So, you are probably wondering, if not literally asking, "Well what does she know about constructing meaningful eLearning resources and projects, about ID paradigms, best online practices, or even about EdTech and training?"

First, I am as passionate about designing such projects and resources, for both onsite and online, educational and training purposes, as much as I am about educating and training. However, as I started teaching more "Distance Learning" courses, my interest in developing more meaningful delivery options and content intensified.

You when I began teaching "DL" courses, the intials were synonymous with video-checkout courses, at least at my place of employment. That is, students still had to come to campus, rent or buy the series of course videos, and then either mail (as in the USPS) their completed assignments or submit them, in person, at the dedicated DL desk in the library. As an instructor, I would then pick up the assignment(s), grade them, and either mail them back to the student (if a self-addressed stamped envelope was included) or leave the graded assignment at the "special" desk for the student to pick up every Friday. (I even took such a course--Beginning Spanish--in the mid-90's, while completing my last undergrad. semester.)

Needless to say, as a former student/now professor, this course delivery format and lack of interactivity (although there was a true "distance" factor, but not in any meaningful form) was something I could never appreciate. I was even embarrassed by the title of "Distance Learning Professor." As a young doctoral candidate whose dissertation concentrated on the intersection of literary translation and, what was at the time referred to as "new" media, I quickly became more disheartened.

Thus, began my mission for change, but the progress was slow. Fortunately, two colleagues in my department started campaigning for faculty email accounts, and from here, the English Department began offering a few "online" composition and literature courses, which by the end year, made the video-checkout courses obsolete. Of course I had to be in on this, but the only difference between these courses and that of video courses was email, and I suppose a somewhat quicker turnaround time for graded assignments.

Eventually, the World Wide Web took off in the educational realm, and more faculty began teaching courses that more closely approximated the title of "Distance Learning," yet interactivity (or lack thereof), modernized teaching and learning models and practices, and Instructional Design were know where to be found.

Once DL faculty had their hands on WebCT (eventually Blackboard Learn), hope was on the horizon, but most faculty simply uploaded a few important course documents and had students email their work. There was not even an interest in exploring or truly learning this new, cumbersome LMS. A few of us still forged ahead and other faculty and some administrators began to notice.

I will not continue to bore you with this professional-technological auto-biography, but allow me to add a few more points . . . after using limited LMS's and having little professional/technical support (as in no help desk, instructional designers on site, and so on), I was still teaching online courses and realized, in an epiphany-like moment, that I love building course, creating and curating content, and everything about the Internet and computers. It became an obsession for and an art to me.

After 14 years of teaching DL composition and literature courses, serving on numerous tech-related committees, and attending and presenting at numerous conferences, I finally decided to follow my relatively new passion for EdTech and ID. So, I returned to college exactly 10 years after I completed my Ph.D., and I earned an MS Degree in Learning Technologies (instructional design track) from the University of North Texas. And here I am now, pursuing a career as an onsite and online trainer, an L&D specialist, and/or an Instructional Designer! (and, "yes," I understand this page is text-heavy, but my background is in composition after all.)