Day 1

1
Day 1 TC520Technical Communication
SystemsUnderstanding and Improving the Role of
Information Communication Systems (ICS) in
Emergency Capacity Building (ECB)

• Professor Mark Haselkorn
• 14E Loew Hall
• 543-2577
• markh_at_u.washington.edu
• http//faculty.washington.edu/markh/TC520/tc520.ht
  ml
• Office Hours Wed/Fri 1011 AM and by appointment

TC 520 Class NotesHaselkorn Winter 2006
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Day 1 Questions

• What do you need to know to get started?
• What are we going to do?
• How are we going to do it?
• Why are we going to do it?
• What are our outcome measures?
• What are your immediate responsibilities?
• What is the overall class plan?

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What do you need to know to get started?

• Systems
• What is a system and how can we think about
  them?
• What are TC Systems?
• IT? ICT? IS? ICS? DBMS? IMS? CMS? KMS? EISS?
• Concepts from the TC realm
• Data/Information/Content/Communication
• Content Creation/ User-centered Design/
  Usability/ User Communities
• Content Management/ Knowledge Management

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What do you need to know to get started?

• II. Humanitarian Relief/Emergency Capacity
  Building
• What has been happening in the humanitarian
  relief sector?
• What is Emergency Capacity Building (ECB)?
• What systems operate in disaster preparedness,
  response and management?
• How do TC systems fit into these systems?
• What is the current situation in ECB?
• What are IWG, ECB I-IV, IAWG, IPHR, CARE EHAU,
  the Disasters Reference Group, LINGOs, the NSF
  workshop?
• Who are the people we will be interacting with
  from these groups and efforts?

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What are we going to do?

• Conduct a research project that contributes to
  the general ECB effort
• Form teams by January 11th
• Pick projects by January 25th
• Develop projects by February 8th
• Conduct projects by February 22nd
• Present Outcomes by March 8th
• Four teams of four
• Different team leader for phases 2 - 5

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How are we going to do it?

• Explore theoretical perspectives on systems,
  information, content and knowledge management
• Explore how these perspectives work out in the
  context of ICS in general and ECB systems in
  particular
• Generate hypotheses from our reading and
  discussion
• Look at needs and interests of the existing ECB
  groups and activities
• Look at proposals generated by last quarters
  class that focused on the Gulf relief efforts
• Look at relevant issues and stories from the
  numerous recent global and regional emergencies
  (Tsunami, Gulf, Pakistan, etc.
• Ongoing use of a bulletin board for discussion
  and posting of materials

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Why are we going to do it?

• It is needed
• We have a unique opportunity to do it
• Build on previous and ongoing work available to
  us
• Learn by doing
• Work on interdisciplinary teams
• Focus on issues that are both common to systems
  in general and specific to an interesting ICS
  case
• Study systems under stress (ECB systems are
  extreme examples of systems under stress)
• Gain practical experience in the strategic
  management of organizational information and
  knowledge
• Gain important connections into the humanitarian
  relief sector
• Demonstrates the significance of a TC and
  systems approach

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What are your outcome measures?

• Quality of your group project report
• Quality of group presentations and papers along
  the way
• Individual discussion and activities that advance
  our work
• Individual contributions to the project
• Individual contributions to the bulletin board

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What are your immediate responsibilities?

• For 1/9
• (a) If you have not read Information Ecology
  (Davenport), read Chapters 1-4 (pp. 1-66), or if
  you have (b) Read in Leveraging the New
  Infrastructure (Weill and Broadbent) the Preface
  (pp. vii-xiii) and Chapters 1-2 (pp. 1-45)
• Presentation_at_ 5 minutes plus 2 minutes QA
  What in your reading was potentially useful in
  our ECB research? How might we use it in our
  projects?
• Contribute to online bulletin board
  discussionpost at least three times per week
  (e.g. news item plus comments)
• Get an overview of existing material on the
  bulletin board and website

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What is the overall class plan?

• Complete syllabus to be posted to the website by
  end of week
• I will notify using class email list
  tc520b_wi06_at_u.washington.edu

TC 520 Class NotesHaselkorn Winter 2006