.
8)
Hopefully there would be time to also touch on the Revenue and Profit
model
of BlueVolt's three businesses and an update on where the Cluster can
support
them.
This
will be followed by some Q&A and the meeting should end around 8:00pm.
There
will be pizza and drinks starting at 6:00 and the meeting portion will
be
starting around 6:45.
Please
RSVP to me or Kelvin (kelvin.n.ng@msdw.com.)
The space is limited to
about
25 people. Look forward to seeing you
there!
Don't
forget the website, check it out... http://www.portlandedcluster.com
Regards,
Jim
Snyder
503-702-7420
·
Email sent to members 8/27/04:
“Greetings Portland Education Cluster members and
friends,
I
hope you have all had great summer and with school (and the rain) starting you
have begun to think about the next Portland Education Cluster Meeting! I know I have.
Well,
keep the evening of Thursday, October 7th open for the next planned
meeting. More details about where it
will be held and the agenda, will be
sent out as we get closer to the date, but judging from the last few meetings
it should be exciting and very thought provoking! This is a motivated group.
We
have also changed the URL of our website!
The new website is www.portlandedcluster.com. Fred Phillips, the long time keeper of the
website and strong and generous supporter of PEC, has moved to Holland to the Maastricht School of
Management as Professor and Associate Dean.
We wish him well at his new position but will miss his presence at the
cluster meetings.
New
on the site is a great article from the NY Times that demonstrates that being a
member of the Portland Education Cluster can really pay off.
More
details about the meeting will be posted once the site as well as information
about new member of the cluster. Check it out... www.portlandedcluster.com.
On
the website are many of our members bio's.
Please check them out and send me updates or if it is not there send me
yours. If you would also like me to add
you email and telephone number to the site let me know and I can get them up
there also.
Remember
to save Oct. 7th for our next meeting. See
you there!”
- The
June 7th, 2004 PEC meeting was hosted by KCDistanceLearning.
After pizza and drinks, Kelly Garrett and Keith Oelrich of
KCDistanceLearning spoke on:
1) What KCDistanceLearning does
2) What is their target for their next phase of growth
3) How could and how does KCDistanceLearning interface within the
education and student community?
4) How can we as a cluster help them further their objectives?
5) How entrepreneurs could exploit opportunities within the framework of
KCDistanceLearning and the Portland
education community.
Their talk was followed by Q&A. It was a great meeting with many
ideas exchanged.
- On Feb 17th NWEA hosted the get-together at their new building at 5885 SW Meadows Road, Suite 200,
Lake Oswego, Oregon
97035 http://www.nwea.org/forms/contact.asp
NWEA has built over the past 20 years a Growth Research Database. It is
unique in the education assessment field with over 3 million students and
14 million assessment test results. In the spirit of encouraging
more people into the business, NWEA gave an overview of their research
into the database and how budding entrepreneurs can then exploit
opportunities like designing validation studies for companies, etc., with
the data. Allan Olsen, Ron Houser and Gage Kingsbury presented more
information about
this exciting, growing collection of data, how it is being used, and how
it could be used in the future. NWEA just did a national study about
student testing. Here is the press
release about it, and the Oregonian article.
- The Portland Business Journal covered our August, 2003
meeting, and focused on Inspiration Software. Here's the story. Inspiration Software was recently named to the
Inc 500, the ranking of America's
fastest-growing private companies. They have also won many awards from
educators, educational magazines, and computer learning labs.
The November 5 meeting
featured interesting and inspiring presentations by Michael Hoskins of PersonalProfessors;
Don Spear of BlueVolt;
Jennifer Arns of OETC; and
Elia Freedman of Infinity
Softworks.
|
Here are the details about our last meeting of the education
cluster meeting hosted by Learning.com.
When: October
7th, Thursday, from 6:00 - 8:00 pm
Where: Hosted
by Learning.com.
Address is 1440
NW Overton St., 2nd Floor, Portland, OR 97209
http://www.learning.com
There will be pizza and drinks starting at 6:00 and
Learning.com will have their presentation starting around 6:45. Ileana Rowe and Bill Kelly from
Learning.com will be leading the discussion.
