From: Dr. Charles Evans, Dr. Agatha Taormina, Dr. Diane Thompson

cc: Dr. Belle Wheelan

Date: 28 July 2000

We would like to request funding in the amount of $31,100 from "Academic and Advanced Technical Support" budget of the college technology budget to continue our work on the Dogwood project in the upcoming academic year. Please consider putting this request for funds and discussion of our proposal on the agenda for the August ITC meeting. We would be willing to attend that meeting, if necessary, to answer any questions about our proposal.

The Dogwood project (http://www.nvcc.edu/Dogwood) began during the 1998-99 academic year and substantially expanded during the 1999-2000 year. The project was the result of an earlier NEH-funded faculty study project, "Teaching the Humanities in a World Wide Web Environment" (http://www.nvcc.edu/grants/neh/). Dogwood is intended to be an interdisciplinary, web-based, virtual learning environment of teaching and resource materials for the faculty, staff and students of the College. Thus, it fosters collaboration and cooperation among disciplines and across campuses at NVCC. The project web site now includes web resource sites (such as Franklin Roosevelt), skill-based sites (such as Effective Internet Searching), user resources (such as the Web Design Center), mentoring aids (such as Browser Compatibility), examples of best pedagogical practices using technology (such as Web-Based Forums) and a searchable database of Dogwood materials.

We seek an additional $31,100 in funding from Northern Virginia Community College to

• Continue to refine Dogwood's overall site architecture;
• Enlarge the searchable database for the components of Dogwood;
• Develop more faculty-authored projects for inclusion on the Dogwood site;
• Faculty from all five campuses will be selected to develop web resource sites. We will also welcome faculty sponsored by divisions or TLTRs.
• Integrate a new group of faculty with previous Dogwood participants to foster continued growth;
• Maintain and expand the critique discussion forum;
• Develop an effective liaison with both the campus and college TLTRs to integrate the Dogwood project with TLTR goals;
• Hold a winter web authoring institute in cooperation with the Technical Applications Center (TAC) for Dogwood participants and other interested faculty;
• Attempt to increase collaboration and cooperation across disciplines and campuses through inter-campus workshops and demonstrations;
• Continue to work closely with TAC, ELI and the dean of information technology to support the development of the participant projects for Dogwood;
• Develop an online journal of pedagogy and best practices;
• Disseminate information about Dogwood to college (TLTRs), state (New Horizons) and national (AACC and League for Innovation) audiences;
• Seek additional grant funding from both the VCCS and national sources.

Directors

Charles Evans

• Manage overall project administration
• Collaborate on Dogwood site development
• Mentor project participants
• Present at conferences

Diane Thompson

• Manage the critique forum
• Organize and develop pedagogy section of online journal
• Collaborate on Dogwood site development
• Mentor project participants
• Co-run winter institute and meetings
• Present at conferences

Agatha Taormina

• Collaborate on Dogwood site development
• Organize and develop technology mentoring section of online journal
• Supervise the programming of the search engine/database
• Mentor project participants
• Present during the winter institute
• Present at conferences

Campus coordinator-mentors (one per campus)

• Previous Dogwood participant who will mentor new participant in developing their projects
• Join and provide liaison to campus TLTRs
• Seek other projects to add to the projects developed by Dogwood Project participants

Project participants

• Attend and participate in all Dogwood activities (meetings, discussions, etc.)
• Develop a content-based web project for inclusion in Dogwood

Proposed schedule

Fall 2000: Implement recommendations from project evaluation; work on project database and search engine

October 2000: Issue call for participants

November 2000: Notify participants and undertake initial contacts

December 2000: Hold initial planning meeting

January 2001: Winter web-authoring institute with TAC

Spring 2001: Actively seek the inclusion of web projects from all faculty at NVCC to submit their sites for inclusion in Dogwood.

Spring 2001: Dogwood meetings; critique, review and mentor project development; one-on-one laboratory fine-tuning of projects.

May 2001: Dogwood final presentation

Reassigned time (spring 2000)

2 directors @ 1 course each @ $1,500 per course 3,000

Charles Evans

Diane Thompson

5 campus coordinator-mentors @ 1 course each @ $1,500 per course 7,500

(Jud Sage, Bridget Pool, Nancy McTaggart, Terry Doyle, Berta Finkelstein)

10 faculty participants @ 1 course each @ $1,500 per course 15,000

Stipends (spring 2000)

Faculty/Staff participant/consultant @ $1,500 stipend 1,500

Aggie Taormina

Conferences, e.g., New Horizons, League for Innovation, AACC 3,000

Software/Database consultant 500

Software (fall 1999-spring 2000) 500

Winter Institute (with TAC) 1,000

TOTAL 32,000

Less carryover from 1999-2000 900

TOTAL REQUESTED $31,100