National Adult Literacy Database

The idea to pursue Literacy Training Through Audiographic Teleconferencing as a literacy project began in the fall of 1992. The Business Studies Department at Lakeland College in Vermilion, Alberta had begun distance delivery using this technology. My husband, Barton, was the instructor for the course being delivered. His involvement in the project initiated
many discussions about using this and other types of technologies to provide training opportunities to a greater number of
individuals located at some distance from the instruction site.

My experience as a literacy coordinator led me to believe that audiographic teleconferencing had great potential for volunteer tutor training, especially in rural literacy programs. Providing training opportunities on restricted budgets, being
separated by great distances and not having access to resources is a great concern for rural literacy programs. It seemed reasonable to expect that literacy coordinators would benefit from sharing the responsibility for and the expense of training with other program coordinators. Creating partnerships to explore current distance delivery methods was an imperative.