Skip to content

The Connected Classroom

“Information on and from Cooperating School Districts of Greater St. Louis' Learning Division”

Tag Archives: Support Staff Academy

Wednesday, April 17, 2013 Celebrating and Honoring Support Staff this June 5

SSA Mini Conf 2012

SSA Mini-Conference 2012

The 21st annual Support Staff Academy Mini-Conference: Celebrating and Honoring Support Staff takes place Wednesday, June 5, 2013, 7:45 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. at Lindenwood University’s Spellman Building. Non-certified educational professionals in a school district are expected to wear many hats and rarely offered an opportunity for professional development.

Cooperating School Districts offers a Mini-Conference with a keynote presentation and a series of breakout sessions designed to update skills, introduce new ideas, rejuvenate enthusiasm, and so much more for non-certified staff members. Don’t miss this day filled with information, networking and support. Breakout sessions will help you:

· Lead staff with success
· Update and learn new high productive tech skills
· Get organized
· Practice what it means to be a team member
· Write effective emails
· Play an active part in safety at school
· Live a healthier life and reduce stress

The Mini-Conference is a great day packed with all sorts of resources, great speakers, and fun. This full-day of professional development will give you the tools you need to be more successful, more enthusiastic and more self-confident.

Costs: $99 CSD Members | CSD Credit applies to SSA Programs​​ | $124 non-members.  Learn more and register online with Cooperating School Districts.

Tags: , , , ,

Friday, February 8, 2013 ‘Positively Amazing Interactions’

how to work with bullies, complainers,
gossipers, and other difficult people

csd pdIn this half-day Support Staff Academy session, on Friday, March 1st, you’ll create positive cultural change by raising awareness on acceptable standards of workplace behavior. Learn ways to redirect negative behaviors to focus on positive communication goals. Gain an understanding of the concepts of workplace “bullying” and “harassment” and guidance on what to do should an issue arise. Register online, today!

Tags: , , ,

Monday, May 21, 2012 Support Staff Academy Mini-Conference in June

The 20th Annual Support Staff Academy Mini-Conference takes place Wednesday, June 6, 2012 from 7:45 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Lindenwood University. Register now! The Virtual Learning Center will be there in full force! Not only does Karen Vaughan run this conference, several staff members will be presenting:

Free Cool Tools to Increase Productivity
Presenter: Martha Bogart, Program Coordinator, Cooperating School Districts
In this session, you can fill your technology toolbox!  You’ll be amazed how many free online tools are out there for you to use in scheduling, organizing, and collaborating on your job tasks.  Topics will include file conversion, sharing and storing, calendar creation, to do lists, mind mapping, graphic editors, PDF creators, screen casting and more!.

Powerful Presentations with PowerPoint
Presenter: Nancy George, Director, Cooperating School Districts’ Virtual Learning Center
Know the basics of PowerPoint, but want to jazz up your presentations with style and pizazz?  Come learn how to create presentations that hold the audience’s attention and still deliver the message!

Saving Time with Online Documents: Google 101
Presenter: Stephanie Madlinger, Ed.S. – Google Certified Teacher Instructional Technology Program Coordinator, Cooperating School Districts
In this session, participants will learn how Google Documents and Google Presentations can:
• Allow you to work on files anywhere, anytime
• Make the writing process visible to anyone or everyone
• Plus more…
PRE-REQUISITE: Participants must have a Google Account and/or Gmail.

Collecting Data Using Online Forms: Google 201
Presenter:  Stephanie Madlinger, Ed.S. – Google Certified Teacher Instructional Technology Program Coordinator, Cooperating School Districts
In this session, participants will focus on two of the six Google Docs available, Google Forms and Google Spreadsheets. Through these two tools, you can easily create a questionnaire or survey, invite others to respond, share the results, and then download the data into Excel for easy manipulation.
PRE-REQUISITE: You must have a Google Account and/or Gmail.

Powerful Presentations with PowerPoint
Presenter: Nancy George, Director, Cooperating School Districts’ Virtual Learning Center
Know the basics of PowerPoint, but want to jazz up your presentations with style and pizazz?  Come learn how to create presentations that hold the audience’s attention and still deliver the message!

Status Update: I Need to Know More about Social Networking!
Presenter: Rebecca Morrison, Program Coordinator, Cooperating School Districts
Feel like you’ve been left in the 20th century when it comes to Web 2.0? In this session, learn about some of the most popular 21st century social media sites, like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, LinkedIn, and Pinterest. What’s right for you? How do you balance the sharing side of social networking with your privacy? We’ll discuss how to safely maintain a presence online while not damaging your reputation.

Tips & Shortcuts with MS Word
Presenter: Nancy George, Director, Cooperating School Districts’ Virtual Learning Center
Learn shortcuts and tips that will make you productive in creating programs, permission forms, tables & more.

