More on AECT

Okay, so this new blogger has burst on to the scene with four messages in a three day span about AECT. Rick Xaver, over at Disruptive Technocrat, is a former employee of AECT and the creator of the http//www.aect-members.org site. In a series of posts (see The Challenge of AECT Electronic Services, Symposium sponsored by Denny's?, Beyond complaints: a sense of direction, and Out of date, out of touch), he takes AECT to task over the disconnect between the organization's mandate (i.e., cutting edge of educational communications and technology) and the reality of their main organizational homepage (i.e., http//www.aect.org - which short of an act of God, never gets updated).

As someone relataively new to the inner workings of AECT, I am only starting to realize the real problems of the organization (and they go far beyond the complaints that I had about the annual meeting - expressed in First Impression of AECT 2005 - Continue to Disappoint, Second Impressions of AECT 2005, More Internet Woes, First Real Day, Second Full Day, Post-Mortem on AECT, and Final Thoughts on AECT 2005 - I promise). Since becoming more involved in the Distance Learning Division, I have come to learn that the main AECT website (i.e., http//www.aect.org) is so static and so difficult to get content added, that there was a geniune need to create the members site (i.e., http//www.aect-members.org). I have since learned that it was Rick who was responsible for the creation of this second site - thanks Rick - and did so having to fight against the AECT home office. Now I may be wrong, but other than the Handbook chapters, ETR&D articles, and to renew my membership, I have no cause to go to the main AECT site. But I use the member's site quite often, because that is where the action is. Divisions are able to post regular notices, regardless of content or importance, for their membership. All of the division areas have an RSS feed so that I can plug them into my Bloglines account and not have to continuous check to see if they've finally updated the content of the site (which is what I would have to do with the main AECT site, so I simply don't).

Now Nate, over at Cognitive Dissonance, has posted a suggestion (see Disruptive Technocrat) on how we can start to change the system and improve upon what is essentially litter on the side of the information highway. I personally don't have the server knowledge to help them out on this task, but you might.

And a personal note to Rick, I can't wait to hear your thoughts on "Next: is wireless Internet access at the conference a perk or a necessity?", as alluded to in your The Challenge of AECT Electronic Services entry.

Tags: AECT, graduate student, graduate students, graduate school, higher education, education