MOOC-tip-plication: Application of a tip from a MOOC for Global Staff

Marian Abernathy, LINGOs Director of Membership & Communications

WiFi Cow gives a MOOC Tip From the 2012 Cow Parade in Durham, Chapel Hill and Raleigh, NC, USA

I recently took part in my second Massive Open Online Course (or MOOC).  And, while a few of my candid colleagues and family may have thought it too basic for me… I got a lot out of “A Beginner’s Guide to Irrationality,” offered by Duke University Professor Dan Ariely. This Coursera MOOC put a lot of the behavioral economic theory it covered into practice, and I’ll share couple of  relevant tips here.

Among the approaches with potential for those of us managing organizational learning programs, corporate universities or LMSes can use is the introductory quiz. As part of the initial set-up (after registering for the free course), there was an introductory “quiz” or survey. The teaching team noted that in all likelihood, the cohort of learners would be similar to most MOOC participants and not complete the full course (see “Not Staying the Course” about low completion rates). They asked participants a few questions to help learners take responsibility for our own learning and to encourage us to be realistic:

“What do you plan to for this course (check all that apply):

[ ] Watch/attend the lectures

[ ] Engage in discussion board forums

[ ] Read all the reading material

[ ] Take quizzes on lectures/reading

[ ] Peruse extra material

[ ]  Complete the written assignment(s)

[ ]  Grade/comment on other people’s submissions

[ ] Take the final learning assessment (exam/certification)

[ ] Other_________

This list gave learners an idea of what was coming and a grounding in what it would take to earn a statement of completion. And the next question prepared us for how to be successful learners, even if we didn’t complete the course. I liken this to how to continue to keep myself on track toward a new year’s resolution when I miss an early milestone.

“If you don’t have time to do all the things you checked above, which item will you sacrifice first?

• Watch/attend the lectures
• Engage in discussion board forums
• Read all the reading material
• Take quizzes on lectures/reading
• Peruse extra material
• Complete the written assignment(s)
• Grade/comment on other people’s submissions
• Take the final learning assessment (exam/certification)
• Other

As this was a course on behavioral theory, the instructors applied some of their own content and offered some ideas that could help learners who chose to be helped!

What best describes how you plan to encourage your own participation in this course
	do not plan to do	plan to do	already done	not sure
Block of time for this course in your calendar
Tell others you are taking the course
Take the course with others (ie study groups)
Reward yourself for staying on track
Set consequences for not staying on track
Other

This chart contains many tips for adult learners, particularly those of us who are not professional learners to put in place. Offering your learners something as simple as this type of chart may help them build the supportive scaffolding they need to complete the course work.

More importantly, what does the learner hope to achieve, accomplish or apply (do better/differently as a result of the learning)?  One very simple approach is used by LINGOs member organization Islamic Relief Worldwide.    The Islamic Relief Learning & Development team provides their learners with a very simple Learning Log through which staff identify what they did, why, what they learned from it and how they will apply it.

Defining the what and the why at the start of a formal learning venture can support the application of learning.  At LINGOs, we believe that development professionals with better skills deliver better quality services and produce better results for beneficiary communities. We continue to explore various approaches to support the application of learning.

New Kid on the Block

Posted by Gus Curran, LINGOs Manager of Member Services

It is hard to believe it has been four months since my first day at LINGOs. I’ve been enjoying my time as the newest staff person, but in May, LINGOs made a new hire: Beth Bramble, Technical Support Specialist. Beth will be working with Robb Allen on all things technical support. She brings experience not only with the IntraLearn LMS, but she also has graphic design skills and experience with Moodle. We are thrilled to have her on the team. This means, however, that I am no longer the “new kid on the block” at LINGOs, and this has me reflecting on my first few months on the job.

Making the transition from LMS Administrator/Key Contact for a member organization to a LINGOs staff member was generally very smooth. I had already met almost everyone on the LINGOs team at the annual meetings or at various conferences. I was familiar with LINGOs and its mission, and I was excited about joining the team in the newly created position of Member Services Manager.

