Graduate students at Emporia State University in the Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) program Julie La Combe and Milton Knopp recently won the top honor at the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) 2016 International Convention.
The convention was held Oct. 17-21 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
“The purpose of the competition is to take out promising instructional design research,” La Combe said. “(Knopp and I) were very well prepared for the competition because of the classes we took at ESU.”
La Combe feels professors at ESU provided challenges and very usable information and activities.
“So we are a small university but we have very capable and intelligent professors,” La Combe said.
She and Knopp began working on their project this past Spring.
Judging occurs in three phases, with 16 teams advancing to phase two after the start of competition in the Spring and then three teams advancing to the finals, according to Knopp.
“(La Combe and I) were actually very surprised when we found out we won,” Knopp said. “Some of the other teams had very good graphic design and polished presentations.”
Two out of the three team finalists, not including La Combe and Knopp, were comprised of doctorate students, one team from Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, the other from the University of South Florida in Tampa.
“It (the finals) felt a little intimidating,” La Combe said.
“Milton’s and Julie’s win reflects the quality of our program and our faculty and staff,” said Jezenia Colorado-Resa, IDT department chair.
ESU has had seven IDT teams make the finals since 2007, three of those seven teams taking the overall win.
“If anybody else is interested in participating in the competition, we have a very good history with it at ESU and I strongly encourage it,” La Combe said.
