Shelley Keith

Well the first day of regular sessions went swimmingly, at least for the UAD track. I’ve not seen the results of the evaluation forms yet, but comments in Club 23 put Gabriel McGovern ahead in the “best of track” race. We’ll have to see what the number crunchers come up with, and what the competition looks like tomorrow.

I really enjoyed our sessions today. Lori started us off this morning with a really excellent session on usability studies involving parents and new students. We got some great questions and I think a lot of people walked away having active conversations on the topic. Also of note was Dan Frommelt who, as always, did a fantastic job with his universal design piece that he scaled down significantly for our 1 hour time slot. I’d love to see him turn that into a pre or post conference session next year so we can get more info out of him for the price of admission.

“Club 23″ is officially open for business. It’s BYOB this year, but that didn’t keep it from being THE place to be tonight. Dale is scaling back a bit though, he was kickin’ us out at midnight this year…a bit of a reversal from the revelry of last year’s infamous “Club 25″.

I got a lot of questions tonight about the location of HEWD next year. I know nothing folks, and my attempts to find out got me nothing but assurances that it’ll be announced tomorrow. It looks like I’ll find out with the rest of you.

I’ve posted more Flickr pics from today, mostly shots of our little adventure to Dinosaur BBQ. I’m gonna miss that place when it comes time to move the conference, cause I’m not likely to end up in Rochester again for any foreseeable reason.

Tomorrow…I win an iPod.

1. Hyatt hotel whirlpool – worth putting on a bathing suit for (4th floor, in the Health Center)
2. Elvis Costello vs. ACDC – stunning victory for Elvis, I totally didn’t see that coming.
3. Quote of the night during dinner: “The first time I had to go to defensive driving…”, Sarah. Also something about being attacked by squirrels and seeing a beaver in downtown Rochester.
4. Serving finger foods and calling it dinner doesn’t make it so.

Registration kicked off without any significant hitches (that I’m aware of)…so far so good. I ditched out of the conference floor before the pre-conference sessions let out, so I haven’t heard any reviews yet.

If you were here last year, it’s a little different…and by that I mean completely the opposite of the way it was done last year. The sessions and breakfast are done at the Clarion. Lunches and the Tuesday night event are at the Hyatt. Welcome to backwards world.

Insider tips (aka answers to questions I got a lot today):

1. Yes, most people take the skywalk between venues. Catch the people with the blue ribbons on their name badges, we usually know where we’re going and would be glad to show you the way.
2. Yes, parking is free for attendees at the Clarion (first come, first served), if you have any issues with that we can help.
3. Monday night is really the only meal “on your own” that you have to worry about, but we try to setup interest groups so you can still hang with attendees and keep the discussion going. Tip: Dinosaur BBQ…totally worth it.

I’m off for now, time to hit the Orientation session and then dinner. I’ll post more as it comes to me. Don’t forget, we’re highedwebdev2007 on Flickr :)

• All flights reached on time: check
• Co-Chair present: check
• Track presenters spotted: 1
• Luggage ruined by Delta: 1 giant suitcase
• Meetings attended: 1
• Number of people who recognized me as the girl with a drink in my hand from (many of) last years’ Flickr pics: yikes.
• Meetings scheduled: (searching for the infinity sign)
• Sleep: whasat?

Basic update: I’m a co-chair for the Accessibility, Usability and Design track here at HighEdWebDev this year. I haven’t had a chance to blog about the process because it’s come in the midst of major redesigns of the main website and several mini-sites on my campus, lots of classes, some holidays, etc. In short, I’m a non-committal blogger…it’s my curse.

The process:

1. Me: What do you think?
2. Steph: I dunno, what do you think?

Rinse, repeat until we have a full track and hopefully well-communicated-with presenters. If you’re one of our track presenters and need anything, please don’t hesitate to ask.

I’m going to go work on homework now…the air conditioner in my room is loud.

It’s just around the corner folks, HEWD 2007 is shaping up to be yet another great conference. This year I’ve been handed the privilege of serving on the Program Committee and as co-chair of the Usability, Accessibility and Design track. Stephanie Leary and I have filtered through the proposals and I’m excited to say it looks like we’re going to have some really fantastic speakers to work with.