Curriculum Vitae of  
Justin Olmanson  
Justin Olmanson
Austin, TX

 

Career / Research Goals:

My primary goal is to work with fellow university faculty, graduate students, and public school teachers & students on the design, development, implementation and research of experimental technologies that draw on and put to work a range of ideas typically peripheral to or at odds with common narratives/discourses of school, learning, literacy and technology. I am also interested in tracking the ways various narratives or discourses of school, learning, literacy, and technology play out in public school classrooms.

Education:

  • PhD in Curriculum & Instruction ~ Instructional Technology. University of Texas at Austin, (June 2011).
  • Master of Education in Technology In Education. Harvard University, (June 2004).
  • Master of Education in Curriculum & Instruction ~ Bilingual Education. University of Houston, (May 2001).
  • BA in Spanish, Scandinavian Studies Minor. Mankato State University, Mankato, Minnesota, (June 97).

Also:

  • Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center LearnLab Summer Program in Intelligent Tutoring Technologies. Carnegie Mellon University, (June 2005).
  • Spanish grammar and syntax, Universidad de Guadalajara, Guadalajara, Mexico and the Centro de Ideomas, Mazatlan, Mexico (December 1995-March 1996) in conjunction with Mankato State University, Mankato, Minnesota.
  • Spanish literature and Latin American culture, Academia de Español, Quito, Ecuador (June-August 1996) in conjunction with Nicholls State University, Thibodaux, LA.

Research and Working Group Membership:

  • Digital Spaces Working Group (2006-Present):
    • Distributed Biography project [link].
  • Language Learning and Technology Design Group (2007-Present):
    • Mapperbot project.
    • FunWritr project [link].
  • Alien Rescue Exploratory Qualitative and Motivational Research Group (2010)

Employment & Consulting History:

  • Division of Instructional Innovation & Assessment, University of Texas at Austin, (2008 - Present)
    • FAST Tex Project Manager (2008 - Present)
    • Advanced Digital Media Institute Coordinator (Summer 2009)
  • Distance Education Department, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX (2005 - 2007).
    • Consultant, K-16 LUCHA Curriculum Alignment Project (2006-2008)
    • Sr. Program Coordinator, DEC-UTOPIA Lesson Plan Project (2005 - 2007).
    • Lead ASKME Social Studies Scriptwriter (2005).
    • ASKME Algebra II Scriptwriter (2005).
  • Crespo Elementary, Houston Independent School District, Houston, TX (1998 - 2003).
    • K-5 Technology Teacher (2000-2003).
    • HISD Interactive Multimedia / Macromedia Director Trainer (2001-2003).
    • Lead Campus Grant Writer (2001-2003).
    • After School Achievement Program: Project Director (2001-2002).
    • Bilingual 3rd Grade Teacher (1999-2000).
    • Bilingual 4th Grade Teacher (1998-1999).
  • Webmaster and Content Director of IteachIlearn.com. 1999-2004.
  • Spanish Teaching Assistant, Department of Modern Languages, University of Houston, Houston, Texas (1997-1998).
  • Spanish Teacher, Mankato East Jr. High School & Dakota Meadows Middle School (1997).


Grant Work:

  • Innovative Ubiquitous Learning Design & Development Grant. $500 (2007)
  • After School Achievement Program. $20,000 (2003-2004).
  • Texas Infrastructure Fund Special Projects Grant. $40,000 (2002-2003).
  • After School Achievement Program. $30,000 (2002-2003).
  • Houston ISD Technology Integration Grant. $5,000 (2001-2002).
  • After School Achievement Program. $40,000 (2001-2002).
  • Texas Computer Education Association Travel Grant Recipient. $380 (February, 2001).


Journal Articles, Reviews & Book Chapters:

  • Liu, M., Horton, L., Olmanson, J., & Wang, P. Y. (2008). An Exploration of Mashups and Their Potential Educational Uses. Computers in the Schools.

  • Olmanson, J. (2007). Review of eSpindle Vocabulary & Spelling Program online. Language, Learning & Technology , 11, 18-28. [html] [pdf]

Conference Presentations:

  • Olmanson, J., Kim, Y. S., Sung, W. H., Huang, C., & Chen, Y. H. (2010). Technology in the Creative and Participatory Literacy Practices of a Second Grade Classroom (Vol. 2010). Presented at the ED-MEDIA 2010-World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications, Toronto, Canada: AACE.
  • Huang, C., Chen, Y. H., Olmanson, J., Sung, W. H., & Kim, Y. S. (2010). On Initiating Maintaining and Growing an Affinity Based Student Led Research and Design Group (Vol. 2010). Presented at the ED-MEDIA 2010-World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications, Toronto, Canada: AACE.
  • Olmanson, J., Lee, J., Navarrete, C., Wong, A. P., Farchy, A., & Day, P. (2010). FunWritr an Online Language and Literacy Playground (Vol. 2010). Presented at the ED-MEDIA 2010-World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications, Toronto, Canada: AACE.
  • Olmanson, J., Liu, M., Wivagg, J., & Hamilton, K. (2010). Launched into outer space yet tethered to earth: PBL science curriculum within middle school milieus. Presented at the Understanding Complex Ecologies in a Changing World 2010 Annual Meeting, Denver, CO: American Educational Research Association.
  • Olmanson, J., (2009). The Strong Case for Weak Theory: Unrealized Roles for New Ethnography in Educational Technology Research. In Disciplined Inquiry: Education Research in the Circle of Knowledge (p. 372). San Diego, CA: American Educational Research Association. April 2009.
  • When Naïve Notions of the Efficient Qualitative Education Researcher Get in the Way: Tracking how discourses of efficiency, quality and [new] ethnography collided in a pilot study. In American Education Studies Association Annual Conference 2008. Savannah, GA: educationalstudies.org.
  • Designing Distributed Biography: co-constructing a polyphonic application on borrowed time. Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on the Design of Communication, Annual Conference, El Paso, Texas. October 22-24, 2007. [pdf] [presentation]
  • Improving Your Serve: consuming and using educational research. Church of the Lutheran Confession, Annual Teacher's Conference, Mankato, Minnesota. October 20, 2006.
  • Mathematics Understanding and Programming By Example. Texas Computer Education Association, Area IV Conference, Deerpark, Texas. November 2, 2002.
  • Real Science: Authentic Research & Invention in Grades 3-6. Texas Computer Education Association, Area IV Conference, Deerpark, Texas. November 2, 2002.
  • Using Microsoft Access to Homogeneously Group Bilingual Students for ESL Classes. Texas Computer Education Association, 2002 State Convention, Austin, Texas. February 6, 2002.
  • Literacy and Language Development of Bilingual Kindergarten Students Through the use of Animated Online Storybooks. Area IV 2001 Conference, Texas Computer Education Association, Westside High School, Houston, Texas. September 22, 2001.
  • Using the Internet for Academic Research in a Developing Nation. South West Jiaotong University, Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China. June 23, 2001.
  • The impact of placement of semi-dense items in a criterion referenced test of subtraction. Mathematics Methods Dual Class Presentation. University of Houston, Houston, Texas. November 28, 2000.
  • Class of 2000 Commencement Address. Immanuel Lutheran High School, Mankato, Minnesota. June 4, 2000.
  • Cummins, Krashen, and Trelease: Theory into ESL Practice in My Bilingual Classroom. Lamar High School, Houston, Texas. March 4, 2000.
  • Jim Cummins' Research Based Language Learning Strategies. Crespo Fine Arts Elementary, Houston ISD, Houston, Texas. February 14, 2000.
  • Using Krashen's Theories of Second Language Acquisition through Free Voluntary Reading for Classroom Success. Crespo Fine Arts Elementary, Houston ISD, Houston, Texas. January 4, 2000.
  • Learning Spanish in the High School Classroom. Immanuel Lutheran High School, Mankato, Minnesota. December 22, 1999.

Societal Affiliations:

  • American Educational Research Association.
  • American Educational Studies Association.
  • Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education.
  • International Artificial Intelligence in Education Society.
  • American Anthropological Association.
  • Texas Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages.

Honors, Appointments and Fellowships:

  • Virginia C. Patterson Endowed Graduate Scholarship (2008-2009).
  • Shared Decision Making Committee, Crespo Fine Arts Elementary, Houston ISD, Houston, Texas. (2001-2003).
  • Intel Teach to the Future Master Teacher candidacy award & Gates Leadership Training, (July-August 2001).
  • Chairman, Technology Committee, Crespo Fine Arts Elementary, Houston ISD, Houston, Texas. (2000-2003).


Volunteer work:

  • Classroom Technology Integration Consultant, An Austin ISD Elementary School (2007 - Present).
  • Registration Support, International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education, Los Angeles, California (2007).
  • Registration and Technology Support, TexTESOL 2006 State Conference, Austin, Texas (2006).
  • Pre-Conference Registration and In-Conference Technology Support, Joint Human Language Technologies and the North American Association for Computational Linguistics, Boston, Massachusetts (2004).
  • Webmaster for The Appian, Harvard Graduate School of Education Student Newspaper, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2003).
  • Spanish Language Translator for the Church of the Lutheran Confession (2001 - Present).
  • Webmaster for Dr. Jim Cummins, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario (1999 - 2004).
  • Webmaster for Bethel Lutheran Church, Spring, Texas (1998 -Present).


Language Study:

 Human:

  • Spanish- Strong communication abilities.
  • Norwegian- Communication abilities.
  • French- Limited communication abilities.

 Computer:

  • Python- Advanced programming abilities.
  • PHP- Strong programming abilities.
  • mySQL- Strong programming abilities.
  • HTML- Strong programming abilities.
  • Lingo- Adobe Director. Advanced programming abilities.
  • Cold Fusion- Intermediate programming abilities.
  • Perl- Practical Extraction and Report Language. Intermediate programming abilities.
  • LISP- Intermediate programming abilities.
  • ActionScript- Adobe Flex/Flash. Intermediate programming and design abilities.


International travel / education experience:

  • Japan- Informally interviewed teachers, parents and students at an elementary school: Tokyo.
  • Spain- Guest teacher at a language school: Madrid.
  • Norway- Guest speaker at Asak Elementary: Leirsund.
  • China- Presentation of "Using the Internet for Academic..." (see above): Chengdu. Attended Chinese language and painting classes: Chengdu.
  • Mexico- Attended Spanish language classes (see above): Guadalajara & Mazatlan.
  • Ecuador- Attended Spanish language classes (see above): Quito.
  • El Salvador- Informally interviewed teachers, students and the director of a rural mountain school: Boqueron.
  • Morocco- Informally interviewed students of an urban elementary school: Tangiers.
  • Germany, Austria, Italy, France, England, Denmark, Sweden, Belgium, Netherlands, Greece, Canada, Luxemburg, Vatican City, Panama- general cultural travel.