In the presentation they will be covering:
1) what
Learning.com does
2) what is
their target for their next phase of growth -- news from the latest launch
and tradeshow activity
3) how
could and how does Learning.com interface within the education and student
community?
4) how can
we as a cluster help Learning.com further their objectives?
5) This
could then progress into more about the Portland
education community and what are the needs of Learning.com.
Finally leading into a discussion as to how
entrepreneurs could exploit
opportunities within that framework as well as
Q&A.
I know with all that has been happening there is a
great deal to talk about and this will be a great meeting with
many ideas exchanged.
Please RSVP to me or Kelvin
(kelvin.n.ng@msdw.com.) The space is
limited to
about 25 people.
Look forward to seeing you there!
Regards,
Jim Snyder
jlouiset@msn.com
|
Can being
a member of the Portland
Education Cluster pay off?
You bet, says Daniel Gross of The NY Times in this
article from 8/22/04
A note from Joe Meyer of Metalytics Inc.
I just posted the Oregon K-12 state-wide test results
at:
http://buckmanu.org/bu.py/Entropy/ORED/table
and thought
that this might be useful for some members of the cluster. See you on October
7th.
The
Oregonian
(June 12, 2004) focuses on PEC and member companies:
Both articles by Mike
Francis
________________________________________________________________________________________
Highlighting New Members (and
name changes!)
MasterSolution is a developer of educational software tools for
teachers. MasterSolution
is a wholly owned subsidiary of a Swiss company with approximately 75% of
worldwide sales generated in the US
and Canada.
It is co-headquartered in Portland and Madiswil, Switzerland.
All development is performed in Europe but much of the worldwide Product
Management, Marketing, Sales and Support is performed here in Portland.
Says
MasterSolution President Kirk Greiner, "I would be interested in
participating in a local organization whose members are focused on providing
technology solutions to the education market."
Julie Chappelle writes, "As of this month, we (OETC)
have changed our name from the 'Oregon Educational Technology Consortium' to
the 'Organization for Educational Technology & Curriculum,' but we
retained the letters OETC as our acronym. We were very happy to see our
organization mentioned in the June 12, 2004 Oregonian article! Thanks for
listing us! But now we need to let people know about our new name
and also get the word out that we have expanded into California,
Wyoming, and Hawaii, in addition to the five Northwest
states we already serve. Our URL is still http://www.oetc.org and we will be launching the new web
site on July 1 |
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
We would like to invite you to
attend the Technology in Education Summit on Tuesday, May 4th, which is part of
the 2004 Oregon Economic & Business Forum at the Oregon
Convention Center, Portland, Oregon.
ISTE will be exhibiting at the Forum in an effort to raise the visibility of
the importance for business and government leaders to support integration of
technology in education and your attendance will help reinforce that message.
... The two-day Oregon Economic & Business
Forum itself is a multi-faceted Forum bringing business and government leaders
together to encourage investment and growth in Oregon in the areas of
education, finance, healthcare, non-profit, and Information
Technology -- see http://www.groworegonbiz.com
for more information about the Forum in general.
The Technology in Education Summit specifically, will bring educators,
administrators, IT and community leaders together to discuss the topics that
are most critical for schools, communities and students and to demonstrate that
the strength of our education system is critically important to the overall
health of Oregon's economy. ISTE's Deputy CEO Leslie S. Conery, PhD will be
leading the Technology in Education Power Panel on Tuesday morning at 9am to
increase awareness of the impact that technology has had on learning and to
explore ways that technology may transform learning further
still ( see http://groworegonbiz.com/OEBF/index.htm#2 for details about
the Power Panel). Please, bring your voice and your support to the Oregon Convention
Center on Tuesday morning!
To attend the Technology in Education Summit or any of the rest of the events
(highlights below), please go to the complimentary registration link at http://groworegonbiz.com/attendee.php
As an added incentive from the Forum producers, all pre-registered attendees
will be eligible to win an InFocus X1 Projector, MP3 Player, or Geely Scooter.
We hope to see you in Portland
in May!
