Fw: [KYHAM] IS703 NIMS RESOURCE MANAGEMENT - NOW ONLINE!

[N4AOF]

RE: [KYHAM] IS703 NIMS RESOURCE MANAGEMENT - NOW ONLINE!I just completed the 
new course, overall it was pretty good.

For most non-supervisory non-manager people it is basically just 
nice-to-know information -- but for anyone with any sort of leadership role 
this is a very valuable course.  It gives a better description of resource 
typing than anything else that I have seen from FEMS/DHS -- especially why 
resource types are so important under NIMS (This is a critical issue for 
volunteer emergency communications people because there are NO offical 
resource types for such communications resources).

The new online course comes loaded in a new Learning Management System (LMS) 
that DHS bought from a different vendor than whoever wrote the previous EMI 
LMS.  The new LMS requires students to log in, but it doesn't have any of 
the old student records so it has never heard of all the training you 
previously completed.  There are only 13 courses available under the new LMS 
because FEMA is loading their new courses in the new LMS but it will be a 
while before they move any of the older courses over.  The old courses are 
still running under the old system.

Their webmaster assures me that all the training records are actually 
maintained is a database separate from either LMS, so your transcript should 
still include all courses taken under the old and the new systems.

I did note that IS703 seems to have been rushed online without really being 
100% complete, there is one screen where it says "Click on Hear the Audio to 
hear how Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue arranges for its field personnel to 
make emergency purchases." but the Hear the Audio button results only in an 
Error icon at the bottom of the page, and the View the Transcript button 
produces a screen saying "Pending interview."  The course manager tells me 
that the interview to tape this audio segment is scheduled later this month 
and then the audio and the transcript will be added to the course.  None of 
the audio segments (or their matching transcripts) are essential to learning 
the course material so you don't really miss anything by this one audio clip 
being missing.

I also found that at the end of the course the vendor included a screen 
explaining how to take the final exam, but the directions and the 
illustration apparently are from some function in the new LMS that hasn't 
been fully implemented yet.  The actual final exam has to be downloaded (as 
a pdf file) then the answers have to be entered online the same way they 
have been for the last several years.

My personal opinion as a professional training developer is that IS703 is 
better written that either IS700 or IS800.

Tom Currie
N4AOF/WPOL710
Secretary, KyVOAD

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Ron Dodson <mailto:ka4map at ispky.com>
To: KyARES at yahoogroups.com ; kyham at kyham.net
Sent: Monday, May 08, 2006 07:49
Subject: [KYHAM] IS703 NIMS RESOURCE MANAGEMENT - NOW ONLINE!



If anyone is interested there is yet another new home study course! This one 
is on NIMS Resource Management. 


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