Special thanks to Theodore Lind for the following background on the history and current process of course development in the PRC’s Computer Literacy Training.
Ted started as an instructor in 1999 when Frank Goetz and an administrative assistant were the heart of the program. Frank had a group that met at a church, ate pizza and worked on refurbishing computers for clients. Frank found sites to run computer literacy training and kept the list students signed up and which instructors would teach the course. The instructors developed their own course content and materials.
Ted’s first assignment was to teach at a local senior facility. He quickly put together materials to teach a six-week course and also wrote a student guide, copied at his own expense for the students. He named the course “Discovering Computers.” The name stuck and soon the introduction course was called by that name.
Frank had meetings with a facilitator for all the volunteers in the computer program to discuss issues. When the facilitator moved to Michigan, Frank asked Ted to be the new facilitator. Ted asked all the instructors to send him a copy of their course materials. He consolidated them, scanning or getting electronic copies, and put it all on a reference CD. Frank handed out hundreds over several years. Every new instructor received one. Ted updated the CD, which was used until 2007 when a password protected website became the repository for course materials.
After the CD was launched, Ted gathered several volunteer instructors interested in course development and had the first curriculum meetings at a local eatery. The goal of the first committee was to put together course materials for a basic computer course and a Microsoft Word course. Within six months, the committee had developed course objectives, an instructor guide, a student guide and supporting course materials. This information was published on the CD for all the instructors.
A second curricula committee reviewed the current courses and developed a more complete curricula. This committee had the good fortune to include Jean Buending, who had worked at a professional training organization. Along with a couple of other volunteers, Jean and her co-instructor did a very professional job of completely rewriting the curricula to create the courses we basically have today. Since then, individuals have updated some of the materials, such as the Windows 7 update that Dennis McCain worked with a volunteer to complete.
The efforts have been championed by talented and dedicated volunteers since there are not any professional course developers on staff.