Voting

11/25=from Christina WWWOOOOWWWW! Beautiful summary Melinda (Bigs storms South Fl no internet til just now_

11/25 8:14 AM Michelle: Ditto on the summary being excellent and looking awesome Melinda!

11/25 6:54am Maria: The summary is awesome! Looks good to me--and how awesome is it that we won military too! wohoo!

11-25 6:20 am katie- Great work, Melinda! This is an excellent summary.

11/24 11:56 PM Melinda: Please review the attached letter and spreadsheet (no major spreadsheet changes, just added headers and footers for each tab).



11/24/ 11:37 PM Maria: Yes, thanks for the work on the spreadsheet Melinda. It looks great, very clean-cut and professional. Do you think we should post an "acceptance" type letter like Business did for who we pick?

11/24 10:38PM Michelle: Thanks Melinda! You're spreadsheet is top notch! :)

11/24 9:35 PM - Okay I made the adjustments to the scores based on two things: 1. Dr. A's emphasis he made in class regarding time and some grammar errors in the proposal. As I recall, this was a big deal for him as he spend several minutes discussing the importance of this in the class session about how if you were late in the real world you wouldn't be considered. Also, I felt that since they were so vague it was really difficult to assess "demonstration of excellence" and I was more assessing this in accordance to what I was reading into the proposal instead of what was actually on the page...and even with those adjustments when I did an average score...Cast Falcons had the most points. Please see the following spreadsheet:

Accordingly, I think that since there are pros and cons to each, I think it make sense to simply let math be the factor and award it to Cast Falcons. This is how most RPF's are awarded anyway scores from evaluator are either totaled or average and the one with the most points normally wins. Thus, I am putting together a 1 page justification to go along with the spreadsheet and pending further feedback here before 3:00 PM tomorrow I will post and award. :-)

11/24 9:27 pm katie- In addition to the reasons I described previously, the CBT level also affected my decision. We gave all teams a set cost of how much we are paying for the training, and Skynet provided the highest CBT level. Additionally, their proposal for Module 2 offers simulations with vision impairment goggles, earplugs, and bandage gauge—a rather interesting approach to our instructional goals. Our SOW didn’t specify whether we wanted to incorporate facilitator-led; our SOW seemed to leave it open, so the teams went by the guidelines we provided. Both teams did a good job and I think they addressed our training problem in two very different ways. At the same time, there were opportunities that both teams missed in writing their proposal. At the end of the day though, I think we would get more of our money’s worth with Skynet. I see what you mean, Maria when you say our training is to be accessed through the Elder Affairs website. So Skynet would need to have training accessible through the website but also incorporate a faciltator. In which case, I'm not sure that this is what we were lookng for. Either we should have been more specific, or they should have asked questions. . . But I'm good with whatever the team decides. I can understand everyone's viewpoints.

11/23 4:09pm Maria: Well, I guess creatively was not the right word. And yes, I agree that the criteria we are supposed to be rating them on is very wishy-washy and more feeling oriented. I think that we should be accepting the proposal on the basis of their training program idea (the vendor issues are also important--but the base should be their idea).

Any vendor issues we had we would tell the team to address in their PPT presentation to us. As Michelle posted in the snippet from Dr. A's email: “ …what was overlooked or not adequately addressed? What could have been better? Recommend changes in the proposal that should be addressed in the final step of this process, creating a PPT." Although I feel Education did an excellent job, I think Cast Falcons actually met more of the criteria we were looking for in our SOW.Based on the training portion, here is why I think we should choose Cast Falcons (and we can tell them to fix whatever other vendor issues we have in their PPT).

Here is what we spelled out in our SOW and how Cast Falcons and Skynet proposed to address it:

1. Our primary goal: "The learners will access the program through the website of the Department of Elder Affairs." (This training program is supposed to be accessible from the DEA website--people can get into it anytime- at least that was the impression I had when we decided this).

2. In addition to the website, a print-friendly Adobe pdf of training materials/references of guidelines and concepts should be downloadable from the website. This is very important--we included it in our proposal.. Since realistically someone may not remember all of the design tactics from just 1 training. It allows them to go back for review or keep shortcuts at hand for efficiency. Learners can't be expected to remember everything they learned. It's just not possible.

