The Agency for Health Care Administration announces a public meeting to which all persons are invited.

Date: July 15, 2009
Start Time: 11:00 am
End Time: 12:00 pm

The purpose of this webcast is to introduce hospitals and clinics in Florida’s Rural Areas of Critical Economic Concern (RACEC) to the opportunities for health care and broadband connectivity funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The meeting will be a webcast from the FSU College of  Communication & Information and can be accessed through a computer’s web browser. The Internet address to view the webcast is http://cci.fsu.edu/PlayVideo. If you have any difficulty accessing the webcast, please call the Florida Center’s main number at (850) 922-5771.

Florida State University College of Information invites alumni, students, and friends to meet us in Chicago at the American Library Association 2009 Annual Conference.

We will host a table at the 2009 Cooperative Library and Information Science School/Program Alumni Reunion, taking place on July 12, 2009, 5:30-7:30 p.m. at the Grand Ballroom, The Westin River North, 320 N. Dearborn St., Chicago, IL.

WHAT: The Florida State University table at 2009 Cooperative Library and Information Science School/Program Alumni Reunion

WHEN: Sunday, July 12, 2009 • 5:30-7:30 p.m.

WHERE: Grand Ballroom, The Westin River North, 320 N. Dearborn St., Chicago, IL

RSVP Form:  http://ci.fsu.edu/rsvp

Nancy Everhart, an associate professor at The Florida State University’s College of Information, has been appointed by the Certification Council of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) to the Library Media Standards Committee.

NBPTS is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan and nongovernmental organization. It was formed in 1987 to advance the quality of teaching and learning by developing professional standards for accomplished teaching, creating a voluntary system to certify teachers who meet those standards and integrating certified teachers into educational reform efforts.

Everhart was selected from a pool of 425 applicants to serve on this committee which will be responsible for review and revision, as necessary, of the existing Library Media Standards document. This document serves as the foundation for the assessment in the National Board Certification process in Library Media.

Serving on this committee will provide a meaningful opportunity for Everhart to use her expertise to revise the national standards for library media specialists. Everhart’s teaching and research have focused on school library leadership. At Florida State, she co-developed an online leadership program, Project LEAD, for aspiring school library media specialists based on the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards tenets.

Everhart also directs the PALM Center at Florida State, an interdisciplinary school library research center, in collaboration with College of Education faculty.  Everhart obtained her Ph.D. in 1990 from The Florida State University. She was on the faculty of St. John’s University in New York for 10 years and served as a media specialist in Pennsylvania for 14 years. She is the recipient of the numerous awards in the field as well as the author of several books and more than 50 journal publications. She is also a member of the board of directors of the Florida Association for Media in Education.

Dr. Kenn Apel and students involved in his Research on Orthographic Learning Lab (ROLL) are expanding their research into early indicators of literacy learning risks with a project that investigates children’s eye movement during storybook reading.

For some time, Dr. Apel has been investigating whether young children in the early stages of reading acquire quickly the mental images of written words (mental orthographic representations, or MORs) during storybook reading. Results of his initial studies suggest that kindergarten children quickly acquire some MOR information and that this ability uniquely predicts their reading and spelling skills, above other known contributors.

Other researchers have investigated children’s eye gaze during storybook reading and have found that children devote minimal amount of eye gaze to print. Dr. Apel’s newest project melds these two lines of research by examining both eye gaze and MOR learning during storybook reading tasks in young children.

The project, the result of a $12,000 Council on Research and Creativity planning grant, will include kindergarten children from middle and low socio-economic -status homes, because Dr. Apel’s previous research found differences in MOR learning between these two groups. The hope is that the results of the study will lead to future external funding and, ultimately, to more precise and early identification of children at risk for literacy learning — and earlier and more effective intervention.

The second floor renovation of the Regional Rehabilitation Center is finally completed and ready for business, making the entire building available for use by the School of Communication Science & Disorders.

Previously used by the Psychology Department, the area opens up more room for client therapy as well as more offices for faculty. The department’s LISTEN team, composed of graduate students and supervised by faculty member Janet Kahn, now has the space it needed for therapy that allows active involvement of clients, therapists, family members and observation students. The LISTEN team provides services to clients ranging from newborns to adults that have some degree of hearing loss.

The second floor now also houses Dr. Kenn Apel and his Research on Orthographic Learning Lab (ROLL); Erin Lundblom, clinical educator for the Child Team serving children and adolescents with a variety of communication disorders; and faculty members Dr. Shurita Thomas-Tate and Dr. Ramonda Horton-Ikard.

Additional rooms include one that is used for group therapy sessions, meetings, and seminars; a waiting area; a kitchen; and a remodeled conference room for faculty meetings with a brand new conference table and chairs as well. Dr.Leonard LaPointe donated funds from the research foundation that supports his Francis Eppes Endowed Professorship to split the cost with the School of Communication for the new furniture.