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During the opening day of Adobe MAX 2009 in Los Angeles, two separate sessions featured DU video systems.

Firstly, Joseph Labrecque, Senior Multimedia Application Developer for the University of Denver and Adobe Higher Education Leader included mention of the ALORA Embed Generator video player and its ability to tap into Google Analytics during his session for the FITC Unconference:

Custom Event Reporting from Flash to Google Analytics

With the ability to define and report custom events from within your Flash application, you retain control over how specific events are reported and the information contained in these reports. This presentation will cover the implementation of the Google Analytics Tracking For Adobe Flash ActionScript 3 API for generating custom events and the generation of unorthodox event logging from within Flash.

This presentation was streamed live by FITC and Influxis.

Another strong mention was made by John Schuman, Education Solutions Architect for Adobe Systems during his session on video delivery systems in education during which he focused on the CourseMedia™ application:

Customizing the University Experience with a Rich Media Delivery System

Explore the potential of developing a customized, security-focused, RSS-driven delivery solution. This session shows how you can use Adobe Flash Media Rights Management Server, Flash Media Server 3, and Adobe Media Player

While there were some inaccuracies presented during the session, the spirit of our system was well-represented and we thank John for his coverage of CourseMedia™ and other DU video delivery mechanisms.

I'm finally back home from a fantastic week in San Jose at the Adobe Summer Institute. The Summer Institute is a 5 day conference/workshop event run by Adobe's Education division for members of their global Adobe Education Leaders program. I was inducted into the AEL program last year but was unable to attend the 2008 event in San Francisco. This year I was determined to attend the San Jose event and I'm really glad I went.

When you do in fact know a fair bit about technology and how to use it, it becomes harder to find professional development experiences that challenge and extend you. One of the reasons I was so keen to attend the Summer Institute was that I felt it would push me to learn more and build on some of the knowledge I already have. Having been a Photoshop user for many years, and spending many hours inside programs like InDesign (and PageMaker before that) and having taught Flash and Dreamweaver to students, I've always been quite immersed in Adobe's Creative Suite, but the nature of these tools always seems to be such that the more you know about them, the more you realise you don't know.

The other AELs came mainly from all over the US, with quite a few from the UK and a handful from other places like New Zealand, Hong Kong and Belgium. I was the only Aussie. We started the week on Monday evening with a Welcome Party at our hotel where we got to meet the other AELS and some of the folk from Adobe. It was good to meet new people and make new connections.

Tuesday started early for me with a Photoshop exam. This was taken as part of the Adobe Certified Associate, a recognised certification for Photoshop users. Happily, I passed the exam without too much trouble. The rest of Tuesday was filled with meeting with the Adobe product teams, where we got to hear about future product roadmaps, learn about upcoming features and directions for the Creative Suite, and to offer suggestions for how we thought the products could be improved. Parts of the day were done under NDA so I can't really go into details, but suffice to say there will be plenty of exciting new stuff coming from Adobe in the next year or two. Dinner that night was held at Saratoga Springs, a lovely camping ground in the hills surrounding Silicon Valley, and we had fun and games with some hilarious variations on team volleyball played with water-filled balloons.

Wednesday was filled with AEL to AEL sessions - workshops where we presented to each other many of the things we were doing in our own schools and districts. Watching these sessions, it really struck me what an intensely creative and passionate group of educators this was. Although not everything was directly relevant to my own teaching situation, I still got tons of great ideas from the sharing that took place. Collaborative projects, experimental ideas based on art, design and creativity, ideas for streamlining school administration, examples of how teachers do things in other parts of the world... we got all sorts of cool ideas from these AEL sessions. After a full day of learning from each other, we regrouped in the Adobe Cafeteria for a delicious dinner and drinks, where more sharing and conversation took place in a relaxed casual atmosphere. I was quite amazed as we watched the planes fly over the Adobe building, which was directly in the landing path of San Jose airport, seeming to clear the top of the building with only a few hundred feet to spare. A few of us kicked on to a bar in downtown San Jose where the conversations continued into the night, only louder.

