July 27, 2008
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AIT’s Executive Director, Chuck Wilson
Chuck Wilson was named Executive Director of the Agency for Instructional Technology, AIT, on July 1, 2003, moving from interim status as of January 4, 2003. He had been hired originally to work with AIT’s sales department in 1994 and was promoted to director of the Agency’s marketing and sales division in 1996. Mr. Wilson managed the internal and external sales staff and oversaw all marketing efforts supporting the Agency’s 1,500-plus instructional and professional development products and services. In 1997, AIT’s Workshops were added to his responsibilities; and, in 1999, fulfillment and distribution services were included. Chuck forged many of AIT’s present partnerships and continues to pursue others to fund AIT’s various instructional and professional development products and services. He is responsible for the Agency’s move to digital distribution of materials.
T: You’ve served AIT in various capacities since 1994. What new products, programs, or services are in the works at the Agency in the 21st Century?
CW: The monthly Technos e-Zine is new since last summer. We’ve recently concluded production on Educating Kids about Gun Violence (EKG), which was a response to demand for information for dealing with youth and guns, a problem that is crying for attention across the country. We have new reading comprehension and classroom management series in production—both of those titles are still to be determined. A new financial management series, being funded by Topics, is in the works, which will provide guidance for using credit wisely to college students. Many of these projects include video, DVD, and/or CD-ROM production; teacher and facilitator guide writing; and Web site design. Plus, our staff continues metadata creation on a client-by-client basis, and state standards correlations of our products, just to name a few.
Which companies, foundations, or other entities is AIT presently involved with?
AIT is working with some terrific partners: Wisconsin Public Television, Wisconsin Educational Communications Board, Topics Education, National Educational Service, Marion County (Indiana) Prosecutor’s Office, U.S. Attorney’s Office—Southern District of Indiana, and Project Safe Neighborhoods. The projects we’ve produced in conjunction with these entities are topical and top-notch.
I understand there are some new members joining the AIT Board of Directors this year—who are they?
Two old friends, Alan Morgan, Vice President, Government Relations for Pearson Education, and Bernice Stafford, Senior Vice President of School Strategies and Evaluations for PLATO Learning, Inc., are re-joining our Board this year. George Wright, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Magic Lantern Group, Inc. in Canada, will be a new face in our Board meetings. We look forward to their contributions to the continued well-being of the Agency.
Explain AIT’s move to digital distribution. Why is it so important? And how are digital instructional materials being used now in schools?
AIT’s mission is to enhance student learning and to do that we must provide educational materials in many different formats based on the hardware available at the schools. Going digital gives us the capability to do just that.
As we all know, there are the haves and have-nots in the school community. Some schools are still using VHS cassette players, while others have the capability to download digital video streams of educational materials. We have seen digital video used in several ways: streamed, downloaded, or placed on a hard drive behind a school firewall to be used on a LAN (local area network) or a WAN (wide area network). This is true for professional development materials for teachers, as well.
How can AIT assist K–12 schools in developing, acquiring, and utilizing digital products?
AIT has to be able to provide a viable solution for our schools—and I liken this to the full briefcase approach. AIT has partnered with not only educational producers but also hardware providers to provide a complete solution for schools. We make sure we bring the right people to the table to provide our clients with the necessary information to make intelligent decisions.
What is the future of digital programming/production?
Digital media will be around for quite some time. Once decision makers in the education system adopt a process, they stay with it for an extended time because of several reasons: funding, training, and implementation, for example. It is not easy for schools to ramp-up and change technology overnight. Digital technology also has the capability to engage students. Today’s students start at a very early age with computers in the home, play stations, and computer games. It is imperative for schools to keep up with the technologies that children see at home every day, or risk boring them in classrooms and having them tune out instruction.
How can technology—such as instructional videos like Educating Kids about Gun Violence (EKG) and Youth Crises I and II—assist teachers in dealing with school violence, like the recent shootings in Illinois and Minnesota?
