Mobility Operations School earns award for online course

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FORT DIX, N.J. (AFNEWS) --  An online course aimed at training students in the Air Force air transportation career field in aerial port air freight operations earned a Gold Award in the 2006 Brandon Hall Excellence in E-Learning Awards competition in Denver.

The Air Mobility Warfare Center's Mobility Operations School here designed the winning course, "Air Freight Web-based Training Lesson," and partnered with their online contractor, TraCorp Inc., to make it a success overall, said Tech. Sgt. James Carson III, an MOS instructor who assisted in coordinating building of the course.

The winning air freight course began with an initiative by instructors in the Mobility Operations School's Air Transportation Branch who facilitated a mobile-learning, or M-learning, pilot project that was fielded by Airmen during Air Expeditionary Force deployment cycles 9 and 10 from January to April 2006.

"Air Mobility Command provided full support and funding for use of a personal digital assistant initiative to assist deployed and home station members in the air transportation career field with completion of upgrade training requirements and use as a job enhancement aid," Sergeant Carson said. "The MOS, through it's partnership with TraCorp, developed the Air Freight Web-based Training Lesson and transferred four out of six modules of that lesson for use on the PDAs we received. Those lessons were entered into the Brandon Hall awards competition and are what earned the award."

Col. David Lawton, the MOS commandant, said the award shows the drive and initiative his school's instructors put into their work.

"I am proud of the dedication and hard work of everyone in the MOS who helped make M-Learning a success," Colonel Lawton said. "With the aerial porters of the Air Mobility Warfare Center winning the Brandon Hall award, it demonstrates to all that we are providing cutting edge media education and training to Department of Defense personnel that is second to none."

"The companies that we beat out in the competition are top notch in the e-learning business," said Tech. Sgt. Dan Spain, an air transportation program manager for the MOS. "This certainly is an achievement for all involved."

Andy Schermuly, chief executive officer of TraCorp, Inc., said TraCorp and AMC are very close to offering deployed troops the opportunity to use innovative mobile PDA delivery strategies to earn college credits with this award-winning course.

"Once the last two modules of the course are formatted and added to the current PDA-based course, it will be possible for an Airman to earn one Community College of the Air Force credit while flying to a deployment, sitting in an aircraft loader, or even waiting in line at the dining facility," Mr. Schermuly said.

Overall, besides the air freight course, the AMWC offers 10 online learning courses covering such topics as air mobility operations, aircrew stage management, Tanker Airlift Control Element fundamentals and air transportation. Of these courses, four courses offer CCAF credits upon completion. These courses can be accessed at https://amc.csd.disa.mil.

The air freight course and other on-line learning tools the AMWC provides is what the center is here to do, said Maj. Gen. David S. Gray, the Air Mobility Warfare Center commander.

"M-Learning is just one example of the Air Mobility Warfare Center initiatives out there to generate velocity in training," General Gray said.

The competition is held by Brandon Hall Research -- a nationally known research company that provides independent expert advice in the form of published reports and phone consultations on the tools of e-learning ... and other tools to help organizations develop successful e-learning solutions.

Overall the awards competition had 252 entries from 16 countries, according to information on Brandon Hall's Web site, www.brandon-hall.com. Entries are submitted online and are reviewed by four independent, randomly assigned judges. The judges rate the entries on specific criteria and add written comments.

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