My first assignment and priority was to help Robb on the technical support help desk so that he could focus on bigger projects such as coding the Last Mile Learning portal. A few months spent solving technical problems and helping members has been a great way to meet many of you. It has also given me both valuable insight into some of the challenges members face and ideas on how we can address those challenges moving forward.

While stepping into my role at LINGOs has been mostly stress-free, the transition from traditional office worker to a virtual worker was more challenging. At LINGOs we don’t call ourselves telecommuters; that term doesn’t apply, because we all work from home and there is no office to commute back to. I like the term “digital nomad” because I truly can work from anywhere in the world. That said, anywhere in the world up to this point is two places: my house and a Starbucks down the street. But I can work from anywhere, if I want to. I suppose I’m more of a digital roamer. I do occasionally roam over to the dining room with my laptop.

If we’ve met before, you might have guessed that I’m what some refer to as a “people person.” On the Insights Color Wheel, I’m sunshiny yellow! Going from an office full of people to just me in my house was a bit of a shock. The first few weeks were difficult. I placed a bird feeder outside of my home office window and named some of the regular visitors after former colleagues. I looked forward to the mailman dropping by and found reasons to be near the door at the time so I could say “hi.” When the woman who makes a daily run past my house with her dog hadn’t gone by in a week, I was concerned. (Don’t worry—she returned, with the dog.)

By Sarah Stierch (Flickr: Yellow Finch) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

Over time, however, I have come to enjoy this working-from-home thing. With Skype, Blackboard Collaborate, and that old standby the telephone, I’ve discovered that I stay connected with my LINGOs colleagues and members throughout the day. Skype IM is now my water cooler. I get what I need.

Now I’m handing the new-kid-on-the-block baton to Beth. As Beth takes over as key support contact, I will begin to take what I’ve learned from the past few months and think of ways to improve the LINGOs membership experience.

My “door” is always open. As LINGOs members, you are always welcome to email me  (Gus[at]LINGOs.org) or find me on Skype (gus.curran) if you ever want to talk to me about your LINGOs membership. Not only am I always happy to speak with members, I could probably use the company.

5 reasons blended learning on project management is going viral at Rainforest Alliance

What would it take to get your organization abuzz about learning?

The Rainforest Alliance’s Patti Lukas found that blended learning was a key to scoring a low-cost, quick win in learning new skills and bringing in a new approach to project management. Rainforest Alliance (RA) worked with LINGOs to introduce a new approach to project management. Shortly after starting with RA in November, Patti got in touch with LINGOs and learned about the blended courses on project management, which appeared to meet an immediate need at RA. She and LINGOs Director of Project Services John Cropper used a capacity assessment tool to as a way to understand organizational strengths and weaknesses in project management and explored options to bring capacity building in project management to RA on a global scale.

In addition to providing training resources in project management, the LINGOs Project Services work is an active learning laboratory, testing innovative learning approaches with NGOs working in international development and humanitarian relief.  As we’ve noted in past posts, blended gets learning to where the learners are and provides some quick wins for an international NGO with a diverse globally dispersed workforce and limited resources.

Having identified an organizational need to strengthen skills and build a unified approach to project management, Rainforest Alliance  contracted with LINGOs to run four-week blended learning courses (one in English and one in Spanish) for 79 of their project managers around the world. Similar to the Open Course starting this week, participants in the dedicated Rainforest Alliance 4-week blended learning courses spent about six to eight hours per week on learning: two 90 minute virtual classroom events per week and about 3 hours in self-paced eLearning and individual assignments, as well as participating in asynchronous discussions in the course’s community platform.

As more RA staff heard about the blended learning that had gotten underway, another 18 signed up for open courses that LINGOs was running in English and Spanish in March and more registered for the May course getting underway this week (For more info, see: http://may2013-4weekpmdpro.eventbrite.com)   RA is preparing to offer another round of dedicated RA blended learning course in July.