AIT has produced professional development materials for many years, and the concept was always to provide educators with the means to train their staffs without the need of bringing in an outside content expert. So, AIT developed what we call the “workshop in a box.” Programs like EKG and the Youth Crises materials were created with educators in mind. We have developed a complete training package supported by video and print that is presented in a workshop format for training purposes. With today’s budgetary constraints, it is not easy for schools to send their teachers to workshops for much-needed training. Our concept is to provide these materials in a convenient package, so they will be available whenever they are needed with no additional costs to the school. Of course, the timeliness of these particular products makes them even more attractive to principals and superintendents when they consider professional development materials for their staffs.
In developing the Youth Crises series, AIT worked with the Indiana Safe Schools Academy and schools throughout the state. It was a very rewarding experience to work with such a committed and dedicated group of individuals. EKG was developed with the Marion County Prosecutors Office with a grant from Project Safe Neighborhoods. These projects were developed to assist schools and their communities to better understand the need to work effectively together in a crisis situation that might affect schoolchildren.
Why is the partnership model so important to such projects?
Partnerships are crucial in all aspects of materials development. No one can do it alone. We have found that by bringing the experts together around a common table, we are able to produce a better product. The partnership allows us to explore different mindsets, different beliefs and philosophies, and to utilize the strengths of others to provide the best solutions for our clients. It’s a complementary arrangement that results the best possible result.
In addition, AIT is a not-for-profit organization with no primary funding source, so we understand stringent budgets very well. We have spent many years working directly with schools and districts to provide the materials and services they need at a cost they can afford. Keeping costs of materials down is also very important to the Agency.
How can technology—specifically AIT products, which are standards-based—provide assistance to teachers and school districts?
We have found the one major item lacking for an educator today is time! We have kept this fact in mind as we have developed our materials. By correlating our materials to all of the state standards, we have eliminated the need for teachers to evaluate the materials themselves. During the production of educational materials, AIT has created several learning objects and utilized them throughout the video. The digitization of these materials allows us to separate and correlate them directly to standards, so it is no longer necessary to spend valuable time looking for a particular subject or topic, which educators have had to do in the past.
Let’s take a moment to talk about your experience as executive director … If you had it to do over again, would you change anything in your performance since your appointment in 2003?
No. In my life I have found that you make a decision based on sound information and then you live with it, whatever the outcome may be. I believe that the only wrong decision is the decision not to act. In my tenure as Executive Director of AIT, I have always tried to be proactive instead of reactive — to take advantage of the opportunities that were afforded to us and to use these opportunities to make something positive happen for the staff and the learners we serve.
What achievements—personally, or AIT’s and its staff—are you proudest of?
I am very proud of our staff and the things they have accomplished in the past two years. We have a core group of individuals who have a passion for the mission of this organization and the learners it serves. The staff has put in long hours and a lot of hard work to make AIT what it is today. For instance, making the move to digital was not easy. We once again found ourselves on the leading edge of a new technology for schools, and it was not always accepted as a viable solution for some schools and districts. But we continued on that course and today have found it was the right choice, the correct direction, not only for the Agency but also for education. For us to be in a global market, we must think globally. We must step out of our comfortable past to see what is over the horizon, which may be very uncomfortable at first glance! As an Agency, we did just that and are much stronger for the journey.
How does the reform of education play into AIT’s decisions to pursue or not to pursue a project?
The mission of AIT is to be the premier provider of services and products to enhance student learning. We spend considerable time evaluating educational needs to make sure the materials we acquire or produce support our mission and ultimately the learners we serve.
What “hot topics” will be the next focus for producers of instructional and/or professional development materials?
There are several: bullying, gun safety, childhood obesity, high school language arts, and high school mathematics to name just a few.
Which new initiative would you most like to see AIT launch in the future? And what do you see for the future, in general, of the Agency?
I would like to create a community learning portal/center. As I said earlier, our mission is to serve learners — and what better place to do so than a center for learning? It would be necessary to partner with community leaders, business partners, school corporations, institutes of higher education, and a strong funding source to make this happen. However, I think the value to the community and to the population it serves would be phenomenal.
AIT will continue to fulfill its mission to serve learners through providing products and services needed by the education community. We will continue to grow in the creation of metadata to support educational curriculum and professional development materials. We will continue to support schools by providing quality materials as they move to new technologies. As new delivery methods are created, AIT must be ready to provide schools with curriculum and professional development materials that are accessible through those methods. I see no problem in our meeting that challenge.