Best regards, Jack Buchanan
Director of ISTE Membership Services
From Kelvin, 22 Aug 2003:
That distance learning space is a viable business and
worthwhile endeavor can be inferred from the August 21, 2003 WSJ article,
"For-Profit Education faces tough course," by Cynthia Schreiber. She
quoted huge growth (doubling in recent years) in internet college education
enrollment and in fact posits that success will attract competition from
traditional mainstream colleges, which accounted for the inclusion of the
"tough course" phrase in the title of her article.
It would be very gratifying for us to build and keep
our education companies in Portland.
So on to the next steps!
From:
Robert Aughenbaugh [mailto:roberta@viatraining.com]
Sent: Wednesday, July 09, 2003 2:04 AM
To: Kelvin.n.ng@msdw.com
Cc: Bruce Carocci
Subject: RSVP
Kelvin,
Thanks for the invitation. I am very interested in attending. However, I'll be
out of town that day, so I won't be able to make it. Please keep me informed of
the results of the meeting and add me to any mailing list.
Since I won't be able to attend the Roundtable, I'd like to send you a little
information about Via Training, to stand in as a proxy for our interests. I'm
not sure how well Via Training will fit in, which I guess depends on the focus
of the group. We're only an education company in the loosest sense. I think of
education as having to do with schools and colleges. We're more of a training
company. Our clients are corporations.
And we're not really a technology company, although we do have a 20+ person
engineering department. We use technology (much of which we developed) to
deliver courses, but it's not our primary focus.
Via Training is an web-based training company. Our focus is sales training,
with specialized experience in the retail channel and the computer products/consumer
electronics categories. Our clients include HP, Microsoft, Intel, Pioneer,
Kodak, Canon, and Motorola. None of our clients are in Portland. We are doing business in Europe and will be opening an office there this fall, so
I guess we fit into the "able to compete globally now" category.
Our offerings range from custom online sales training courses to complete sales
training programs, including including course and site development, e-learning
technology, and ongoing management. We have developed a specialized
sales-training LMS with a unique points-based Incentive Management System. Our
Active Learningª instructional methodology is supported by a rapid development
tool--our Reusable Learning Activity Library.
Via has been a modest Portland
success story. Since our launch in January 2000, we have grown to over 90
people. Our revenues have grown better than 50% per year in the face of a poor
economy and a contracting e-learning market. We've maintained profitability
every quarter since launch. We're projecting continued growth this year.
Our main problem right now is finding people with e-learning experience,
especially higher-level positions. We are hiring management positions outside
of Portland
occasionally.
There is really nothing that Portland
offers as a location for our company (other than that I live here and am not
contemplating a move). Since we travel frequently, a central location would be
better. The Bay Area would offer much-improved access to our clients and to an
established talent pool. There is not much of a talent pool here in Portland, and there is no
strong University program providing entry-level candidates.
I'm interested in helping to explore forming an e-learning cluster here in Portland. Please include
me in further communications.
Robert
--
Robert Aughenbaugh
President
Via Training, Inc.
503-944-0957
503-548-6323 direct
First Workshop for Portland's
Educational Information Technology Companies (Announcement for August, 2003
meeting)
Purpose
The workshop will:
∑ Introduce firms working in this sector to each other and to attendees
∑ Articulate these firms’ shared interests and common concerns relative
to
∑ The state of their industry
∑ Opportunities for business development, growth, collaboration
∑ Connections to broader local economy
∑ Expore ways to promote growth of existing companies to be able to
compete globally
∑ Explore ways to promote formation, in-migration and growth of more
companies
Workshop participants—firms, aspiring entrepreneurs, relevant government and
non-profit organizations—seek to explore a “cluster” approach to the growth and
development of new and existing firms developing innovative technologies for
the education sector. This initiative is a timely, private-sector-led
response to economic opportunity—and a bit of good news to counter the barrage
of negative press about education in Oregon.
Leveraging both the state’s reputation as “wired” and the city’s ability to
attract creative talent, this initiative seeks to build the region’s credentials
as an hub of tech-ed
innovation.
