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Welcome to HIV-AIDS Education at the University of Central Florida
If you have registered for the course numbered HSC3593 then you need to:
Send an E-mail to TeachUCF@gmail.com (Professor Douglass) to let her know you have registered for the course and which section (live or web). It is important that you write as this will allow the professor to capture your e-mail address and in turn send you a welcome letter.
Web students only. Please note the following dates. These are the orientation dates for each semester for the academic school year 2008-2009. There will only be one live, face-to-face orientation each semester. It is strongly recommended that you make plans to attend this orientation as we will go over the entire website and all the expectations for successful completion of the course. Alternate arrangements will be made for true distance learning students who live at least 2 hours from the main UCF campus. Please contact the professor for these alternate arrangements.
Live section students will receive orientation on the first day of scheduled class.
Summer Semester - Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 9 a.m., HPA Bldg 1, Room 125. Students will be given additional information when they write the professor upon registering.
Fall Semester - Saturday, August 23, 2008 at 9 a.m., HPA Bldg 1. Room 125. Students will be given additional information when they write the professor upon registering.
Spring Semester- Saturday, January 5, 2009 at 9 a.m., HPA Bldg 1. Room TBA. Students will be given additional information when they write the professor upon registering.
Pen Pal Program Information
Hello,
I assume since you have clicked on this button that you are interested in the University of Central Florida's Pen Pal Project. This page was constructed to give you as much information about the program as possible; to help you determine if this is something you may be interested in doing.
I started teaching this class back in 1985 with 12 brave young ladies and since then it has grown to over 150 students between the live, Wed night, web-enhanced class and the web-based section. I teach to any major; any university standing from freshman to graduate students. Some majors must take this course to graduate, for others it is an elective.
The class is designed to impact the student internally, because unless they take ownership for this disease, they will continue to believe that it belongs to someone else. The pen pal project was born of an idea that one student had, when she could not meet one of the course requirements. She found the positive living room on AOL and was speaking with the people in the room, when she asked one of them if they would consider answering her questions for this class. She wrote the pen pal's story and enlisted that very person to help spread the word that HIV infected and affected people were needed for the course. It grew from there. Today I have 60 pen pals in the program. Not all are participating at the same time, as this program can be taxing and vacations are necessary. Hence the continuous need for new pen pals.
Private pen pals agree to be open and honest with how they are dealing with HIV disease. The students e-mail them with questions specifically related to this issue. Students are required to e-mail a set number of letters over the course of the fall, spring and summer semester. Students are allowed to substitute Instant Message conversations for 3 of the set e-mails each semester. Students will share things that are going on in their lives with their pen pals, in addition to asking the questions about what it is like to live HIV positive. The only question they are unable to ask is how you became infected. If you choose to share, that is your right. I am more interested in how you are living with it day-to-day. I would also hope that pen pals would share some of their day-to-day lives with the student. If all you do is answer their questions, there will be no further grounds for communication.
Students must write a minimum of 27 lines, which is equal to one full page in Verdana each time they write, for the e-mail to count toward their total. Pen pals are asked to keep a log of what they receive for cross-reference purposes. An example of the length of a qualified e-mail is sent with the pairing letter each semester.
Hopefully a bond will develop between the pen pal and the student that transcends the course itself. I have old students and pen pals still communicating after many years.
Once you become a pen pal, you are given access to our web site, which enables you to see just what it is the students are learning throughout the semester. To gain access I will need your birth date (d/m/yy), social security number, address with phone number and your full name. This information is used to create a unique log-on and password for you. You do not need to have access to the course to participate in the pen pal portion. Some pen pals want to also participate in the discussions on the website and that information is necessary for that participation.
Should the student choose not to have a private pen pal, they can chat once weekly in our private chat rooms on the website. We chat on Monday evenings from 8:00-9:30 p.m. The students have weekly chat topics and the Question of the Week that they discuss during the hour. We also schedule time for free pen pal chat as we call it, where the students bombard the host with questions about living with HIV. The chat room is hosted either by two positive individuals. We also have students who blog for the semester so I also want to find individuals who would be willing to read and respond to blogs.
If you are interested in becoming a pen pal, you may speak with CTR5000@comcast.net. Colin has been with me the longest and has agreed to help new pen pals by answering any questions they may have about the program from the perspective of the pen pal. He welcomes your inquiries.
This is a time commitment that you will be making. Please understand that the students receive a grade for this interaction and if you don't write back to them or you disappear from sight, they will panic. Initially the panic is because of their grade, and then it turns into real concern about you as the friendship develops. So please, if you are going on vacation, or if you find yourself in the hospital, please get word to your student so they don't worry.
If you have any additional questions please fell free to contact me. I'll answer them promptly. My screen name is SED1920 or TeachUCF. You may not find me visible too often because of grading constraints. The e-mail address I use for the course is TeachUCF@gmail.com. I reserve my other e-mails for non-class business. When you write to me, please be sure that your e-mail provider is set to accept e-mails from me. So often I get my welcome e-mails returned to me because the server won't accept mail from gmail. I will place HSC3593 Pen Pal Project in the subject line so you will be alerted that the mail isn't spam.
I feel this is perhaps the most important part of this course and I would hate to see it stop for want of pen pals. My wish is if I am to stop teaching this class, it will be because a cure has been found and there is no need for my services any longer. I look forward to hearing from you.
Thanks so much.
Sharon (aka Teach)
Sharon E. Douglass, M.S., R.R.T
Associate Professor/Director
College of Health & Public Affairs
Health Management Infomatics Department
University of Central Florida
Orlando, Florida 32816
(407) 823-2301 (Office)
(407) 637-9434 (cell)
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