ARC-BC Launch for Pilot Districts
September 2008
The Accessible Resource Centre – British Columbia was launched on September 8th for the eight BC school districts participating in the ARC-BC Pilot Project. During a teleconference and online meeting, Pilot Project team members reviewed the progress that has been made on the collection of alternate format materials and, with great anticipation, got their first look at the actual repository.
Team members watched as the ARC-BC registration, search, and contribution to collection process was demonstrated. They also learned how to select and download the alternate formats that are available through ARC-BC. The collection is based on the Ministry of Education K-12 recommended resources, with the initial collection being based on contributions from the pilot districts and PRCVI.
This event marked the beginning of the very important trial phase of the repository. The pilot districts will be accessing the collection and providing feedback to the ARC-BC provincial team during September, October and November. Other BC school districts are invited to join the ARC-BC Community beginning in January 2009 – applications being available after September 30th.
The pilot team members were excited to start downloading alternate formats for their students with perceptual disabilities and are moving forward with plans to introduce ARC-BC to district and school-based teams. For more information on the ARC-BC project, please visit our project page. To visit the ARC-BC site itself, go to www.arc-bc.org.