Grant+Idea+&+Info

=Grant Idea(s) and Information (early version draft/notes)=

Basic idea:
Advancing digital resources" grant that would create some sort of open access database for teachers and others

**Need/Issue:**
Libraries and museums, put amazing resources online along with great standards based lesson plans to encourage teachers to use them. But the teachers, who are actually in huge need of these materials, never find them because they're all individually floating around out there in cyberspace twenty pages deep into Google results. So they figure out some of the most likely resources -- the Library of Congress has great lesson plans, for example, if you're doing American history or literature, and they might come across a few favorites at smaller museums or special collections libraries. But the teacher has to first figure out which institutions are likely to have something for their particular need and then search each website individually and it might take over a dozen different visits


 * ASSESSMENT OF NEED**
 * Teachers**
 * Middle and high school teachers of humanities
 * Arguments: there's a LOT out there for grade school, less freedom for grade school teachers (check this for truth?)
 * Focus on one population and then expand to other disciplines and age groups
 * Public and private ... and non-traditional, such as homeschooling (cite evidence of growing numbers of homeschooling), teachers in small schools (might be the only one teaching that grade or course), parochial schools
 * NEW teachers would really benefit from this support
 * Schools of education ... pre-service teachers and student teachers
 * School media specialists**
 * Part of their mandate IS to support the teachers
 * Students**
 * Who will benefit from the access to digital resources and more sane teachers

"Project reflects an understanding of current issues related to library, archive, and/or museum services, creatively addresses issues facing museums and/or libraries of similar size or discipline, nd envisions change in the field that could result from the project"** "Describe the scope, project goals and activities, the planning process, specifics of project implementation, and the expected results"** Scope
 * "Has performed a formal or informal assessment of its need"**
 * We're currently conducting an informal survey of current teachers in xx districts or states to assess need
 * Insert findings from teacher information behavior studies showing that they use online resources but not ones built for teachers because those ones suck
 * Any evidence of usage data of existing curricular materials
 * "Is aware of similar projects completed by other institutions"**
 * Gateway to Educational Materials (GEM)
 * Literally hundreds of individual sites with curricular information and lots of portals ... ReadWriteThink, etc, etc.
 * LISTSERVs such as the College Board's lists for AP teachers
 * NATIONAL IMPACT AND INTENDED RESULTS
 * Play up the part about how we'll focus on museums and libraries
 * Local libraries and museums lack the infrastructure to push their digitized materials out to a national audience, but many have content that is well worth sharing at the national level
 * Can encourage the creation of new materials as well as the dissemination of existing materials
 * Will create a "community of practice" or "information commons" (pick your buzzwords!!) among teachers in different parts of the country (specific features to be determined by research in the first phase of the project)
 * Teachers contributing and tweaking lesson plans
 * Forum for collaboration
 * User reviews of lessons
 * Partnerships for student blogs or wikis (e.g., urban and rural schools) (outcome?)
 * Online workshops run by teachers for teachers, or run by museums or libraries to promote the use of their materials
 * "Evidence that the project will create, implement, and document workable models that have the potential for successful, widespread adaptation where appropriate, or will produce far-reaching results"**
 * Once we create a successful model, it can be easily expanded to other disciplines and ages
 * PROJECT DESIGN AND EVALUATION PLAN
 * Reiterate scope and goals
 * Kat will look for material on phases of projects!! Pre-production, production, post-production??
 * Phase I
 * What do teachers want? Focus groups, usage studies, figure out the design
 * NB: This is a big brainstorm dump!! What are best practices for lesson plans, how do people look for lesson plans, how do teachers collaborate and how can we encourage
 * Developing relationships with partners
 * Phase II
 * Design, continuing iterative feedback
 * Development
 * Phase III
 * Small scale (beta) launch with pilot schools
 * Testing, contributing resources, beginning to develop the community
 * Phase IV
 * Launch
 * Phase V
 * Sustaining momentum after the grant
 * "If ... a partnership, describe how information will be shared and decisions will be made"**
 * "Efficient, effective, reasonable approaches to accomplish its clear goals and objectives"**
 * Using extensive teacher input and usability testing: focus groups, surveys
 * Partnerships with pilot schools: investing in the critical mass, PAY teachers professional development stipends to work with us
 * Pilot schools will be diverse (size, urban/rural, private/public, etc)
 * Partnerships with specific museums and libraries (e.g., Library of Congress)
 * "Methodology and design are appropriate to the scope of the project"**
 * Figure out who will actually do the design: work with MIM or another center or contract out to a private professional?
 * "Uses existing or emerging standard or best practices"**
 * Integrated with existing state standards
 * Work with the new nationally based standards
 * "Evaluation plan ties directly to project goals through measurable project outcomes, findings, or products"**
 * Measure usage, do exit surveys
 * There will be xx lesson plans created
 * There will be this many views or uses
 * There will be this many views or uses
 * Targeted outreach to museums and libraries with special emphasis on digitized primary resources (how many of the NLM grants in recent years have resulted in curricular materials based on digitized materials??)

"Will be made transparent and accessible through effective communication channels to the museum, library, and/or archiving fields and to other professional organizations and communities as appropriate"** Random Ideas to Sort Later
 * DISSEMINATION
 * Outreach to libraries and museums (how??)
 * Outreach to teachers and school media specialists (how??)
 * SUSTAINABILITY**
 * Crowdsourcing!

Lingering Questions
 * Can anyone link to anything on the web?? (Lindsay will double check case study)
 * WHO ARE OUR PARTNERS??
 * Library of Congress
 * Smithsonian
 * Pilot schools
 * Rural, urban, large, small, public (maybe ONLY public??) or private, magnet, etc.
 * Do we want an ed school too?