Kevin's Portal Page

Welcome to Kevin's Portal Page

My interest in technology began when I was 14. I worked detasling corn for a summer and saved up and bought a Commodore 64 (Whoooo! Hoooo!). I spent hours teaching myself to program, which later lead to a programming position with the University of Illinois. Anyone remember Plato terminals? I spent three years working with the Computer Adaptive Testing and Measurement team developing online study materials for domestic and international audiences.

For the past twelve years, I have developed curriculum and taught in both academic and corporate environments. Even though I have taught multiple subjects, a majority of my teaching has centered on technology. After graduating with my Master of Education degree from the University of Illinois, I moved to California where I taught for a Business College. Due to my desire to save paper (not to mention the desire to no longer fight for the copy machine), I started providing lecture notes and other resources to students on CDs. As the Internet emerged, the college asked me to teach a web development course. It was a natural transition for me to move from burning CDs to placing course content on the web. Before I knew it, I was interacting with my students electronically and my interest in online education began. It was this interest that pushed me to participate in the Online Teaching and Learning program through California State University-Hayward.

The online program through CSU is similar to the MVCR program offered by the Illinois Online Network (http://www.ion.uillinois.edu), where I have designed and taught online courses focusing in areas of online pedagogy, instructional design, web design, synchronous communication and more. I also facilitated a state-wide initiative whose goal was to develop a rubric outlining quality standards for online courses.

Recently, I have accepted the position of Coordinator of Instructor Support for the University of Illinois Global Campus (http://global.uillinois.edu). In this position, I provide pedagogical and technical support to instructors, supervise the mentoring program, and participate in mentoring and evaluating instructors.

Most recently, I have decided to continue my education journey and have enrolled in a doctoral program through Nova Southeastern (http://www.nova.edu). The program is a doctorate of education degree with a concentration in instructional technology and distance education (http://www.schoolofed.nova.edu/doctoral/concentrations/itde.htm). This website has been developed to help me organize and reflect on my educational journey.