School of Education hosts computer workshops for community members, students

Using certain computer programs can be intimidating for a begginer, but the School of Education is hoping to make the process easier for some people by hosting tutorial workshops.

The School puts on workshops every week for faculty, students and the community to utilize. The workshops educate people in the use of Photoshop, Excel, Computer basics, PowerPoint basics and Google Docs. The workshops are held in the Center for Teaching and Learning at the McKusick Technology Center.

Bruce Kelley, director of the Center for Teaching and Learning, said these classes open opportunities for anyone interested in learning.

“The Center for Teaching and Learning develops and supports a community dedicated to excellent teaching and learning, regardless of location, formality or modality,” he said. “As such we offer a full range of faculty and staff development opportunities, ranging from basic technology training … to Quality Assurance training for online faculty to faculty teaching consultations to the development of special events, such as organizing President Bordeaux’s visit to USD last October.”

Last week, the School hosted a workshop about Photoshop. Seven people were in attendance, and about half were USD students and the other half were members of the Vermillion community.

The Photoshop 2 class explored intermediate photo retouching skills along with repairing damages and distortions. The students were able to use the McKusick Technology Center computers to follow along with the instructor.

Photoshop 2 instructor Ellie Dailey is a senior at USD and has been working with Photoshop since her sophomore year of high school.

“I applied to be a Technology Fellow my freshman year of college. I was hired and placed in the Center for Teaching in Learning. Part of my job is to teach these workshops, as well as assist faculty one-on-one with their classroom technology,” she said.

Students and community members learned how to use different elements within Photoshop such as color balance, curves, brush strokes, filters and levels.

Sophomore Shanel Goranowski attended the Photoshop workshop to help with her class.

“I came because I am doing a research class and one of the projects for undergraduate students is to edit about 1,000 photos. With all of the different ethnicities of the people in the photos, I need to edit them differently so the pictures still look the same. I needed to learn how to contrast, crop and use different sizes,” Goranowski said.

The workshop also provided the students with a packet to follow along with and display what all of the Photoshop symbols mean and where they are located in the program. The packet displays a table of contents to help the students locate each adjustment easily.

The next School of Education workshop will be the Design to Impact event set for today from 1-2 p.m. in the MuKusick Technology Center.

They are held at different times of the day and are one hour long. The workshops are $15 for non-students and free for students.