The annual Support Staff Academy is a program designed to provide professional development to area schools’ educational support professionals (i.e., administrative assistants, secretaries/office personnel, maintenance/custodial, food service, security, teachers’ and library aides). To see a complete list of the sessions on June 6, click here.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Tuesday, March 6, 2012 Great Google PD this March in St. Louis!

Support Staff Academy Session:
Google Mania presented by Google Certified Teacher Stephanie Madlinger
Date: Friday, March 16, 2012
Times: 8:30-3:30 P.M. 
Location: Cooperating School Districts, 1460 Craig Road, St. Louis, MO  
Cost: CSD Member: $95 | Nonmember: $119

In this all day SSA workshop, you will learn how to create slide presentations, documents, spreadsheets, forms & surveys, as well as drawings all online for free! And the best part is, you can share with coworkers & friends, allowing them access to help edit and refine. No more emailing back and forth, trying to keep track of which version is the latest. Moving online & providing 24/7 access means you will be paperless – and green!

Be sure to bring your laptop & learn even more about other Google Tools available to make your job easier! Please set up a free Google Account prior to attending the SSA session & bring your username and password on March 16th. Register by going here (note that online registrations require a Purchase Order, Credit Card or CSD/Network credit; the reference number is 24033-11).

The annual Support Staff Academy is a Virtual Learning Center program designed to provide professional development to area schools’ educational support professionals (i.e., administrative assistants, secretaries/office personnel, maintenance/custodial, food service, security, teachers’ and library aides). The topics vary each year based upon the Advisory Committee recommendations. At the end of each year is the Support Staff Mini-Conference (June 6 this year). The VLC and SSA are programs of Cooperating School Districts of Greater St. Louis.

Interested in using Google but you are not support staff? We have several other upcoming Google PD opportunities:

• March 14th, 4 PM CT: free Webinar Wednesday session: Google Tools for Education Save time and become more efficient! During this webinar we will spend time learning about Google’s Hidden Treasures. Participants will be empowered by their new knowledge about Google Apps.

• March 28-29th, 4-7 PM CT: Google Tools for Educators Participants will learn Advanced Search techniques, develop a Custom Search Engine, and discover easier ways to find images, resources and websites, plus much more! ($149 CSD member; $189 non-member | plus 1 Graduate Credit Available | register here)

• March 30th, All Day: Online Classroom Collaboration with Google Docs Participants will learn how Google Documents and Google Sites can support learning 24/7 because you can use the basic abilities of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel in an online collaborative environment. ($149 CSD member; $189 non-member | plus 1 Graduate Credit Available | register here)

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Tuesday, October 4, 2011 Google Mania at CSD Last Week

Google Certified Teacher Stephanie Madlinger led an all day session on “Google Mania” on Friday, September 30th for the Support Staff Academy here at Cooperating School Districts of Greater St. Louis.

The Virtual Learning Center’s Megan Moncure was also on hand to assist Stephanie with the group’s questions. To see photos from the day’s professional development, visit our Flickr page by clicking on the photo. Karen Vaughan is the SSA coordinator; if you have questions about this event or upcoming SSA programs, contact her at kvaughan@csd.org.

Tags: , , ,

Tuesday, July 5, 2011 VLC Spotlight: Karen Vaughan

We’re continuing on with our VLC Spotlight series by featuring one of the newest team members, Karen Vaughan. While Karen has only worked for the Virtual Learning Center for about three years, she’s been with Cooperating School Districts for 20 years!

Karen is the Conference and Special Events Coordinator. You probably recognize her – Karen coordinates the Midwest Education Technology Conference (METC), the Character Education Conference (CEC), the Best Practices Conference, along with the Support Staff Academy/Mini-Conference and Executive Professionals Academy. She touches nearly every division of CSD with her work, though the VLC is lucky enough to call her our own.

Karen is a Certified Meeting Professional and Certified Special Events Professional; she graduated from University of Missouri-St. Louis with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration.

At home, she has two Irish Setters and a Boston Terrier that she considers to be her “fur-babies.” She’s a skilled quilter, loves to ride her Harley, and Karen is an avid NHRA (that’s National Hot Rod Association) drag racing fan.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Thursday, June 16, 2011 Support Staff Academy Mini-Conference a Success!

Last week, Virtual Learning Center staff Martha Bogart, Nancy George and Stephanie Madlinger presented at the Support Staff Academy Mini- Conference. The Mini-Conference, a program of Cooperating School Districts, is the last event each year for SSA. (In 2012, by the way, the Mini-Conferences takes place Wednesday, June 6th).