)The education sector in the U. S.. is a promising one—the e-learning software
industry alone is about US$2 billion. according to stockbrokers Jefferies
& Co. Furthermore, some Portland-based education and technology
businesses have been growing at 20% annually, and appear to be on the right
track.
Portland has
more than 20 companies in this innovative space. Many of these
companies—or their founders—located here for lifestyle reasons. However,
lifestyle incentives alone cannot sustain a business. If there are not
strong economic advantages to growing in Portland,
these firms become vulnerable to takeover or merger, or seek to relocate where
such advantages can be found—as many formerly Portland-based firms have
done.
Benefits
This initiative is exploratory in nature. At this time, the economic
benefits of clustering—networking and relationship building among firms
researching, trading, supplying or purchasing technology goods and services in
the education sector—have not yet been identified.
Yet, potential benefits are significant. As other organizing cluster have
discovered, these include:
∑ Collaboration opportunities for firms
∑ Business development opportunities for aspiring entrepreneurs
∑ Networking and professional development opportunities for local talent;
professional community for incoming talent
∑ Marketing and general awareness-raising—“buzz”—relative to sector
∑ Public recognition of successful firms and local s/heros
∑ Opportunities for articulating shared needs, addressing common
challenges within the industry
∑ Opportunities for effective interface with public, non-profit, and
private-sector agencies, groups, and associations
∑ Increased competition and innovation among firms with regular contact
∑ Robust debate about the marketplace—where it’s going, what it means,
how to maintain competitive advantage
∑ Improved infrastructure—ability to grow and recruit talent, access to
specific IT, marketing and other business supports
∑ Improved access to money—organizing could make Portland a necessary
stop for financiers and promote better financing opportunities for new firms.
A Way Forward…
The following are a draft of questions by Professor Niki Steckler of the Management
in Science and Technology Department, OGI School of Science and Engineering,
OHSU, that could be discussed at the workshop:[still needs revising, but here’s
a go]
1. State of industry (ies)/cluster
∑ growth: current/potential
∑ sectors inside cluster—how to describe
∑ trends/innovation/cutting edge work
∑ positive returns from aggregation and scale
∑ companies who can now compete globally
2. Opportunities and challenges
∑ What would be helpful for building and/or growing a company in the
ed-tech space? (these might be organized into a cluster wish list, with
initial thoughts about actions for improvement)
∑ What is the potential for collaboration or joint infrastructure
creation by a group of companies in this space?
3. Broader connections
∑ What makes Portland
a great place for building and/or growing a company in the ed-tech space?
∑ What degree of competition exists between Portland companies in this space? What
safeguards might lead to productive collaboration on areas of mutual interest?
∑ What are the legal and public policy obstacles to a vibrant education
industry in Portland?
∑ What are the roles that Portland’s
Universities can play to assist the education industry?
∑ What could be learnt from Phoenix,
the current center of education?
What next? (For example, would it be beneficial to create an ongoing
opportunity for roundtable discussions among Portland ed-tech-learning industry
participants?)
Below is Niki's suggestion of a possible format for the workshop to facilitate
brainstorming.
∑ Short initial roundtable meeting (1_ - 2 hours)
∑ Small-circle/Large-circle room setup (small circle of 5-6 chairs,
surrounded by a larger circle of 20-30 chairs)
∑ Agenda with questions published in advance
∑ Initial dialogue (first 30-45 minutes) among 5-6 key leaders in
Portland's e-learning sector leaders
∑ Broader dialogue invited, after the small group of 5-6 move their
chairs out to join the larger circle, among the entire group during the later
30-45 minutes
∑ Participants invited based on role in the ed-tech-learning industry;
broad network (Harvard/MIT/Ivy alumni clubs?) invited to nominate potential
participants
∑ Light refreshments, low or no-cost location (OGI/OHSU would be glad to
host)
∑ Maintain focus on Portland's ed-tech business cluster, identifying
infrastructure needs and potential mutual benefits of stronger e-learning
community ties
Please feel free to contact Kelvin (kelvin.n.ng@msdw.com) and Niki (steckler@ohsu.edu) with feedback and/or issues that
you would like to see addressed by this workshop.
Home