New application for Oral Assignments

This fall, we have implemented Wimba Voice Tools for our Spanish and Japanese oral assignments, and during the process I have learned quite a lot about the leadwork required for a technology implementation of this type....although not quite fast enough, it seems, if the numerous crises are any indication....

This week I have had to create student and isntructor help sheets, train my staff on the tool, set up workshops for the faculty, work one-on-one with various instructors, and soothe the nerves of many panicked students. All oral Spanish oral assignments are due by the end of next week, and then we'll know how well we did preparing for the change in technology.

It's interesting (and a bit perplexing) to me, though, that some instructors, primarily the French section, are still interested in using the older system of student recordings being sent via ftp to their instructor folders. Even stranger is the fact that the instructors in the ESL department (which funded the Wimba purchase), many of whom attended the initial Wimba training sessions, are still "falling back" on the ftp solution. Wimba is a much more elegant solution for everyone concerned. I had expected that with the initial level of enthusiasm they showed for the application that they would be leading the charge to utilize it as much as possible. But not so.

My questions this week are: why aren't they using Wimba, how can I facilitate the use of Wimba, and why is it so hard to coordinate workshops for faculty? [No, nevermind....I already know the answer to that question!]