Karen Vaughan works with the SSA to get quality PD every year. Karen shared these pictures and some feedback she got on the program, which included:

  • “… found out that Google had more to offer than I knew…. very good presenter.”
  • “Great information! [I] will be able to use this info daily.”
  • “I love to hear [keynote] Dr. [Debra] Peppers, she always comes very prepared and engages her audience.”
  • “[We got] very knowledgeable-clear explanations, learned a lot from Brian Bax on retirement…”
  • “Learned useful information to manage interruptions at work!”

Tags: , , , ,

Wednesday, June 8, 2011 Stretching Classroom Boundaries

We had a great time in the tele today during the New Links in the Classroom with Videoconferencing and Skype class. Ten participants from schools in the bi-state region showed up to learning about H323 videoconferencing, Skype, collaborations, content providers, bridging and much, much more! We even played with the Blue Jeans Network for the first time- bridging an H323 vc call with a Skype account!

In the morning, we connected to the Center for Puppetry Arts for a vc demo and had a great connection with Iyabo Shabazz, a DL Program Presentation Specialist with the Center. She had the teachers wiggle their fingers and stretch just has should would with a group of younger students. Iyabo shared what kind of programming they do over H323 vc (Butterflies, Mexico, and Edgar Allan Poe) and said they had started using Elluminate to deliver programs as webinars to schools who do not have H323 vc equipment (such as Polycom, LifeSize or Tandberg).

In the afternoon, we had a couple of Skype connections- one with Martha Bogart, who was at the Support Staff Academy Mini-Conference talking about… Skype! We also connected to Manuel Hererra, who Skyped in using the iPad he won at the 2011 Midwest Education Technology Conference. We talked about all the Skype resources out there, including education.skype.com.

It was great to work such an enthusiastic group! I’m looking forward to working with them in the future- in person, or at a distance. Thanks again for coming, ladies!

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Wednesday, April 27, 2011 VLC @ SSA for TechPD

The Support Staff Academy Mini-Conference will be June 8.
Here’s what you’ll find from the Virtual Learning Center at SSA:

Presenter: Stephanie Madlinger, Program Coordinator & Technology Instructor, School Districts’ Virtual Learning Center, St. Louis, MO

Save Time Collecting Information with Google Forms
If you need to collect data, create surveys, or build a spreadsheet of information & chart it, this session is for you. Google Forms allows you to create simple forms to be used in collecting and collating information. With a simple click of a button you can have a chart or graph of your data to be shared with parents or the school board. In this hands-on session we will create an online version of the sample questionnaire or survey you bring. You can email it or share the entire form on your website today. In order to leave with a completed form, participants must have a Google Account or Gmail set up prior to this session.

Social Networking 101: Building Safe Online Relationships
A social network site allows people who share interests to build a ‘trusted’ network/ online community. A social network site will usually provide various ways for users to interact, such as IM (chat/ instant messaging), email, video sharing, file sharing, blogging, discussion groups, etc. Most contain libraries/ directories of some categories, such as former classmates, old work colleagues, and so on (like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn). These social networking sites provide a means to connect with friends and develop professional relationships by allowing users to create a detailed profile page. You’ll learn how to be safe while building safe online relationships.

Organize & Access Your Favorite Bookmarks Anytime, Anywhere
Online books allow you to access your favorite bookmarks anytime, anywhere. In this hands-on session we will create an iKeepBookmarks account so that you can use your favorite bookmarks at work, home or even on the road. iKeepBookmarks.com allows you to upload, and keep, your bookmarks on the web for free. You can access them at any time, anywhere, from any computer! Participants will also learn how to share your favorite webpages with friends and associates. Participants may want to bring your own laptop to upload your favorites and access your favorite bookmarks today!

Presenter: Martha Bogart, Program Coordinator & Technology Instructor, School Districts’ Virtual Learning Center, St. Louis, MO

See What Skype Can Do For You!
Learn exactly what Skype is and how communicating with Skype can save you and your employer money! Skype is jam-packed and bursting with cool stuff that makes it easier, more fun and useful to keep in touch with friends, family and colleagues. Martha will help you set up a free account, explain the entire process, and connect to fellow classmates during this session.

Presenter: Nancy George, Director, Cooperating School Districts’ Virtual Learning Center, St. Louis, MO

Designing Effective & Fun Presentations
PowerPoint presentations have matured.  Gone should be presentations adapted from transparencies aka “let’s give them lots of text.” Sleek presentations are in; the ones you really want to sit through and don’t doze off. Learn the simple, little secrets to transform a text heavy slideshow into an appealing one that people will remember. Really, it’s easy! Come and have fun while learning.

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Tuesday, April 26, 2011 Free Spring DE Virtual Conference Plus More from the VLC

Click below to learn more about these great opportunities for you and your colleagues!

Tags: , , ,

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 722 other followers