Five reasons that blended learning goes viral

1. Knowledge gain is equal or greater than face to face

Because the project management training is linked to a standardized exam of knowledge, the PMD Pro 1 exam, it’s relatively easy to evaluate knowledge gain from different learning approaches and to determine differences in the pass-rate across different learning modalities. Our learning laboratory results show that blended results are comparable to or better than face to face training with regards to PMDPro results. Among the 79 Rainforest Alliance staff from the two blended courses, only 2 did not pass the PMD Pro exam on first attempt. When LINGOs ran a pilot with Oxfam in East Africa last year, blended pass rates were 100% as opposed to 75% in F2F trainings (See this post for more information). Blended approaches give people more time to absorb and internalize content and they can do the exam when they are ready. This finding is consistent with a recent New York Times article on MOOCs.

2. Lower costs allows learning to scale

 In these days of budget cuts and “doing more with less,” Rainforest Alliance contracted with LINGOs for two, month-long blended courses, one in English and one in Spanish, for the approximate cost of three week-long work trips from New York to Africa.   Had the trips been face to face, there would likely have been several international trips by some of the 79 RA participants and trainers. In addition, RA avoided the “hidden” opportunity costs of face-to-face training (when participants attend an all-day or all-week event, other works slows significantly if does not come to a complete stop). In addition, as the blended learning course took place over a month, RA staff could work as they learned, and had the opportunity to apply their new learning and come back to the facilitator and group with questions and comments. The discussion forum was so successful that RA is creating a similar one internally to continue and grow such cross-cutting conversations.

3. Learning where the Learner Is means greater diversity among participants

For learners, the ability to participate in a course from where you are, rather than traveling to it, enables greater diversity of participation. In the case of the RA English-language course, similar to what we found with Oxfam in Africa [http://lingos.wordpress.com/2012/03/05/pm-training-_women/], 63% of the 40 participants were women. Staff from seven countries participated: Mexico, Guatemala, Ghana, Canada, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and the US; and those from the US were from multiple locations in six states. Given the travel costs, would this group ever have been able to learn together in traditional face to face training?

4.  Expanded participation leads to greater adoption of learning

Through the blended learning platform, participants were actually sharing examples of their own project management work and making connections with colleagues in other locations. The strongly positive responses from project management course participants on three continents have caught the attention of senior management.  The relatively large group from so many locations now able to “speak the same language” in terms of project management, has led RA’s executive team to plan a Project Management Office (PMO). RA is eager to have global teams using common tools and approaches for project management and the ability to roll out this new initiative both quickly and cost-efficiently are huge wins for the organization.  Initial plans include appointing a lead for the PMO, building an internal governing committee that will ensure the right tools are used for the specific project types. RA is also determining how to include reporting as part of the practice so that the organization can better understand how money is spent and improve and streamline internal processes.

5. Blended learning is greener…

For an NGO dedicated to conservation and sustainable livelihoods, adopting learning and training approaches that don’t require carbon generating travel (not to mention the costs and time associated with travel), blended learning is a no brainer!

Quick win!

Effective learning for a diverse global audience with lower costs than standard approaches, leading to rapid and expanded adoption AND an approach aligned with a green mission… blended learning on project management was a very quick win for Rainforest Alliance and for Patti, who started with the organization less than six months ago!  Stay tuned for an update in about a year to learn about the impact on project management that has come about from this first round of blended learning at Rainforest Alliance!

 Want to get involved?

An English language 4-week blended learning course on PMD Pro is starting this week:

A Spanish Language 4-week course starts June 3

Stay tuned for Portuguese!

The Power of Volunteers

Posted by Gus Curran, LINGOs Member Services Manager

 What comes to mind when you think volunteers?

Non-profits reach out to volunteers on a regular basis for all kinds of projects and tasks, from stuffing envelopes to helping out at events to doing field work, even building houses.

What could you accomplish if you asked highly skilled learning professionals to volunteer their talents for you and your organization?

If you are Mike Culligan ,Director of LINGOs’ Last Mile Learning Program, the answer to that question is that volunteers can get incredible things done. During the last year, Mike worked with over 80 volunteers to create the Last Mile Learning portal and courses. He recently posted on the Global Giveback LinkedIn Group the following list of accomplishments, completed almost entirely by a team of volunteers.