Cast Falcon's response to that: For additional information and help, the learner will be provided with access to online knowledge and job aids that will provide additional instruction and help.

Skynet's response to that: Nothing.

3. We say: " Impacting learner's attitudes through simulations of common disabilities that impact seniors to include: Glaucoma, Age Related Macular Degeneration, Hemianopsia, Cataracts, yellowing of the lens, loss of high frequency sounds, use of a hearing aid and Arthritis."

Cast Falcons said- -An ability for the user to "experience" specific age-associated ailments through the use of Adobe Flash Skynet proposed to use physical aids to simulate the problems. Now would this mean the learner would have to pay for this course to cover these aids or would agency solutions?

-Cast Falcon's proposal says that the program they design will be "highly engaging format for web designers." Now, also, in our SOW, we didn't say we wanted a highly engaging program, but I think we really do (for our audience. Education’s proposal includes highly engaging aspects also, but... Website designers expect visual and highly engaging things. That's why they are website/graphic designers.

Points taken from Cast Falcon's proposal: -Training section bookmarks -On-screen dashboard - A combination of video clips and interactive graphic media will be used to teach and illustrate the knowledge and skills required -"Cast Falcons Human Performance Consulting Corporation will incorporate role-playing through the use of videos and as the learner makes on screen selections mediated by branching."

Meanwhile, while SkyNet put together a very visually impressive proposal, I think they missed the very basic purpose/goal of our training. They put together a course that will require a facilitator.

-essay -email -chatting with a senior citizen

We may have said Gagne's 9 events of instruction (which I guess is supposed to be facilitator led) but I don't think we really wanted a facilitator led training. Our training program is supposed to just be up on our website that designers can just go into---having a facilitator means we would have to pay for them--which I don't think we wanted.

Mainly while Skynet’s proposal is very strong and the instructional ideas are great, the thing that bothers me in choosing them over Cast Falcons is do they REALLY meet the needs we are looking for? The proposed training is excellent, but I’m not sure they address the things we had in mind when writing the SOW. I agree that Cast Falcon may need a little more, but I think their core concept meets what we wanted. The PPT presentation is where they actually give us a more detailed version of their plan at our request (the screenshots, the example of models, etc.). Just my two cents.

11/24-from Christina Hi Maria, Personally, as I expressed in an earlier posting, I was dismayed that the professor's criteria asks us to rate our perceptions of what I feel is vague criteria. He did not indicate what is most important-I wish he had indicated levels of importance and assigned higher points and a specific breakdown for certain elements such technologies, training, etc.

His criteria presents a very difficult and I think unscientific task. To illustrate, as Melinda said her posting, "Even though I feel like their approach was less technology based than I would have wished". We all have to rely on our **feelings t**o complete this assignment.

Both SOWS were good, if our team members were different people, their feelings would be different-maybe they would assign more points to one or the other for what they perceive as creativity. But how does one define and measure creativity? There is no clear answer for me to why we have such vague criteria except to have conversations as we are having now, for consensus, cooperation, identifying priorities and expressing ourselves.

11/24 11:33 AM Maria: Thanks Melinda. Just wondering, what were the other elements that impacted the vendor selection for you for the military group. I don't think we are supposed to take the lateness thing into account--Dr. A said to count it and so I took that to mean pretend it was turned in on time and not detract points for that (plus there is no where in the criteria that about lateness) In my opinion, the military one says they'll do more along the lines of what we wanted training wise and more creatively too. And I know other elements go into it, but isn't the training the big thing here? I think that their proposal gave a little more--they had more performance support for after the training and set things up for going through the learning in a linear fasion, but also allowing the user to go through it in a nonlinear fashion for review. In the real world, I think that any other issues we might have with their proposal we would address at the meeting where they present their ideas to us, you know? Just was curious as to your rationale. Maybe there is something I'm missing when I look over it. :) Katie and Christina, would love to hear your thoughts too.

From Melinda 11/24: Tonight, I will put together a team averaged score evaluation and write up a justification for us to review. Also, after reviewing the SOW's again I will be adjusting my scores slightly and giving the edge to the Education Group. Even though I feel like their approach was less technology based than I would have wished, the lateness of the the posting and some of the other elements would impact a vendor selection in the real world and I don't think I took that into enough account. I welcome feedback on the document. I should have it posted no later than 10:00 PM tonight, but I will try to get it done sooner if possible.

