Beginning Monday, Aug. 2, roughly 25 teachers will begin training to learn how to educate students sitting in front of a computer rather than in front of them in a classroom.

Funding for the teachers in part will depend on how many students succeed in completing and passing the online courses.

Debbie Harris, eSchool and STAR Education Center principal, said it’s a big change for teachers to learn the ins and outs of reaching students in addition to knowing how to navigate online through Florida Virtual School.

She said area educators have expressed interest in expanding their instructional skills to the Internet. Those who teach full-time can also teach online and receive additional pay. Harris said the amount of extra income is still being negotiated.

“The program still gives leeway for teachers to add their personal touch to the curriculum,” Harris said. “What’s great about this is these are local teachers working with local students, so along with communicating through the Internet and telephone, if needed students could meet with teachers face to face for tutoring.”

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Many local high schools do not have enough computers, sufficient network access or even the right rooms to securely test hundreds of students online, educators say. In another tight budget year, finding money for needed upgrades — they could cost $750,000 in Seminole County alone — isn’t easy.

Florida’s track record with computer-based testing is short and problem-plagued, adding to administrators’ apprehension about the test change. The debut of the state’s online reading test last fall and its trial run of computerized FCAT and algebra exams this spring both were marred by mishaps.

And there is the potential for even more trouble in coming years, administrators fear, as the number of computer-based standardized tests increases.

Next spring, some 370,000 ninth- and 10th-graders statewide are to take online the math section of the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test and a new algebra end-of-course exam. A smaller number of older students is scheduled to take FCAT math online in the fall.

A survey by the Florida Department of Education this spring showed that only two districts — and only Brevard County in Central Florida — deemed themselves fully ready for computer-based testing.

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There’s a new course-management system in town.

Most Summer B online courses and all fall online courses will be hosted on Sakai, UF’s new course-management system.

Blackboard, the company that owns the software, will stop supporting WebCT Vista 8, the e-Learning system UF has used, in December 2011.

Fedro Zazueta headed up a UF committee that searched for a replacement.

The committee narrowed it down to three platforms: ANGEL, Moodle and Sakai. Sakai was chosen unanimously.

Sakai is an open-source platform, which means UF can customize it to better suit its students’ needs. It also means that although UF doesn’t need to pay for licenses, like it did with WebCT, it has to spend more money on a programming team, Zazueta said.

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