Program Announcement: EPSS
Robert K. Branson
for Educational Technology at Florida State University, Project TREE
(Technology Reforming Exceptional Education) announces the availability of
a Program Announcement (PA) to solicit letters of interest from potential
codevelopment partners. The purpose of the codevelopment effort is to
construct an electronic performance support system (EPSS). The PA is
available in paper form at the mailing address or fax number below. It is
also available for ftp from the CET server at the Internet address below.
TREE is a collaborative effort of the Center for Educational Technology
(CET) at Florida State University, Florida Department of Education's (DOE)
Bureau of Education for Exceptional Students (BEES), and Florida School
Districts. A multi-year effort, the goal of the project is to design,
develop, test and make available an EPSS for instructional staff of Varying
Exceptionalities (VE) classes in Florida's public school system.
Instructional staff who work with elementary students age 7 to 10
in a special education class setting are targeted. Instructional staff for
VE classes have critical job performance requirements. In VE classes,
students with various types of special education needs, such as specific
learning disabilities, physical impairments, visual and auditory
impairments, and emotional handicaps, are combined into one class. This
diversity results in a broad scope of important information, techniques and
processes that instructional staff must access to provide services to their
students. Traditional forms of assistance such as colleagues, training
manuals, text books, and workshops, do not adequately provide the
performance support that is required at the moment when it is needed.
The TREE EPSS will be designed to expand readily to serve other
instructional staff of special education programs. TREE is an integral part
of the Florida Schoolyear 2000 Initiative (SY2000). SY2000 is a statewide
initiative to reengineer public education for Florida's future. The design
concepts and requirements developed through TREE activities will be
concurrently incorporated in the design model of the SY2000 Staff
Performance Support subsystem. The impact of electronic performance
support will extend throughout the SY2000 operations model. We have
enclosed a description of some requirements and design needs that have
already been identified for Florida's future.
Design and development of the EPSS will be via rapid prototyping.
The initial prototype will consist of a set of features identified through
an analysis of job and task requirements. Preliminary work on the job and
task analysis is underway. The initial prototype is scheduled to be tested
during Summer, 1994. An operational test, involving at least 12 elementary
schools and 25-30 instructional staff, is scheduled to be conducted during
the 1994-95 school year.
The PA can be accessed through:
cet.fsu.edu in the path: /pub/sy2000/TREE_Letter.txt
Letters of interest are due at the address or fax number below by 5:00PM
EST, February 25, 1994.
We welcome your inquiries.
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Robert K. Branson, Director
Center for Educational Technology
Florida State University
TALLAHASSEE, FL 32306-4018
Phone: (904) 644-4720
FAX: (904) 644-5803
Internet: rbra...@CET.FSU.EDU Office address: 413 Milton
Carothers Hall
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