Thursday was another full day of learning, with a intense session run by Adobe's John Schuman. We learned many of the very cool features in the software tools, and in particular how to make them work together smoothly. Our project required us to integrate our work across Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Flash, Fireworks, InDesign and Bridge as we roundtripped files between the various tools. In each of the applications we discovered lots of useful workflows and there were quite a few new concepts that I hadn't come across before. The last part of the day took us into a project using Flash Catalyst, a relatively new product still in beta, that makes it much easier for designers to create interactive content. I'm still getting my head around Catalyst, but it looks like a great tool for rapidly designing interactive media without the need to know heavy-duty coding stuff.

Thursday night was good fun, with a night out to a local San Jose pool hall. By this stage we had gotten to know each other a little better, so it was cool to hang out, shoot some pool and have still more conversations about learning and life. The night finished while it was still young, as the pool tables were reclaimed at the stroke of 9:00pm. A few of us wandered across the road to another party that looked like it would be fun. I turned out to be an Open Source party, sponsored by Source Forge. With free drinks (free as in "beer" - I thought that was hilarious at an Open Source event), tatoos getting done in the basement (no, I didn't get one), as well as Twitter stations, free T-shirt giveaways from the good folk at ThinkGeek, guys playing with Star Wars light sabres, people wearing infra-red night vision goggles, etc, it was a truly geeky event... I loved it!

Friday morning was the last day of the conference and I'd arranged to do another certification exam, this time in Dreamweaver. Although I've used Dreamweaver a lot in the past, I hadn't used it much lately so wasn't feeling too confident in my ability to pass this exam. However, I did pass, and since I had a bit of time to spare at the end I decided to have a crack at the remaining exam for Flash. This one I really wasn't too confident about, since I haven't used Flash much in the last 12 months and there are some big changes to the CS4 version. Even so, I surprised myself by passing the Flash exam too, so I was feeling pretty pleased that I managed to get my certification in Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Flash all in the same week.

The rest of Friday morning was a general wrap up of the event, with feedback and a debriefing session between the AELs and the Adobe folk. It was kind of sad to have it all come to an end, but we eventually said our goodbyes and all went our separate ways. The sessions were all recorded with Adobe Connect, as well as a ton of Twitter, Flickr and Delicious resources all tagged with ael09, so at least there is a decent electronic record of the sessions.

I didn't have to be at the airport until quite late so myself and Saiqa, another AEL from London, decided to rent a car and do some Silicon Valley sightseeing. We dropped in on the headquarters of Apple and Google, then headed in to San Francisco for some last minute sightseeing around Fisherman's Wharf before getting back to SFO airport for our late flights.

Overall, a great week and one I'd be keen to do again. Thanks Adobe for running and hosting the event, especially to Megan Stewart and her team who did a great job of making sure the program went off perfectly. Great conference, can't wait to get back next year!

The 2009 Adobe Education Leader Summer Institute in now over and my intention is to document a few thoughts here while everything is still fresh in my mind.

About 80 Adobe Education Leaders from both K-12 and Higher Education institutions from around the world gathered at Adobe HQ in San Jose, CA for 5 days of networking, presentations, training, and corporate roadmaps. I've only been involved in this group since November of last year, so this was the first time I had personally attended this event. This is also the first year that Higher Education was formally represented.

I wasn't quite sure what to expect, so tried not to have any sort of pre-conceived notions of how the week would play out. One of the most beneficial aspects of the event was the constant networking going on - a perpetual idea mill and information interchange center. I'm sure that if I had passed up on the 4 hours of sleep I got most nights, those 4 hours would also be spent engaged in intense discussion with my peers.

Most days allowed us to explore San Jose, Adobe HQ (the less secure portions, anyway), and interface with a great number of Adobe employees through presentations, round-tables, Q+A sessions, and some very nice dinner receptions. I found a lot of these individuals to be surprisingly frank and quite receptive to any of the ideas and thoughts that were proposed to them.

