WVNET 2020 Accomplishments
2020 was a year unlike any other before, with the COVID-19 pandemic presenting many new challenges for WVNET and our customers. WVNET management and staff expertly managed the challenges head on. The year consisted of some restructuring, staff retirements and some employees moving on to a new opportunity. But we still finished the year with six new employees joining the WVNET team, along with several employee promotions and advancements. On top of that, WVNET celebrated 45 years of service this year. Kids Connect: With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing K-12 schools to immediately shift to remote learning, the absence of reliable,…
Customer Spotlight: New River Community & Technical College
New River’s IT Response to the Pandemic Like many colleges and universities, since March 2020, New River Community and Technical College has been working and delivering services remotely. This sudden change required us to quickly identify services not yet available to students and remote workers so we could modify these services to make them available for remote users. While this sounds simple enough, it required a good deal of effort to modify several services while we were also working remotely and continuing to meet the daily demands of IT support. When in-house modifications weren’t possible, we had to quickly purchase…
Customer Spotlight: WVROCKS
The Fall 2020 semester marks West Virginia’s Remote Online Collaborative Knowledge System (WVROCKS) ninth year of service to institutions of higher education in the State. The WVROCKS portal delivers quality online courses to Regents Bachelor of Arts (RBA) and Board of Governor’s (BOG) degree students from eight different institutions: Bluefield State College, Concord University, Fairmont State University, Marshall University, Shepherd University, BridgeValley Community & Technical College, Southern Community & Technical College, and West Virginia Northern Community & Technical College. Their winning formula of accelerated, affordable, and accessible courses covering a range of subjects from the humanities to mathematics and sciences…
Customer Spotlight: First2 Network
First2 Network (First2) is an expanding group of people and organizations across West Virginia that seek to improve Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) persistence among rural, first-generation, and other underrepresented STEM students. As many as 7 in 10 first-generation students leave a STEM major within two years. First2 is working to change that. What started out as a pilot project in 2016 to provide rising college freshmen with early exposure to STEM research, has turned into a National Science Foundation (NSF) Inclusion Across Communities of Learners of Underrepresented Discoverers in Engineering and Science (INCLUDES) grant funded initiative. In September…
WVNET announces Professional Development Week July 13-17
WVNET is excited to launch our new Teaching and Learning Commons— a re-envisioning of how we deliver IT services, expertise and support to the state of West Virginia. Formerly titled the “Distance Learning and Educational Services Division,” the Teaching and Learning Commons is still offering all of the services and support it has always provided; however, we are adding to these services a focus on structured Professional Development. To kick off the launch of our Teaching and Learning Commons, we will be offering Professional Development Week in July. Professional Development Week will be a series of workshops, webinars, vendor presentations…
Customer Spotlight: Morgantown Area Meals on Wheels
The service that the Morgantown Area Meals on Wheels provides is vitally important year-round, but especially during this period of social distancing. Their network of volunteers prepares and delivers an average of 115 fresh and healthy meals each day to clients throughout Morgantown and the organization has experienced an increase in meal requests due to Covid-19. Thankfully they have had 20 new volunteers help out with the daily deliveries. In addition, a number of community partners have stepped forward with donations of food and funding. “The new volunteers have been a blessing, as many of our regular volunteers fall in the more vulnerable…