About

Bio

Melissa Benson
Minnesota/World Wide Web
Tech Support/Web Development/Soccer Coach

What I do

I recently took the job of Database and Web Integration Specialist at Bloomington Public Schools. My first charge is learning the ins and outs of School Fusion and helping successfully implement and integrate it into the system and Moodle in the future.

I currently do tech support and work with software in the Osseo school district, which is located just outside of Minneapolis, Minnesota and serves 20,000+ students. I support and repair equipment (LCD projectors, wireless mouse and keyboards, Document Cameras, etc.) for the TICT program in our district. I am also one of the Moodle admins for our district’s Moodle site. My Moodle responsibilities include making sure it’s up and running, maintaining and improving the site with themes, plugins and tweaks and solving any issues or questions about Moodle. I also work with WPMU software for our district provided blogs. In this job I do a variety of tasks which I enjoy but it keeps me from really digging deep into certain projects or programs. I would like to develop and improve our Moodle site and WPMU install but it’s hard when my main job priorities are with equipment support. The variety is nice, yet a bit frustrating when I know programs can be improved.

Outside of my Osseo job, I’m a consultant for IT4Educators, which provides online technology integration courses for continuing education to educators. All of their online courses use Moodle, which I support and maintain. I also help with the maintenance of their IT4Educators Blog and online web presence. You can follow @It4Educators on Twitter if you’re interested in Technology Integration.

When I’m not staring into a monitor I help coach a Girls U-15 Premiere soccer team in the MapleBrook Soccer Association. It’s a summer club team but we begin training in the Winter after the girls are done with their high-school season.

What I Like

I enjoy working with web-based things, especially open source software. Some software that I have an interest in are Moodle, WordPress, Joomla, Mahara, pretty much anything using PHP and MySQL – although I still have much to learn about those things. A recent interest I’ve had is integrating those types of programs together. Check out my projects that I have worked with and ones that I’m currently working with.

Moodle

I would say that the software I currently have the most knowledge in is Moodle. Right now, I am focused on learning and sharing about Moodle. I work with Moodle in two jobs, so that enables me to spent time working with it. If I’m not too burnt out, I will further explore it in my spare time. I started up a blog called Moodlerific which focuses on everything Moodle. I write posts about useful links and resources, ideas, tips, tutorials, etc. I know more about the admin side of things and I know quite a bit about the functionality, how-tos and coming up with creative solutions to Moodle issues and questions. I also recently joined the Moodle Monthly team, headed up by Joseph Thibault, where I write posts every so often. I like to participate in the different Moodle communities on the web but I wish I had more time to look into and understand the development and code of Moodle a little bit better.

Future

I see myself continuing to work with Moodle and other web-based programs and open source software. I plan to go for my master’s, hopefully soon, depending on other circumstances. I consider myself a life-long learner, you pretty much have to be these days. I currently live in Minnesota but would love to travel – for personal and work experiences. Other than that I am learning more every day and always on the look out for new opportunities.