“LearningWeek Canada” Live Webcast Premieres with the CANARIE Learning Funding Program, Portal of Online Objects for Learning, and CanCore Metadata Protocol Organization

New York – November 21, 2001 – This week’s episode of LearningWeek Live – the first interactive weekly webcast featuring stories about the people, technology and business of learning today – features the premiere of a new program entitled “LearningWeek Canada”.

Hosted by Paul Stacey, LearningWeek’s Canadan Correspondent based at TechBC in Vancouver, B.C., the show will focus on broadband research in Canada, as well as development in the area of learning objects, learning object repositories, and meta data. The show’s guests will span the nation.

From Ottawa, Jamie Rossiter, Director of CANARIE’s Learning Program will discuss this $26 million dollar shared-cost funding program established to encourage the development and use of broadband networks in education and training.

In Vancouver, Griff Richards, Project Manager for the Portal of Online Objects for Learning (POOL) will discuss this CANARIE funded initiative, describing POOL’s components, architecture and purpose.

From Fredericton, Rory McGreal, Executive Director of New Brunswick’s TeleEducation Department of Education will describe CanCore, the Canadian Core Metadata Protocol.

These special guests will join Paul Stacey on LearningWeek Live at 1:00 p.m. EST (New York time) on Wednesday, November 21st.

LearningWeek Live (LWL) airs every Wednesday at 1:00 pm EST at LearningWeek.com. Each show features a dialogue on a learning news story and interviews with industry and thought leaders. Participants interact with special guests and colleagues around the globe.

Guests and show topics are drawn from the worlds of primary, secondary, and higher education, corporate training, publishing, web-based instruction –- anywhere concerted teaching and learning efforts are taking place.

The show concludes with the selection of the “LearningWeek Site of the Week”, recognizing achievement in providing access to quality learning in a connected world.

LWL is produced by Jonathan Finkelstein and John Walber, recognized experts in the learning and technology fields.

“The show has created a virtual space for real-time interaction among thousands of people united by their interest in improving education and accelerating learning,” said Finkelstein. “Human interaction is a basic ingredient for creating effective learning experiences, and it’s important to bring this approach to the discussion of learning issues themselves, live on the Internet.”

The format of this week’s live webcast, which will run about 60 minutes, allows participants to offer their perspectives, ask questions of the featured guests, and recommend topics for future shows.

Previous guests have included: Matthew Pittinsky of Blackboard, Inc., Brandon Hall of brandon-hall.com, Casey Green of The Campus Computing Project, Richard Katz of EDUCAUSE, Bobbi Kurshan of bigchalk, Denis Gilhooly of the UN Development Programme, Kristin Hirst of About.com, Bill Evans of Cal-State Chico, Bernard Percy of Converge magazine, Gene Smarte of eLearning magazine, and Donavan Vicha of the American Library Association. All archives are available on the LearningWeek site.

Sponsorship of the weekly show is provided by HorizonLive.com, Inc., Distance-Educator.com, and The Technology Source, and The Employment Channel. Registration for events is free of charge at LearningWeek.com.

For additional information, visit LearningWeek.com or email learningweek@learningweek.com.