• Who and what is The E-Line?
• Why am I receiving this?
• Privacy, format, security, copyright
• Disclaimers
• Spam and your district email system

The E-Line (formally The Partnership Help Desk) is produced and researched by Jeffrey L. Jones for Educational Media and Consulting of Kentucky. The distribution list includes past participants in the Kentucky Department of Education Summer Academies (thanks to Sheila Vice and the Office of Academic Professional Development for assistance in assembling the lists), but is not exclusive to them. The newsletter archives are hosted at the EMCK website.

The newsletter is distributed every other week, slightly less often in the summer and over holidays. It is intended as a simple classroom instructional resource - a collection of links to lesson plans, teaching and professional resources, and software, all available for free over the Internet, and delivered to our list members' email accounts with short reviews and hints as to usefulness. We spend time examining Internet-delivered resources so you don't have to!

The newsletter originally grew out of the Middle Level Teacher Academies, an initiative of the Kentucky Department of Education Regional Service Centers (the RSCs lost funding in 2003). From an original focus of middle school science and math, the Academies have expanded to include all P-12 subjects and grade levels. 

We want to hear from you!

Since we know that many of you, the over 1,700 recipients (as of September 2, 2005) of The E-Line,  have developed or located resources of your own, we hope that you might share them by responding to the newsletter. Make this a means of exchange for your good work, and the tools you use! You will be given full credit for any submission when it is included in The E-Line  (see Disclaimers for details concerning submissions). Of course, we're just happy to hear what you think!

• Jeffrey L. Jones, District Technology Resource Teacher, Fayette County Public Schools
  Editor, TIPS, FCPS Technology Office E-zine.
  Coordinator, Fayette County Video-Linked Classroom Initiative.

The E-Line is a completely free service, with no commercial ties or interests. If you are receiving this newsletter and did not request it, then your name and email address was submitted to us by one of the Summer Academies instructors, the Kentucky Department of Education's Office of Academics and Professional Development, or your school administrator. You are, of course, under no obligation to continue to receive it - simply notify The E-Line and your name will be removed.

Since it is distributed electronically, and as such has no scaled printing or distribution costs, anyone may ask to be included in The E-Line's mailing.

• Requests to be added (anyone may ask to receive the newsletter),
• Submissions of on line resources for inclusion,
• Requests for removal from the distribution list,
• Questions about links, or the newsletter's format.

The distribution of The E-Line newsletter is managed privately. Your email address and any other information submitted by you or on your behalf will never be sold or otherwise distributed to any other party. If you have any concerns or questions about your presence on this distribution list, feel free to contact The E-Line.

The newsletter is distributed using so-called "loose HTML" format. If your email client cannot receive and display "loose HTML" (Pegasus will not do so, for example) it may not appear to you as it was designed. If so, follow the link at the top of every newsletter to the archives, and you'll be able to see the newsletter in its original format through your Internet browser. Although there is some controversy over the use of this format, the decision to use "loose HTML" was made to reduce email traffic and newsletter delivery size by utilizing the capabilities of the Kentucky Department of Education Internet infrastructure, as defined in the KETS standards. All HTML references embedded within the newsletter are to images only, which are stored on EMCK's web server. Although The E-Line reserves the right to track use of its resources, this data does not give specific user information, only "hit counts" on its links. Beyond this capability, the newsletters do not provide any ability to monitor recipients of the newsletter, or deliver anything unwanted. Since no one is under any obligation to receive The E-Line, if you have concerns, you may simply ask to be removed from the list.

The E-Line, its logo, and the contents of its newsletters are copyrighted only so far as they constitute a published work, and hence are generally protected as intellectual property under copyright law. If you, as a member of another non-profit entity, would like to start your own newsletter and would like to use our content, we only request that you ask us first, acknowledge us, and reference our archives on your website or newsletter. Any attempt to register The E-Line or its logo, or re-market its contents for commercial purposes, will cause our attitude about copyright protection to stiffen noticeably.

Resources: The E-Line is strictly not-for-profit. It receives no compensation or advantage from any of the reviewed sites or resources, and has no contractual relationship with such entities. Hence The E-Line is not liable for their services, products, or resources. If you have problems with any of the reviewed resources, or feel that our review is grossly in error, feel free to pass that information to The E-Line, and, if appropriate, we will in turn pass it on to the list members. However, all resources and reviews are offered without warranty, stated or implied.

Links: The Internet is a free and open resource, and the ease and speed with which information is posted there makes it an ever-changing environment. As such, Internet domains provided by the links in The E-Line may cease to work, or change hands and content. They may be co-opted by new owners with no interest in maintaining their appropriateness for school use. Every effort will be made to insure that The E-Line's archives remain useful and accurate, and we ask your help in this pursuit. However, The E-Line cannot guarantee the accuracy and appropriateness of its links over time.

Submissions: The E-Line will happily post appropriate resources submitted by the list members, with full credit to the submitter. However, all decisions about inclusion in the newsletter are the responsibility of The E-Line's editor, and are not subject to outside review. Although The E-Line may include resources with some advertising or commercial ties, in general it is our intent to provide links to services and resources that are offered completely free and without obligation. As such, we will not solicit, nor will we accept, submissions from any commercial entity intending to profit from such inclusion. If you find that a resource reviewed in The E-Line no longer offers its service for free, please notify us, and we'll remove the link from the archives.

Any unsolicited email is generically referred to as spam. We certainly hope you do not consider us so, but if you do, we would prefer you ask us to  remove you from our lists rather than refer us to your email system manager as spam, since to do so will prevent us from being delivered to anyone else under your email system umbrella. Please let us know if you have concerns!

Blocked Delivery: Occasionally, our format and delivery method causes The E-Line to be classified as spam by the heuristic evaluation process used in your district by a contracted spam blocking service. School district email managers have been quite supportive and helpful in allowing The E-Line to be listed as a protected email domain, which prevents the heuristic process from blocking us. If you stop receiving The E-Line, check on line to see if you've missed any editions. If so, check with your organization's email system manager to have us added to the list of protected email domains, or let us know and we'll be happy to contact him/her ourselves.