It is my great pleasure to announce my recent nomination to the position of production coordinator at the Collegial Centre for Educational Materials Development (CCDMD). My name is Philippe Bonneau and I am replacing Réjean Jobin, who took his well-deserved retirement at the end of February. I am succeeding him, but I have been with the CCDMD as a project manager since 2007. My projects have included overseeing the production of the Chimie du milieu aqueux and Arrangement, 2e édition textbooks and the three Cahier de travaux pratiques et corrigé commenté : Harmonie-jazz, Arrangement and Écriture linéaire. I also worked on the Récolte forestière au Québec website and the web version of Vendeur software program of which the 3rd version is available in English: SalesRep.
What will I be doing?
In my new position I will have many and varied responsibilities. I will support the project managers technically and financially as they support our authors and suppliers. I will make decisions about our production processes and establish quality standards. I will not direct any projects as such, but, like an orchestra conductor, I will maintain a balanced, global vision of production at the CCDMD. So if you submit a project to us, there is a good chance I will have a finger in the pie.
Internally and externally, I will sit on a number of committees and roundtables with our partners. I will work closely with Nicole Perreault and the IT Representatives’ Network, which is a very valuable conduit for learning about the needs of teachers in the CEGEP network. I will also take part in the Groupe de travail québécois sur les normes et standards en TI pour l’apprentissage, l’éducation et la formation (the GTN-Q). At the GTN-Q, we are discussing international standards that will allow the pedagogical resources that you create with the CCDMD to be described, indexed, found, etc., in various repertories, including Eurêka.
And the crossroads in all this?
At this junction of paths and ideas, the CCDMD is entering another cycle: a new boss in the person of Martin Demers, the departure of Réjean Jobin, a hot new strategic plan that will guide our steps forward from now until 2018…
There are many challenges ahead of us. For example, we have to maintain the validity and usefulness of our existing educational materials, encourage multi-platform usability for future educational materials, evaluate our method of identifying the priority needs of the CEGEP network and then meet those needs, expand the use of our materials, promote innovation while respecting the network’s capacity, standardize the materials development process and maintain the performance of the computer network. And that’s just for starters.
To offer a few concrete examples, we are working on web launches for all software created in the last few years, to make them independent of operating systems, which change so frequently, making the software difficult or impossible to use. This is the case with Netquiz¸, for example, which will soon be launched online. In terms of multi-platform usability, we are implementing an adaptive interface strategy that will allow web products to be used on phones, tablets or computers with the same efficiency, when pedagogically appropriate.
We’re definitely ambitious! Our mantra from now to 2018 will be – and I am quoting our strategic plan – “to become the fundamental reference point at the centre of learning in the CEGEP network.” That basically means we have to :
- Preserve our educational heritage and design interactive, multi-platform, easy-to-access resources.
- Build increased presence and visibility in the CEGEPs.
- Improve the efficiency of the production and author support process.
- Strengthen complementarity and team work within the CCDMD.
All these wonderful objectives cannot be achieved without you, the teachers in the CEGEP network, who are the heart of our mandate. We are impatiently awaiting your project proposals.
That’s not all!
All this is very exciting, and I am fortunate to be working with a fantastic, dedicated team at the CCDMD. I am also looking forward to meeting you, getting to know you, working with you, answering your questions and meeting your teaching materials needs… And so: I hope see you soon!
Profweb welcomes Mr. Bonneau and wishes him a long and productive career as coordinator of the CCDMD!