- 1  website built
- 2 Learning paths created
- 4 Last Mile Learning curriculum guides published (self-led, face-to-face, blended synchronous, blended asynchronous)
- 7 courses translated to Spanish, French and Portuguese
- 13 face to face training packages completed
- 15 eLearning modules developed, and
- 21 additional eLearning modules currently under development

Thanks to the support of volunteers, a library of professional development courses is available, FREE OF CHARGE to anybody working to improve the lives poor communities around the world via http://www.LastMileLearning.org.

No Job is too small!

I recently reached out to volunteers on the Global Giveback Group on LinkedIn, asking them to test Last Mile Learning courses. Highly skilled learning professionals responded quickly, and I was moved and humbled by their generosity. As you can imagine, testing courses is not the most glamorous assignment, but volunteers stepped up and did the testing, offering great feedback on the courses and helping to make Last Mile learning even better. One volunteer took my basic Word document reporting forms and improved them, converting them to forms on Google Docs and setting it up so that all the feedback was aggregated and easy to review.  I hadn’t even thought of this, and a volunteer saw the need and reached out to me and offered to help.

No Job is too big!

Did you know that volunteers help LINGOs members learn on a regular basis? Greg Davis of Precision eLearning volunteers his time and skills quarterly to lead the Virtual Training Mastery Series, a popular and engaging course which is helping staff of LINGOs member organizations to design and deliver better training online. He designed the workshop pro-bono for LINGOs, and LINGOs being LINGOs, asked him if would be willing to also deliver the workshop. He said yes. He’s lead over 500 people through this course.

Pam Thomas, owner and certified coach at What’s Within U, LLC,, is a key volunteer for LINGOs from Coaching Out of the Box®. With help from her colleagues, Pam gives several hours of her time each quarter to guide members through a two part online workshop to help them to develop their coaching skills.

Greg and Pam don’t just donate time and experience- both of these volunteers are giving members their materials, as well.

Learning professionals are willing and ready to volunteer

Learning professionals are eager to help.  They are lining up on the Global Giveback LinkedIn group, seeking NGOs whose needs and projects match their interests and skills. All you have to do is reach out to them.  Visit the Global Giveback LinkedIn Group to review posts by potential volunteers. Review the helpful handouts on the LINGOs Global Giveback site to start planning your project with your volunteer.

Optional Competition

In the past, a highlight of Global Giveback has been its element of competition. This year the competition is optional. Non-profits may enter eLearning courses into the competition (with the volunteer’s consent, of course).  A panel of judges for the competition will review courses based on a set of requirements, as in years past. However, it is not required that a project be submitted to the competition. This means that all projects should be considered as potential Global Giveback opportunities, as long as they are related to learning for nonprofit organizations working to improve people’s lives in the developing world. This includes internal courses such as orientations, or converting live workshops into blended courses or elearning.

Learn More at the Global Giveback Webinar

I encourage NGO learning staff to join us for a webinar on May 9 at 11:00AM EDT (click here to register) to learn more about how to use Global Giveback harness the power of volunteers. The webinar will also feature LINGOs members who successfully developed courses with volunteer developers in previous years of Global Giveback, and you can ask them your questions. We look forward to seeing you there.

Read this recent post on the Global Giveback

5 Ways Last Mile Learning will Change the way LINGOS Member Agencies Learn

Posted by Mike Culligan, Director of Last Mile Learning

About a year ago, LINGOS member agencies first heard rumbling of the Last Mile Learning initiative and how it will “change the way their organizations learn.”   Now it’s time to see for yourself!  The Last Mile Learning Open Portal www.lastmilelearning.org is live and ready to share with your staff, your partners, your implementing agencies, your trainers and anyone else that is working to improve the lives of communities around the world.

By now, as a frequent reader of the LINGOs Blog, you probably know the basics of Last Mile Learning.  The initiative provides free learning resources to anyone working in the development and relief sector.  All the courses are organized into learning paths and are available in three formats (self-led e-learning, face-to-face, and blended on-line.)

For LINGOS member agencies, Last Mile Learning provides an especially exciting opportunity to move learning to the next level in five ways:

#5 Content is contextualized to our sector!

The Last Mile Learning catalog is designed specifically for development and relief professionals.  Take for example, the Project Management Learning Path.  Each of the seven courses was designed and developed for development professionals.  The case studies include scenarios of health, conservation and water projects located in rural communities.  The tools examined include log frames, problem trees, monitoring/evaluation plans and other indispensable tools that are critical to our sector.  Furthermore, all the project management content is aligned with the PMDPro certification which, as of last month, over 5,000 development professionals globally have completed.

