Team members: Casey Bell, Jenny Jo Conner, Aaron Snyder, Svetlana Titova
The team reviewed the challenges of a (fictional) high-visibility instructional project. This was a great low-risk opportunity for our team to learn each other's working styles (as we would go on to work together a lot) as well as our design philosophies, preferences, skills, and gaps. It was also a reminder of the incredible value of teamwork on instructional design projects: the result will be so much stronger than the vision any one person would have brought to the task.
As a brief overview of the key players and challenges explored in the case study:
Lynn is an instructional designer for Telopea Learning and the lead designer for an informational kiosk for a large public aquarium. The kiosk is meant to help teach visitors about wetlands. The kiosk will have a WIDE variety of people learning at it—ranging in ages and primary languages—and the occasional visiting dignitaries.
Ben, one of the subject matter experts (SME) (and aquarium employee), is passionate about the project but isn’t very cognizant of the budget restrictions they have. He wants a Ferrari at a Nissan Versa price. Additionally, there is a lot of internal pressure to provide quickly for the client, and managing the disconnects between what the Telopea sales team, led by Janette, sold the aquarium and what the design team, led by Lynn, can deliver adds to the challenge.
Project Output
Instructional technology professionals must be able to manage projects, communicate with stakeholders, and apply excellence in instructional design. Our case study analysis examined pluses and deltas in each of these areas.