2014 Accomplishments and Plans | Office of Workforce Innovation and Research | SIU

Office of Workforce Innovation and Research Accomplishments and Plans 2014

General items completed in 2014:

1. CNA Program Performance Evaluation Improvement-created software that prevents programs from being penalized for same person failing multiple times 
2. Online registration pilot program-first step in movement to online registration and online testing; could save $100,000 annually
3. Staff turnover-one civil service employee promoted and transferred (not replaced as a cost cutting measure); one A/P employee retired (will be replaced)
4. Pass rate/# of tests administered in 2014:  ~18,500 certification exams administered with ~83.5% pass rate statewide
5. Transitioned old Nurse Aide Testing website to new SIU standards
6. Myers Briggs Type Indicator Project-evaluating personality traits to see if better test questions can be written
7. Gamification-three students developing games to better engage students and help prepare students for tests-Alan, Eric, and Sara
8. Working on a patent for SIU to gather information to possibly address test anxiety without the need for individual instrumentation
9. Online Training Course-have sold over 400 full courses and more than 100 modules; very lucrative project for us with expansion planned
10. Direct Support Personnel Registration-Illinois Departments of Human Services continues to be pleased with us developing an online registration process for them (at no cost to the state); huge cost savings for service providers
11. LIUNA-revamped healthcare training program for Laborers International Union of North America and delivered eight training modules
12. Scanning project-developing a means to gather survey information or multiple choice responses into a database using simple scanners; possibly obsoleting need for expensive SCANTRON sheets and scanners
13. Pearson Vue Testing Center-created and administered ~350 exams for Pearson Vue plus conducted preliminary exams for WED; seeing steady growth every month
14. Webcasts/webinars-combined Prezi with Articulate Storyline software-better way to engage students with improved content delivery as well as quizzes and engagement activities
15. Dx Engine-moved our online courses from Desire2Learn to new platform in September; huge cost savings for the project plus we get better service
16. Greenroofs for Healthy Cities-created demo for a potential customer to move their curriculum online
17. Dawg Walk-developing an app that people could use to navigate the SIU campus without requiring the internet
18. 3D Scanning-experimented using a KINECT and a computer to generate 3D scans of objects as a means to improve animation projects
19. Range of Motion Exercises with KINECT-programmed a KINECT to follow a person's motions doing exercises; could be used to conduct physical therapy without a full time physical therapist
20. Turnover of Graduate Assistants-graduated five grad students in August and five more in December; still have ten and am looking to hire up to ten more; we try to run everything possible with graduate students
21. Green Screen Laboratory-largest one on campus planned for construction in early 2015; will collaborate with MCMA, the Center for Teaching Excellence, et al.
22. Motion Capture Lab-largest one in surrounding states planned for construction in early 2015; will collaborate with Kinesiology, MCMA, Industrial Design, et al.
23. Kelly Caringer's Audio Information-had a grad student do an analysis of our suites looking for best manner to create audio tracks for webcasts
24. Conferences-sponsored or co-sponsored four conferences across the state for CNAs or CNA instructors
25. Advisory Committee-chair the CNA Advisory Committee and have staff participate in quarterly meetings
26. CNA II-finalized the draft administrative code for the Illinois Department of Public Health to create CNA II as a career ladder position for CNAs
27. INTACT-created a system whereby we can scan documents into a searchable database for the Illinois Department of Public Health to reduce the amount of paperwork they are currently maintaining 
28. Web portal for 999X-as a favor to Illinois Department of Public Health we created a portal so that people who need to get a fingerprint background check can do so as a prerequisite for the CNA exam; expect to assist 1,000 people annually register for the CNA exam  
29. In-house LMS-as a team project we built our own Learning Management System and it works; shelved the project when it became apparent that we would have to become a software company to keep going-great experience for the team though
30. Presentations-SIU Assessment Day, CNA Instructor Conference, IACTE, Carrie and Joyce at CNA conferences
31. Two graduate students asked to present on Photoshop and Dreamweaver in WED class-Sameer and Sara presentations for Molly Hamilton's class
32. Created a short marketing video for WED as a method to showcase capabilities and possibly improve enrollment

Technical accomplishments:

1. Deployed two "super" Macs with Adobe CS6 and Final Cut 10-used to edit audio and video segments for webcasts
2. Deployed a Wacom Cintiq tablet (24")-used for creating "sprites" for gamification effort
3. Upgraded several office PC's to improve productivity
4. Two HD cameras used to record webcasts
5. Multiple audio recording tools-software, hardware recorder, various microphones-used to record webcasts
6. Continued work on computer maintenance automation-offices and testing center: LINUX system to update and scan computers after hours
7. INTACT server configuration, deployment with new scanner
8. Pearson Vue Testing Center server configuration, deployment, testing, certification by Pearson Vue
9. Pearson Vue Testing Center workstations configuration, deployment, testing, certification by Pearson Vue
10. Departmental Marketing-HTML email campaign, Social media through Twitter and Facebook
11. Extended Internal WiFi with repeater access point to provide wireless internet throughout our seven suites
12. Pearson Vue Testing Center-deployed and configured a firewall, router, and internal switch along with another router, switch, server domain, 16 cameras, 2 admin computers, 1 ADA compliant desk, a printer, and 18 work station computers
13. Created a mock website shell in which to embed Greenroof Articulate content to match their current site and marketing to help better demonstrate what moving their curriculum online would look like
14. Configured and deployed Drupal developmental environment server/Corporate University Project
15. Online meetings using TeamViewer rather than face-to-face; saved >$1,000 on not having to travel for meetings; accelerated CNA II completion
16. Updated TeamViewer to allow continued distance support of Illinois Department of Public Health resources (can remote in to their computers and provide updates and troubleshooting)
17. Nurse Aide Testing website conversion-changed static look to SIU themed via WordPress

Collaborations:

1. College of Mass Communication and Media Arts-facial recognition, Motion Capture, and Green Screen
2. College of Agriculture-creating online courses
3. Kinesiology-motion capture (low speed, markerless sports assessment?)
4. School of Industrial Design-hired 10 seniors to create ten primary and ten alternative designs for the patent as part of their senior design class
5. School of Architecture-3D printing of patent prototypes
6. College of Business-gamification
7. Center for Rural Health and Social Services-revamp EMT training and want to meet in 2015 to discuss further expansion of efforts
8. Rehab Institute-possibly use facial recognition as part of speech rehabilitation
9. Continuing Education-shot some marketing videos and still photography for them
10. DxR Corporation-possible use of animation for physiology teaching
11. College of Medicine-MBTI (use of personality traits to write better test questions)
12. Department  of Information Systems and Technology (CASA)-consulting about game development
13. ARC-hired group of graduate students from Education Psychology Department to assist with statewide survey response improvement
14. School of Social Work-potential need for assistance developing webcasts or online training
15. Illinois Department of Public Health-developing simulation training opportunities to address shortage of clinical sites for CNAs
16. Illinois Department of Human Services-developing more online training courses to sell

Future Plans:

1. Online registration for CNAs
2. Online Testing for CNAs
3. Virtual clinic for CNAs to practice their 21 manual skills without the need for patients or expensive equipment
4. Simulation training for CNAs to improve their clinical skills along with contextual learning
5. More Online Training courses
6. 3D Imaging to assist with animation projects
7. Motion Capture Projects
8. Webcasts expansion
9. Create a Student Success Academy and Professional Development courses for new hires
10. Review/create new Instructor Success Academy courses
11. Expanded websites
12. Green Screen Projects
13. Linguistics-can facial recognition hardware and software be used to improve teaching linguistics?