Etudes Training Facilitators

Training Facilitators

Kathy Fransham, Training Coordinator

Kathy has served as a technology trainer at Foothill College since 1989. Kathy coordinates, offers, and supports training courses and events, writes training and user documentation, and provides user support to faculty in the Consortium. Additionally, Kathy assists the Etudes development team with Quality Assurance testing, especially on the Mac, and a major contributor in the design of support documents, user guides, and training materials. Kathy has a Master's degree in Instructional Technology from San Jose State University.

Wendy Bass Keer, Training Facilitator

Wendy is an associate professor at East Los Angeles College in the field of child development and education. Along with being the Distance Education Coordinator for ELAC, Wendy also teaches child development courses online. She earned her BA in Psychology from University of Arizona, MA in Special Education from Cal State Northridge and Ph.D. in Education from UCLA. When Wendy is not on the computer or teaching, she is busy being a mom to her three boys (2, 5 and 9 :) and helping her husband with his online web publication.

Suzanne Floyd, Training Facilitator

Suzanne is assistant professor at West Los Angeles College, has been teaching writing and literature for over a decade. She is a professional writer and editor and has written for a variety of publications including a New York City-based trade journal and a Caribbean daily newspaper. Suzanne received her M.A. in English with a concentration in Rhetoric and Writing Studies from San Diego State University, and taught at community colleges in New Jersey, Napa Valley and Los Angeles. In her spare time Suzanne enjoys troubleshooting computer problems and helping online instructors and students.

Marion Heyn, Training Facilitator

Marion Heyn (rhymes with "nine"), Professor of English at Los Angeles Valley College, teaches writing, not literature. She has been teaching the art and craft of writing for nearly 20 years, always with the computer in the picture. At first it was merely showing students how to use word processing programs to do their assignments. Soon she developed Kung Fu English, which involved her comp classes in a Web-based international negotiation simulation, and that led her to learn more about how IT could energize learning. After 13 courses at the doctoral level and a 5-year stint as the first director of Virtual Valley, LAVC's online program, Marion now teaches totally online, seeing this mode as the perfect vehicle for teaching reading and writing.

Norah Glover, Training Facilitator

Norah has been teaching anthropology courses in the California Community College system for 8 years and is presently teaching online courses for both the College of the Siskiyous and Foothill College. She has been using Etudes for both her online courses and as a learning enhancement for her face-to-face courses. A veteran online teacher, Norah is one of the first few instructors who went live with a fully-online class with Etudes-NG. Norah has a Master’s Degree in Anthropology from CSU- Fullerton, and Education, with an Option in Online Teaching and Learning from CSU-Hayward.

Jim Marteney, Training Facilitator

Jim has been a Professor of Speech Communication at Los Angeles Valley College for over thirty years. After receiving his Masters degree from the University of California at Santa Barbara he taught at a variety of facilities including a three year stint at the California Youth Authority where he taught youth offenders the fine art of public speaking. In addition to his teaching duties he is the Distance Learning Trainer at Valley College which allows him to work with instructors in developing their online teaching skills. Jim has more time now because his two children are away at college. He is torn between enjoying the new found freedom of the empty nest and missing his children. In his free time Jim listens and plays music on the guitar and works out including keeping up his black belt in karate.

Karl Peter, Training Facilitator

KP is the Program Director of the Foothill College Veterinary Technology Program, has taught at the community college Level since 1992 and has a special interest in the effective integration and use of technology in education. He uses Etudes for four web-enhanced courses and has launched a successful Online Veterinary Assisting Certificate Program. He has been an Etudes user and involved with Foothill Global Access for since 2001, assisted in the redesign of Etudes-NG, facilitates Etudes 101 online and on-site and is a Cyber Teachers' Institute facilitator for CTI 102. KP enjoys teaching and learning online and regularly enrolls in online courses in a variety of subjects.

Sarah Phinney, Training Facilitator

Sarah is the Educational Media Design Specialist at Porterville College. She has been involved with adult education for 14 years, of which, eight of those years have been in distance education. She has been working in the California Community College system for four years and just recently began her new position at Porterville College, where she assists faculty with building online courses and helps them develop technology mediated content for their traditional campus based courses. Sarah earned her M.Ed. in educational technology from Lesley University's online degree program in 2000, and was trained as a CVC certified Etudes trainer in 2003. In her spare time Sarah can be found tending her vegetable garden, playing tennis or hiking in the Sierras.

Riba Taylor, Training Facilitator

Riba earned an MA in English (with a creative writing emphasis) from Sonoma State and is an adjunct member of the English departments at Foothill College, Santa Rosa Junior College, Mendocino College and College of the Siskiyous (beginning Spring 2007). She is also developing a course to introduce community college students to Etudes NG and strategies for success in online learning. Riba gets lit up talking about teaching and learning and believes being an online student is one of the best ways to become an effective online instructor. The Etudes NG project is important to her, and being part of the training team to help support faculty in their introduction to these online learning tools is one of her favorite hats.

Vivian Varela, Training Facilitator

Vivian earned her MA in Sociology at CSU, Bakersfield and MS in Education-Online Teaching and Learning at CSU, Hayward. She is currently the Director of Distance Education at Mendocino College and an adjunct instructor (Sociology) online at Mendocino College, Taft College and College of Alameda. Before starting her new job at Mendocino College in August 2007, Vivian provided tech support for the distance learning program at Taft College along with writing & maintaining the distance learning website. She enjoys web searching for supporting materials for her classes, reading, especially books that combine technology and society, and sewing in her spare time.

Margie White, Training Facilitator

Margie has been a Business and Technical adjunct instructor at the College of the Siskiyous since 1995 and was selected as Adjunct Faculty of the Year for 2001/2002. She has taught over 20 classes using Etudes and currently teaches all her classes online. She has an M.B.A. from U.C. - Irvine and also provides consulting services to small businesses. She loves living in the mountains of rural Siskiyou County and spends her spare time hiking, playing golf, and cross country skiing.