Greetings WOW members and Web professionals everywhere. Bill Cullifer here with the World Organization of Webmasters (WOW) and the WOW Technology Minute.
Today?’s podcast is a continuation of the topic of Web professional education. If you?’ve been following this thread in previous podcast then you?’re aware that I am trying to better understand the current status of Web professional education. By that I mean, its my goal to take you the subscriber of this podcast on a journey of better understanding what resources are available and where, who?’s teaching what, the specifics of what we need to learn and when.
My goal of covering this topic is multi fold:
* To improve upon our eleven year history of working together with education providers, including community colleges, high schools and universities as well
* To act as a resources to curriculum developers, publishers and those that teach and train Web professionals at all levels
* To provide you with you with better understanding how complex this topic really can be. Also, and hopefully at the end of the day, is to do our best to uncover the most up to date best practices and relevant resources that can save you time and money.
* Last but not least it?’s our desire that you land you the job and or keep the one that you have.
As the past few podcast indicate we have a skills gap and we?’re on a mission to improve upon that.
For an insight from a practicing Web veteran professional point of view, I have the pleasure to be interviewing Holly Brewer from the great state of Washington.
Check out the three minute interview with Holly on today?’s WOW Technology Minute website.
Todays WOW Technology Minute is sponsored by Adobe Systems and their series of MAX conferences for 2008/2009
MAX is an experience unlike any other — an opportunity to connect with thousands of designers, developers, partners, executives, and Adobe staff for education, inspiration, and community. MAX 2008/2009 will be held in San Francisco, Milan, and Tokyo. Be sure to mark your calendar for this important global event.
MAX is an experience unlike any other — an opportunity to connect with thousands of designers, developers, partners, executives, and Adobe staff for education, inspiration, and community. MAX 2008/2009 will be held in San Francisco, Milan, and Tokyo. Be sure to mark your calendar for this important global event.
Register today on the Adobe Max website!
Transcript of Holly Brewer Interview
BILL CULLIFER: Bill Cullifer here with the World Organization of Webmasters (WOW) and the WOW Technology Minute. Today?’s podcast is a continuation of the topic of Web professional education. If you?’ve been following along with this thread in previous podcasts then you?’re already aware that I?’m trying to better understand the current status of Web professional education A to Z. By that I mean, it?’s my goal to take you the subscriber of this podcast on a journey of better understanding what resources are available and where, who?’s teaching what, and the specifics of what we need to know and learn and when. My goal of covering this topic is to improve upon our 11-year history of working together with education providers including community colleges, high schools and universities alike. Also to act as a resource to curriculum developers, publishers and those that teach them and train Web professionals at all levels. Also to provide you better understanding of how complex this topic can be. Also, and hopefully at the end of the day, is to do our best to uncover the most up to date best practices and relevant resources that can save you time and money. Last but not least, it?’s our desire that you land your job and/or keep the one that you have.
To assist me with this topic and for an insight from a practicing Web professional?’s point of view, I have the pleasure to be on the phone with Holly Brewer from the great state of Washington. Good afternoon Holly and thanks for agreeing to this interview. Holly, I have a couple of questions for you. One, do you see a need for formal education in this Web space?
HOLLY BREWER: Yeah. I mean, definitely. And the more time goes on the more information there is out there. The amount of information is expanding exponentially and yeah, definitely there?’s a big need for that. It has to be Web-based of course, to keep it up to date. Things change so quickly.
BILL: Yeah, fair enough. And by the way, what are your thoughts on that? Have you had any experience with face-to-face instruction and how do you compare that to your experience on Web-based instruction?
HOLLY: Well, I?’ll first say that I?’ve had face-to-face instruction to sort of round out my education, mainly in the way of programming, quick things, things like this. But the other things seem to change more quickly – CSS, accessibility, usability – these fields evolve more quickly. They?’re not grounded on necessarily firm principles for every aspect of them because they?’re getting so complex now.
BILL: Well interesting perspective on that Holly. I appreciate that. How do you keep up with the frantic pace of the Web?
HOLLY: Well really it?’s a variety of mediums these days. It?’s RSS feeds, it?’s conferences, the occasional class to keep up. People that you know many times will know sources that could be useful to get background information. Certain developers are leading in that field, coming out with new techniques all the time. So all of these together really are necessary to keep going. And there?’s also on-the-job knowing which terms to search, to use to find information, to do that intelligently, to get the right information. But it?’s easy for new techniques to slip through the cracks if you don?’t keep up.
BILL: Yeah, sure, I appreciate that. One of my main concerns, Holly, is the lack of structure of these educational resources. I mean, I hear what you?’re saying with regards to keeping up. Does structure concern you? Do you find you have to work your way through some potential useless knowledge to get to the facts that you need?
HOLLY: There?’s a lot of scanning going on and trying to find stuff, it?’s true. It?’s such a diverse area with SEOs, accessibility, brand reinforcement, analytics, there?’s so many other things coming into it. It?’s very difficult with all those different sorts of information, having new developments all the time, to keep up with these times. Like you say, sift through all the information.
BILL: Very interesting. Well we certainly appreciate your perspective Holly. This is Bill Cullifer with the World Organization of Webmasters (WOW) on the phone with Holly Brewer, from Bellevue. We certainly appreciate your time.
HOLLY: Thank you very much.