146 The world continues to evolve at a fast rate, and as you would expect, the effects of that evolution are increasingly felt in the field of education. It was in this new reality that an innovative project flourished at Fundação de Rotarianos de São Paulo, which would result in the formation of its fifth maintained entity: Ensino a Distância Rio Branco. It all started in 2006 from the idea of using the newly developed online learning environment solution to allow Faculdades Integradas Rio Branco students to access additional supporting materials. The technical work was followed by workshops designed to train teachers, so that they would learn about the tool and how to use it. Within a short time of use of that tool, it was possible to envisage the impact it would have and the huge possibilities it created. The evolution was fast, keeping pace with the technology. Firstly, its use was extended to Colégio Rio Branco, reaching Centro Profissionalizante Rio Branco and Centro de Educação para Surdos Rio Branco afterwards. “The concept of remotely accessing the contents gradually established itself, and in 2008 we set ourselves the goal of structuring Distance Learning and preparing a pilot project at each institution,” says Wagner Tadeu Mendes, Distance Learning coordinator. Those experiences represented a rich lesson that was applied in new programs. One of them took place at the Colégio, during the period when the risks of the H1N1 (known as swine flu) epidemic kept it closed early in the second half of 2009. “Contents were developed to make up for the time that was being lost. Teachers would record their lessons, and students would access them from home,” Wagner Mendes recalls. Another innovative program —which was a finalist for the Santander Universidades award in 2011 and won the Edson Franco technology award the following year — was implemented in the Faculdades’ law school, where students were having difficulties meeting mandatory internship requirements. Since most students were working their way through college, they had no time left for internship. To tackle that problem, a seven-week online course in civil procedure practice was put together with real-case simulations in which students had to develop procedural documents —and were able to do so any time. The next step in that evolutionary process, boosted by the enactment of a regulatory framework for distance learning, was the decision to create a new institution within the Fundação: Ensino a Distância Rio Branco. The work began on two fronts: offering summer school disciplines previously available on Faculdades premises, and offering extension courses, the first of which was Sports Journalism, 30 hours in length. As new courses and disciplines were progressively introduced, a more ambitious project came of age: distance graduation, the application for which was filed with the Ministry of Education (MEC) upon compliance with the mandatory requirements that the institution have a past presence in the industry, and at least 50 percent of the course materials be ready for use. In August 2014, the MEC’s first favorable opinion was on the Administration course, which was followed by a visit by the Evaluation Commission that led to its final approval with a score of 4 (out of 5). Thereupon, the two-year undergraduate courses were evaluated: Human Resources Management, Commercial Management, and Logistics —all of which were approved, also with a score of 4. “At the close of that year we had four courses authorized, and since then we’ve advanced in preparatory courses, to the point of having already determined and adapted the two initial locations, Granja Vianna and Lapa, where the classroom exams required by law will take place,” relates Wagner Mendes. In late 2015, after substantial investments had been made, and all requirements met, it was announced that the Faculdades had been certified by the MEC with the top score, which officially enabled them to offer not only distance graduation courses, but also online postgraduation courses, starting in the following year. As that process unfolded in the Ministry, the other distance learning activities moved forward. As the extension courses attained growing recognition, the options available increased in number, while the distance post-graduation course was structured. Similarly, back in 2014 the first experience came up, with a specialization course customized to meet the specific 2006-2015 New horizons
Livro Comemorativo dos 70 anos da Fundação de Rotarianos de São Paulo - Uma história de ideias e ideais
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