P.S. Not to pat ourselves on the back too much, but after reviewing all of these, I think we did a really good job on our responses. This Thanksgiving, I will be thankful for everyone's commitment and professionalism to our team.

From Melinda: Here is my scoring sheet. I may look again and repost again in the morning (11/24). I wasn't feeling so hot when I first did this. Also, I think my major reasoning for liking Cast Falcon's better is that I wasn't crazy how the Education Team developed the simulations. I really thought there would be a more creative approach without the use of external devices to help simulate the disability. I may need to review it again to just ensure I don't think my bias against this approach is unfair.



From Christina: I will comment on what is most clear to me as being undeniable:

Although I still rank the Business group in third place, they alone addressed (#9) “ appropriate specifications for personnel”. Cheers to them for that. Sadly, their other highest points only met the other teams’ mid level achievement on number 14, as no team completely identified all of the major project risks or presented management plans to address them. Otherwise, I felt that the Business team was very weak in all other areas and so I only awarded them low points.

The Military Team and the Education Team were both impressive, but the deciding factor in my opinion, was the “Demonstration of Excellence in overall Needs Assessment and Preliminary Design” (#12). I gave Education the maximum points because I perceived excellence as they undeniably demonstrated more thought and detail in that area that the Military team did.



11/23- 530 pm katie- Here is my Performance Criteria: See my comments below that I posted previously, which summarizes my thought-process in ranking the business group as my number one choice.

11/23 - 2:00 PM Melinda - I think Michelle's idea is a good one. I will post my report and thoughts tonight. I had some unexpected things creep up over the weekend. Between all of that, I think we are well on our way to having this completed too.

11/23- 11:40 am Great idea Michelle! I will post my report today.

11/23 from Christina- I will do!

11/23 8:51AM Michelle: Here is a snippet of the email Dr A sent regarding the proposals: "Team leaders should announce the winning proposals for your team SOW in the discussion topic on Nov 25th. Include a detailed justification to support your choice. Basically, explain why your team thinks the winning proposal is better than the others. How did you make your decision? What was overlooked or not adequately addressed? What could have been better? Recommend changes in the proposal that should be addressed in the final step of this process, creating a PPT."

Personally I think it would be easiest if everyone filled out the performance sheet and we averaged the points to create just 1 performance sheet that reflects all of our ratings (that way other groups also see why they didn't win) - that would already be half of our justification. Then collect all our pros and cons about the winning group we have here, write it up and write if there is anything else we felt could have made the proposal better (stuff we want to see on the ppt). Any thoughts?

thnks Katie! How should we do it? since we have already posted our ideas about each teams' proposal, to reach our consensus - how will be discuss it?-Christina

11-23 2:56 am Katie- I based our team's proposal template off of the Performance Criteria sheet so we would be in good shape point-wise when teams determine the points on the Justification Report. My understanding has been that only one report would be submitted and posted on the Discussion Board. After everyone posts their general ideas about each team’s proposal, and we reach a general consensus regarding the rankings, we could create one report to reflect our unified decision.

11/22 7:52 pm Maria: I was talking to Lavonda (military group) about another class we are in together. She mentioned that Dr. A said that only their proposal for the education group could not be counted because they had submitted that one after he sent out that email. Their business and our agency ones were submitted before Dr. A sent that email. So we can still consider them.

From Christina-Michelle, thanks so much! I looked at instructions again and I believe you have correctly identified what the professor is asking from us/ thank you for creating and posting the rubric. I think he wants our group to submit one grade for each SOW according to the criteria.

( I am surprised that the professor is asking us to grade and award /points using criterion that is not reliably measurable but are greatly dependent on our subjective estimations of whether elements are effective / appropriate etc.

In other words, how can we know the effectiveness / appropriateness of elements, products or systems until they have been implemented, utilized and assessed?

Perhaps the nature of this criterion is supposed to inspire us to further discussion?