Wednesday provided everyone with an opportunity to make presentations to the group. I gave a presentation on what the University of Denver is doing in regard to the Flash Platform focusing on our work on the CourseMedia™ project and received a ton of positive feedback from both Adobe and other AELs. A really great experience although I had to cut the demo portion short due to time constraints. The slides can be downloaded as a PDF and the recording should be available on AdobeTV later on along with 25+ other extraordinary sessions.

I was delighted to find that everyone was very amiable and even though I was one of the new people in the group- was treated with the utmost respect whether conversing with other AELs, product managers, evangelists, or anyone on the education team at Adobe. What a wonderful group of people to be a part of - I cannot wait to begin some of the many collaborations seeded at this event.

Many thanks to Adobe and everyone that was a part of the planning and execution of the institute this year. It will not be soon forgotten and I look forward to future events and hopefully seeing everyone again in 2010.

The fifth and final Digital Learning Environment Event was held on April 28 in beautiful downtown Pittsburg at the City Center Doubletree Hotel. The keynote speaker for the event was Holly Jobe, the Project Manager for Classrooms for the Future (CFF), Pennsylvania’s high school reform program. Holly Jobe has been involved in all levels of education. Her interests include how education technology can reform education and fully engage student in taking responsibility for learning; and educational leadership. She has served in her current position with the Pennsylvania Department of Education since 2006.

Pennsylvania’s initiative goals are to transform the way high school teacher teach and how student learn. With 20 million dollars budget the plan was to equip classrooms in all curricular areas with enhanced technology, laptop computers, and other state-of-the-art resources. CFF provided funds over three years so that all Pennsylvania high schools could participate. Now in the 3rd year of the initiative, 143,000 laptops have been distributed for 500,000 students.

The important component of professional development is being addressed as well. $6 million in state and federal funds was earmarked for teachers and other staff to receive extensive training. Training includes methods that use technology to increase student achievement and ensure that students are ready for college and other demands of the 21st century. In order to support the teachers as they learn the new technologies and attempt integration into their curriculum, the CCF initiative has initiated on-site instructional coaches in each participating school. These coaches provide support and training to ensure that all school staff acquires the understanding and skills to integrate technology into their classroom instruction, use data to make informed decisions, and promote more individualized instruction.

The specific goals of CFF are;
• Improve teaching and learning in English, math, science, and social studies.
• Change classroom practice.
• Change student-teacher relationships.
• Increase student engagement.
• Students responsible for learning.
• Students developing 21st century skills.
• Increase Academic achievement

More specific information regarding the state’s CFF program can be found at: http://www.edportal.ed.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/classrooms_for_the_future/475

As the 5 city DLE events come to a close, it is clear that the goals of Pennsylvania’s CFF are in line with the regional goals for education that we have seen demonstrated and discussed all around the country. It is encouraging to see so many committed educators embracing the need for systemic change in education. Together we can make change happen as we continue to move from the instructor centric towards the student centric model. The events have been opportunities to look at how a digital leaning environment can be the catalyst for teaching and learning in the 21st century. The hands-on opportunities have demonstrated to attendees how technology-rich learning environments not only enrich students’ learning experiences but also help them achieve their goals. Many thanks to all the partners and individuals who made this year’s DLE Events such a success!

Learn how to create green screen student TV newscasts, classroom video projects and more this summer as Adobe Education Leader Rob Zdrojewski teaches the basic and advanced features of Adobe Visual Communicator 3. New this summer are workshops for existing users, where we will examine features like live flash web streaming and sharing your productions online.

Summer 2009 Workshop offerings:
-School TV Made Easy with Adobe Visual Communicator 3 (Beginners)
-Perfecting Your Adobe Visual Communicator Shows (Advanced Users)
-Using SchoolTube to Safely Share Videos Online
-Create Teacher Websites

Join us as hundreds of teachers, media specialists, and administrators have for an exciting look at using Adobe Visual Communicator for green screened school TV newscasts and more!

Learn more here:
http://www.schooltvmadeeasy.com/workshops.cfm