Recommendation-tashiro

A Letter in Support for Dr. Alec Couros To the Promotion and Tenure Committees of the Faculty of Education and the University University of Regina November 23, 2009 Dear Colleagues: The Health Education Technology Research Unit (HETRU) at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology would like to note the significant contributions of Dr. Alec Couros to our recent conference, “What Really Works: Strategies to Improve Teaching and Learning.” Dr Couros was recruited as our closing keynote speaker because of his international reputation in the areas of digital citizenship, critical media literacy, social and networked learning, instructional design, and open education. As we had hoped, Alec provide a closing address that offered participants a forum for synthesizing the conference themes related to evidence-based learning and the effective use of innovative educational methods and materials to enhance higher order reasoning and skills development. This year, HETRU partnered with McGraw-Hill Ryerson to co-host the “What Really Works” conference as part of the McGraw-Hill Teaching and Learning Conference series. Conference themes focused on e-learning, simulative environments for education, and the emerging field of serious games in education. During 21-22 November, Conference activities included 15 sessions of research papers and two research seminars, with over 45 educators and researchers presenting peer-reviewed, high level work on evidence-based learning frameworks for instructional methods and materials. A total of 235 Conference participants attended the Conference. International representation included educators and researchers from Australia, China, the United States, and from 9 different provinces across Canada. Sessions covered a diversity of discipline areas including Health Sciences, Science, Business, Information Technology, Humanities and the Social Sciences. Alec’s keynote address received an overwhelmingly positive response from participants and the Conference organizers. He engaged diverse educators and researchers in substantive dialogue about harnessing the power of social networking for teaching and learning. In particular, he helped many of the educators examine the potential of leveraging social networks for new models of educational environments, while stimulating researchers to consider new research models that probe how and why social networks could enhance leaning experiences for students. As both an educator and scholar, we consider Dr. Couros a valued colleague. The Health Education Technology Research Unit will certainly sustain ongoing networking with Dr. Couros and will approach him for collaborative research projects during the next several years. We greatly value his insight as well as the rigor of his approach to studying social networks in teaching and learning. His international reputation is well deserved and we were honored by one of the best keynote addresses we have observed in hundreds of conferences. On behalf of the Administrative Team for the Health Education Technology Research Unit, I hope you will place this letter in his Promotion and Tenure file as our strongest recommendation for tenure at the University of Regina. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or concerns about points raised in this letter. Please note I have sent this letter with an electronic signature, which may be verified by contacting me. With best regards,

Jayshiro Tashiro, PhD, BSN, RN, Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences [email protected] HETRU Administrative Team Jayshiro Tashiro, PhD, BSN, RN, Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences Ellen Vogel, PhD, RD, FDC, Associate Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences Holly Jones Taggart, PhD, Associate Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences and Science Bill Muirhead, PhD, Associate Provost, Academic Carrie Norman, MScPT, HETRU Research Associate, Faculty of Health Sciences HETRU  Faculty of Health Science  University of Ontario Institute of Technology  2000 Simcoe Street North, Oshawa, Ontario, Canada, L1H 7K4 T. 905.721.3111 ext 3718 F.905.721.3179 E. [email protected] www.uoit.ca/hetru