Whatever the case, I am relieved that we are close in agreement of the overall ranking, and it appears, if the Cast Falcons lose points for late submission (which would have been a criterion of a standard rubric) whatever points we assign them may be ultimately adjusted by the professor. )

I completely agree with your grading of the Business group. I am reviewing Military and Education to add input today

Christina Votes:

1. **Education /** SkyNet 2. **Military** / Cast Falcons 3. **Business** / ISC

1. Education was first place choice. No question for me. It appeared that the group was committed to excellence.The presentation and content of a proposal is an indication to a potential client of the caliber and standard of potential / future work. I believe that they clearly and correctly identified and addressed the problems with appropriate solutions. Their SOW communicated all the necessry information through visually exciting, aesthetically pleasing graphics and efficiently composed grammatically correct, persuasive and concise information to my complete satisfaction.

2. Military - Although I did appreciate their SOW content, and agree with my team's appreciation of their efforts and content, there was poor grammar; especially the verb tense which varied fairly often. It was evident that different individuals had prepared their sections, using their individual strengths/expertise, which of course is the group project process, but apparently no one / group did not think to take the initiative to correct the grammar, or give the project a singular and cohesive feel and voice to raise it to a truly professional level. Although it did correctly address issues and present appropriate and necessary elements, I think that their greatest undoing, was their late submission.

I was not clear on what the professor wanted us to do as far as ranking them at all. I asked myself whether we should include their proposal in the ranking as it was submitted past deadline. In the real world it would not have been considered. If the proposal couldn’t be delivered on time, how reliable would any of their products/personnel be?

3. Business - I rank Business in last place. It seems that they were not really familiar with the process or were not committed to producing a great product. I felt like I was re-reading our work but a watered down version. I sensed from the content that they did not comprehend who the training was for/ and why it was necessary.

 1. Education- SkyNet 2. Military- Cast Falcon 3. Business- ISC
 * Katie Votes: **


 * Business- ISC:** I completely agree with Michelle’s observation that this proposal extracted too much text from our SOW. In the first page, I felt as though I was reading a summary of our SOW. I don’t think there was much substance to the proposal, and I really didn’t feel as though it was a customized response to our SOW. If you look at their submissions to the other teams’ SOWs, they pretty much did the same thing. Overall, I don’t think as much thought went into the proposal compared to the other teams.

Positives for this group include: The timeline reflected what we are looking for. Their “past performance” page demonstrated an impressive resume of experience and qualifications with senior and digital technology groups.


 * Military- Cast Falcon:** Overall, I enjoyed their proposal. I thought the “Benefits of Senior Sensitive Web Design Training” clearly conveyed what we are looking for. They also clearly described and supported their company’s instructional approach choice.

Negatives: They posted one day past the deadline. I am not sure if this automatically rules them out, as Dr. Atkinson has indicated in his email (referring to Cast Falcon not posting to the Education group by the deadline date).


 * Skynet- Education:** Their “Vertical Slice” section demonstrates that they took time to reflect upon what our department seeks. Specifically, the module section shows that they really considered our goals and how they would tackle the task of teaching them. In summary, they conveyed how they would handle our training problem by providing a customized solution. This was a thorough proposal, and I can appreciate the amount of work that went into the document. They really went “over and beyond” in Appendix D, the storyboard section. I think if this was a real-life proposal, we would be pleased with the level of professionalism and experience this company has to offer. I vote Skynet as the number one choice, but closely behind is the Cast Falcon team.

Negatives: I don’t see a “risk” section, but none of the teams addressed this issue (as specified in Dr. A’s Performance Critiera, “ The team identified all major project risks and developed plans to manage them”). I guess that’s one more point for our team!

Maria Votes: 1. Cast Falcon 2. Skynet 3. ISC

I filled out the performance criteria sheet for each as well. Thanks Michelle for getting us pointed in the right direction as to what we are supposed to do. Here's that.

1. Cast Falcon--I really liked the actual training they proposed. Out of the 2 proposals (ISC's was so terrible I'm not really counting it), I think Cast Falcon came closer to what we were actually wanting. Positives: More along lines of what we were actually wanting the training to be. Negatives: It was posted late--not sure if we are even supposed to be counting it. Like Christina and Katie said, in the real world, theirs wouldn't have even counted if it was late. Like Michelle, a few more visuals/flow charts would have been nice to help picture what they had in mind.

2. Skynet Positives: Looked very visually nice. negatives: I'm not sure they were really grasping the type of training we want. Also, I noticed a lot of typos, different fonts, extra spaces, etc. throughout the doc. (I did see some in the Cast Falcon's one, but not as many as this one).

