Dr. Rita Oates
Coral Gables, FL
Vice President, Education Markets
BLC12 Presentation:
About Dr. Rita Oates:
Dr. Rita Oates directed ed tech in Miami-Dade County Schools, the fourth largest school district in the U.S., for more than seven years. She was education editor of the first U.S. online service with color and graphics, VIEWTRON, which launched in Miami Beach. She was chair of the ed tech graduate program at Barry University and earlier taught at the University of Alabama.
In 2006, Rita was part of a team that worked with the Ministry of Education in the UAE to create an ed tech plan for the public K12 schools of the country. She had earlier worked on ed tech evaluations and plans for several large school districts in Florida and Georgia and evaluated federal grants for teacher training in ed tech at Stetson University, Long Island University and Barry University.
In 2010 FSTE gave her the Lifetime Ed Tech Leadership award, and she became a member of the CoSN Volunteer Hall of Fame. She has been a George Lucas Educational Foundation Faculty Associate.
She began her career as a high school language arts teacher and student publications adviser in Kansas, after earning degrees in curriculum and instruction and in journalism at the University of Kansas. She earned a master's degree and PhD at Indiana University. She has written 12 books and more than 100 articles about ed tech, curriculum, school reform and parental involvement. She served two terms as PTSA president at her children's high school. She has spoken at nearly 1,000 PTA meetings in Florida, Virginia and Kansas about kids and technology.
At ePals, as vice president of education markets since 2007, she works with state and national education leaders and large districts to successfully implement ePals LearningSpace, a virtual workspace, and free web 2.0 tools such as ePals SchoolMail, Classroom Match, and projects in schools here and and abroad.