#4 Resources are available for learners AND facilitators!

Yes, Last Mile Learning will complement LINGOs member agency eLearning libraries with contextualized courses organized into learning paths.  And, for the first time, Last Mile Learning ALSO provides facilitation packages for trainers who would like to lead courses in face-to-face or blended on-line environments.  This means that organizations now have access to resources that allow them to deploy an integrated and comprehensive learning strategy – reaching learners via whatever approach (eLearning, face-to-face, blended on-line) is most appropriate for their context.

#3 Translated content for your global workforce! 

Over 80% of the staff of international NGOs is located outside of the United States.  For most, English is not their first language.  That is why Last Mile Learning is committed to translating its content into multiple languages.  The Project Management learning path is available to LINGOs members in Spanish, French, and Portuguese, as well as English; and available on the Last Mile Learning Open Portal in English and Spanish.  Other learning paths will be translated over the coming year.  These resources will allow organizations to share learning content with the ENTIRE global workforce – not just those who are fluent in English.

#2 It’s time to “expand the we”!

International organizations don’t work alone.  Their work depends on a vibrant network of implementing partners, local NGOs, in-country consortia, government ministries and community based organizations.  Now an organization can develop a professional development strategy for all of the stakeholders involved in its activities.  This can be done via two options:

• Organizations can direct stakeholders to the Last Mile Learning open portal where they can access resources directly;
• Organizations can deploy an LMS Lite where they can directly manage the learning of everyone involved in implementing the organization’s mission.

#1  Adapt resources to your context…  …and your brand!

And, finally, LINGOs members can access the source document files for all of the resources in the Last Mile Learning catalog.  These resources, regardless of whether they are self-led e-learning, face-to-face facilitation packages, or blended on-line content, can be edited to address the unique needs of your organization and the context in which it works.  All LINGOS member agencies have full access to the source files so that they can swap out logos, insert new case studies, revise the learning objectives, or include organization-specific policies for their staff members.

So what’s next?  Help us share the news of the Last Mile Learning  launch!  Visit the open portal, access the resources, and (most importantly) be sure to help us get the word out!

LINGOs is asking that each of its member agency contacts to identify ten people you feel will benefit from free, hi-quality learning resources for professionals in the sector.  This could include:

- Individual Learners – Who can access eLearning courses on topics like Project Identification and Design, Project Planning, Delegation,  Performance Management and much more;

- Trainers – Who can download facilitation guides that allow them to lead face-to-face workshops on all of the topics in the Last Mile Learning catalog;

- Organizations – Who can acquire a Learning Management portal and manage the learning of their stakeholders… …assigning courses, tracking completion status and managing learning paths.

LINGOs Member Agencies desiring to add Last Mile Learning self-paced courses to their existing Learning Management System Catalog may do so. Designated LMS Administrators can request addition of Last Mile Learning Course titles.

International development NGOs – don’t miss Global Giveback 2013!

100+ eLearning courses created for international NGOs at no cost… Global Giveback 2013 is now open, get involved

Through the Global Giveback, highly skilled learning professionals volunteer their highest talent, creativity and experience to support global development non-profit organizations. In the first four Global Giveback events, volunteer instructional designers and eLearning developers have created over 100 eLearning courses for LINGOs and its 75 international NGO member agencies.

All international NGOs provide training

“International NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that provide training for their global staff or to an audience with access to the internet should get involved,” said LINGOs Executive Director, Eric Berg. The Global Giveback allows NGOs to leverage their existing content, dramatically expanding the audience to their global staff and implementing partners.  Last year alone, LINGOs worked with over 60 volunteers to create courses available not only the global staff of our 75+ international member agencies, but they will also be available free to anyone working to improve people’s lives in the developing world.

