West Virginia Broadcasters Association Grant for Video Journalism and Media Classes.

On a day this past March, I left my school right after the bell rang to go to a hearing aid clinic in Clarksburg to get my hearing aid checked out.  I pulled into the parking lot and I got a cell phone call from my assistant principal who was yelling at me "Where are you?" and I was started and I thought I was supposed to be at an after school meeting.  She was yelling at me because she was happy that I got a grant for $7,500!

I have a Media Productions class at Grafton High School.  I don't receive much funding for equipment from the county budget, but I want to update equipment to catch up with technology.  I have been working with $150 WalMart video camera and $35 tripods.  Funds for these came from selling t-shirts in basketball season and selling Graduation DVDs.    I was able to get the contact information from the West Virginia Broadcasters Association Foundation from a colleague in another county.  I wrote a grant request by January 31st that was my "wish list"  and how I teach my class.  You can view my grant request document by clicking on this link.  The request was over $11,000 but the foundation put a limit, but they had said it was the largest grant they ever had given.  I didn't get everything I would have liked and I made some substitutions.  I worked with B & H Video who quoted me with educational prices. This link are some of the items that I had purchased with the funds. I talked with my county Tech Coordinator and she said I should purchase extended warranties for the pricier items as the school district would not cover repair costs on those items.

I view the role of my Media class is to be a public service to the school and the community as I try to record school events and post it to SchoolTube.com and the City of Grafton Public Access channel.   We produce a daily newscast that is posted online and shown to students throughout the school.   I also promote Digital Citizenship in my class as I feel their is not much instruction in that area at my school as well at the First Amendment Free Speech rights for students, school, and society as a whole.  Now I have more equipment that I can record  student projects, teachers instructing, and other events in the school and community.

If you live in the state of West Virginia and would like to modernize technology and have budding video journalists, take the time to apply for this grant this winter.

Rich Zukowski accepting WVBA check from WDTV's Nate Smail 

#WVEDCHAT "A new discussion venue for West Virginia Teachers"

I would like to propose a new hashtag for West Virginia teachers to use on Twitter:  #wvedchat

Why?  The needs to be a network of teachers in West Virginia who would like to be part of a PLN (Personal or Professional Learning Network) with other teachers in West Virginia.  Teachers have similar interests and concerns throughout the state and this would be a perfect venue for it to take place. I envision teachers sharing journals, articles, instructional strategies, workshops, conferences,  and concerns they have about education in West Virginia and education in general.  Educators in all subject areas are welcome to take part in this community.

To participate, all you have to do is go to the Twitter.com website and search for #wvedchat and there would be a listing of those who used the hastag #wvedchat in their Twitter post.  You do not have to have a Twitter account to read these posts, but if you want to contribute, you have to have an account.  You need to remember that Twitter posts are limited to 140 characters, but conversations can continue with replies.  If you like what you see you can "favorite" a post or "retweet" to share the post to your followers.  As you become more involved on Twitter, the more followers you are likely to accumulate.

You can also follow teachers (or anyone on Twitter) to follow their feed on Twitter.
I do not want this to be a place to gripe about education in West Virginia, but as a way for educators to network and make education in West Virginia better for all!  This kind of chat works well with educators in other states and other fields.  There are some chats that have live conversations that take place for an hour each week.  This could be something that we could grow into at a later time if there is interest.

You can follow me on Twitter @richzukowski

If you are unfamiliar with Twitter in education, take a look at these webpages:  http://cybraryman.com/twitter.html
http://podcast.teachercast.net/a-beginners-webinar-to-twitter-and-pln-building-tech-educator-podcast-10/