3. ISC Positive: Their company sounds good. Negative: They didn't really customize it to us at all. Didn't use Gagne's 9 events of instruction. Just regurgitated and spit back out pretty much what we already put in or SOW. Bottom line: Was very not impressed and pretty much didn't consider them at all from the start.

Melinda Votes:

1. Cast Falcon 2. Skynet 3. ISC

1. Cast Falcon - I felt the had the best overall understanding of what we were asking for, but it would've been much more effective if they had included some type of sample page included in the program.

2. Skynet - I thought they were very clear and I really liked how organized they are, but I didn't like how they incorporated the simulations. I was hoping the teams would incorporate the experience within the program without having to use an outside facilitator as much as this team incorporated them.

3. I really feel like they didn't really tell us much about what they planned to do. It was all rather vague and "fuzzy" to me.

Michelle Votes: 1. Cast Falcon 2. Skynet 3. ISC

I took out ISC's proposal from the start after seeing their proposal. So it was a toss up between Skynet and Cast Falcon. I chose Falcons because it seemed more engaging and interesting, like a type of training the target audience we are going after would be more interested in. Below I wrote my thoughts and feelings on each proposal in making my decision. I figure at the very least this might help when we have to write our justification statements.  11/21 4:48PM : I read the activity again and realized we were suppose to "grade" the proposal based on the performance criteria sheet given in Activity 4. I didn't know if we each are suppose to submit one or if as a group we submit one...the more I read the instructions though it seemed like we are suppose to do this as a group and post it in our discussion. Either way, here is how I awarded each proposal- we can adjust this after everyone else gives their input. On a side note as I went through the criterias for the other groups' proposals I think we hit the nail on the head for most of the criterias so GO US!!! Here's the results after using the rubric Education- 99 Business- 37 Military- 110

//Positives:// 1. The intro was good…but that may be because half of it was regurgitated info straight from our SOW :) 2. The organization structure chart and timeline was good to see. 3. Past performance at the end was also good, made me feel a bit more confident in them since they have had past experience. //Negatives:// 1. For some reason I didn’t feel like they proposed anything to solve our problem, the proposal was more like just an overview of their company. 2. Didn’t mention how they would use the 9 events at all. 3. I felt like some things in their proposal made me wonder if they really understood what kind of training we wanted. EX: “Companies will soon begin producing the equipment seniors will need to surf the internet (such as making better mouse substitutes for people with arthritis) Website designers will need to respond in kind.” This isn’t relevant to our SOW. What kind of mouse a person uses has nothing to do with how well a website is designed. //Positives:// 1. What they were purposing was clear. 2. They outlined what we would be expecting to see. 3. Visuals helped a lot in understanding what they were proposing. //Negatives:// 1. Mmm Boring is all I can think of hehe. 2. Although it seems like a learner will get a lot of information, it also seems like a lot of work. It doesn’t seem like a course someone would really want to take –some of their exercises are alright, but… 3. Doesn’t provide much support for after the lesson is over. 4. Sounds like the training will have to be monitored—I thought we were going more for something that may not need that? //Positives:// 1. Their proposal to the training sounded like it would be a more engaging experience for the learner. 2. I liked how they have an independent self-directed…complete part of the course linearly and then ability to review completed portions in a non-linear at own pace. 3. I liked how theirs included an access to online job aid - included performance support tools. //Negatives:// 1. Although I understand the training concept their suggesting. I would have liked to have seen some type of visual to get a clearer picture of how they might apply the scenario based training. 2. Not exactly sure how this would occur where they say “videos will be staged in such a way that actors and actresses used as age appropriate and the learner will feel as though they are experiencing the disabilities affecting this population”. 3. With what they are proposing- videos branching and such, I think they could make it even more interactive.
 * Business (ISC)** – Overall I didn’t feel like I got a real feel for how they were going to go about the training. What they provided in the proposals didn’t really key me in on determining anything.
 * Education (Skynet)-** Overall thought the proposal was pretty thorough and the visuals they had in it was good. The proposed training itself though just sounded boring, it didn’t interest me very much at all.
 * Military (Cast Falcon)-** Overall they had an interesting proposal, but I wish they had included maybe a flowchart or visual of the process they were trying to describe.