3 Reasons to get involved Expand your agency’s training reach: Many learners have access to the internet, and you can reach more via technology-enabled learning than by face-to-face training. Use limited resources wisely: save on scarce travel, trainer, and time resources associated with each and every face-to-face training event, by working with a volunteer to develop eLearning that can be used by many learners around the world. Learn new skills: Agencies participating in past Global Givebacks have learned about eLearning design and project management through working with volunteer learning professionals.

2013 Global Giveback marks the fifth time LINGOs and the eLearning Guild have organized a vehicle through which learning professionals have donated their expertise and time to create eLearning resources for the global community. In years’ past, the resource was limited to agencies that are already members of LINGOs (Learning in NGOs), a not-for-profit consortium of humanitarian relief and international development agencies. This year marks the first time that Global Giveback is open to all non-profits working in the international development sector.

NEW in the 2013 Global Giveback

• Open to any not-for-profit organization working to improve people’s lives in the developing world
• Includes all learning formats: eLearning, Face-to-Face, Blended Learning modalities
• Optional eLearning competition: Non-profit agencies may enter eLearning developed by pro-bono volunteers in 2013.

Learning professionals want to make a difference in the world

Volunteering in the Global Giveback provides a unique opportunity for learning professionals to make a difference in the world. Many volunteers have already signed up in the Global Giveback group on LinkedIn and are eager to get started.

eLearning developer Amanda Warner, who participated in the first three Global Givebacks, winning twice with courses created for the public for Acción and FHI 360, notes “It’s so motivating to see the course in action,” said Warner, who estimates she spent between 180 and 210 hours developing Acción’s winning course “Build, Manage and Improve Credit” which is publically available.

“It was great to play with different ideas, and work on a totally different type of content from my day job,” she said. Warner took reams of ACCION’s existing face-to-face course materials, spread sheets, word documents, published guides and other resources and developed a proposal for an engaging, interactive simulation.

 

Your agency can get involved

It’s easy! You can get involved through the Global Giveback Group on LinkedIn or through your own network. Connect and interview those with interests, skills, timing, and approach to the work that best match your needs.

Projects can include: design and/or development of learning and training resources to be deployed in a variety of ways, including face to face, blended, and self-paced eLearning.

How to get started:

1. Identify the course material you want to adapt into a new format of learning
2. Join the Global Giveback Group on LinkedIn
3. Post your request for a volunteer Be sure to include 
   • Your agency name
   • Course Topic
   • Scope of Work (describe what the volunteer will develop, for what audience, with whom the volunteer will work, the resources s/he will have to work with, ie pre-approved content, subject matter experts whom s/he can consult during the project, etc)
   • Timeline(when you will be ready to start, your target date for completion and launch of your resource)
   • That there is an Identified staff-member who will work with the volunteer
4. Respond to all volunteers who indicate interest. Interview those whose skills match your needs, and keep others apprised of your plans so they can work with another project if your needs and timing don’t match their skills and time-frame.

Global Giveback organizers do not review or manage relationships between agencies and volunteers. Each party should research each other and interact in professionally, clearly defining success for the interaction before agreeing to collaborate.

eLearning Competition

An optional part of the Global Giveback is a competition among eLearning courses. Participation is not required, but may be motivating to some volunteers.

Not-for-profit development agencies may enter any eLearning course created on a volunteer (pro-bono) basis for any non-profit working globally to improve people’s lives in the developing world in 2013 can be entered in the eLearning Global Giveback competition.

Judges will evaluate courses submitted by non-profit global development agencies in two categories based on whether they were developed by individual developers or corporate teams, on ten criteria:

1. Meets stated learning objectives
2. Appearance
3. Creativity
4. Ease of use for the learner
5. Interactivity
6. Graphical content
7. Ease of update (for the non-profit sponsor)
8. Holds the learner’s interest
9. Ease of working with the developer (rated by the non-profit agency)
10. Potential impact of the course (assessed by the non-profit agency based on topic and potential audience)

Volunteer Developers and International Non Profit agencies may use the Global Giveback Group on LinkedIn as a means of finding each other. However, any international non-profit working with a non-staff volunteer on a pro-bono basis may submit courses created in 2013 for competition. Submissions must be received by 5:00PM EST on Jan 10, 2014.  Submission instructions will be posted in the second half of 2013.

Recognition & awards will be announced at the eLearning Guild’s Learning Solutions 2014 conference in Orlando, FL.

Learn More: http://bit.ly/LINGOsGG

Read about past Global Giveback events

• Global Giveback 3 Results
• 3 Ways to Identify Inspiring Ideas from Global Giveback 3
• Coaching for Results and Consumer Protection & Financial Education in Microfinance Courses Win in 2nd eLearning Global Giveback Competition
• 3 Inspiring Ideas from Global Giveback 2

A Drum for David Holcombe

Eric Berg, LINGOs Executive Director

It is considered a good governance practice for non-profits to limit board members to two successive terms before they must cycle off the board for at least a year or more. This keeps a board from becoming stale and injects fresh ideas into the organization. However, one of the downsides to this practice is you must lose board members that you would rather still have on the board.

This past week, I had the opportunity to recognize David Holcombe, co-Founder and CEO of the eLearning Guild and retiring LINGOs Board member in front of his “Guild family” at the Learning Solutions Conference in Orlando. David is finishing his second term on the board and will be leaving the LINGOs board after our next meeting. Needless to say, I hate to see him go.

Community spirit and corporate social responsibility

It seems like only yesterday that I first met David and the Guild’s other co-founder, Heidi Fisk, at what was then called the Annual Member Gathering in Boston. I was so impressed with what they were doing to build a community among eLearning professionals that I knew I wanted David’s help with LINGOs which was simply a start-up operation at that time. David graciously agreed to help and after I “set the hook” I slowly began to reel him into more involvement with LINGOs – first as an advisor, then as a board member and ultimately as the Chairman of the Board. During that time, LINGOs grew from our first half dozen members to the over 75 international organizations that are currently members. Each year we not only expanded our membership but also the services we provided to them and to the sector at large.

David made it possible for each LINGOs member to have a premium membership in the Guild and with it access to the rich library of resources and events on technology-supported learning. I hesitate to point this out – but knowing David, I suspect he has already done the math – that benefit alone is worth over $125,000 each and every year.

The Guild has also been instrumental in supporting the Global Giveback program and since we began that effort, over 100 courses have been completed by volunteer developers. If you put even a nominal value – let’s say $5000 on each course, that is a “donation” worth over half a million dollars to LINGOs and our members.

And David has given unselfishly of his time and traveled at his own expense to LINGOs board meetings and events. In short, David has done everything reasonably or even unreasonably asked of him.

 But, as I told the audience in Orlando, it hasn’t all been hard work. For example, this past fall at the DevLearn Conference in Las Vegas which happened to coincide with Halloween I snapped the picture bat left of David and the Witches of DevLearn. (I know they say “what happens in Vegas – stays in Vegas” but that is only if there isn’t photographic evidence) You might recognize the witches as Shannon of PATH, Catriona of Conservation International, Sam of Save the Children and Jenn of Ipas. I don’t think I have ever seen a larger smile on David’s face.

A Djembe Drum for David

Over the years, David has assisted me with awarding djembe drums to Finalists and Winners of the Global Giveback Competition. David has always looked longingly at those drums and we even have had to pry his fingers off the drum he was awarding to participants. So we thought it would be a great way to acknowledge our gratitude for all he has done for LINGOs and presented David with a drum of his own. Alison Smith, Executive Director of InsideNGO and incoming board chairperson and Alfredo Leone joined me on stage to present David’s drum.

Alison acknowledged she had very big shoes to fill and if you aren’t aware, David is at least as tall as my six foot four inch height so she is quite right, both literally and figuratively. She also acknowledged that David’s entire team at the Guild from Heidi to all the rest of the staff made LINGOs members feel like part of the family and their support made it easier for David to be available to LINGOs.

In receiving the drum and with characteristically modesty, David praised the Guild members and Guild staff that have been so supportive and made it clear that despite leaving the board he still intends to support LINGOs and our members as he always has done and encouraged anyone interested to get involved in way that made sense for them.

We will miss David and I am personally grateful to him for his unselfish support of our members and his willingness to be available to me whenever I needed his counsel and experience. Hopefully, from time to time, David will tap on the drum LINGOs gave him and smile knowing how much he has helped enable.