Well, look what arrived at my home, yesterday, the hardcover copies of my dissertation! I was actually surprised at how thrilling it was to see my work published in such an official manner. As I opened the cover and looked inside, I was most struck by the copyright page. Why? I don’t know. Maybe it was the finality of it all, or maybe it was because my institution, Saint Louis University, actually thought I had something important to say, or maybe it was because of all of the time, effort, and struggle involved in its creation. Whatever the reason, it was quite thrilling to page through my ‘book’ and reflect on all that went into it — the awesome courses and inspiring professors, passing the comprehensive written exam, the research, the reading, the exhilaration of finding a connecting idea or the perfect quote, the writing and re-writing, my successful doctoral oral exam, the gratitude I felt when educators filled out my survey, the statistical analysis, the reflection, more writing and editing, the loneliness and isolation I’ve felt since quitting my job last May to complete Chapters 4 & 5, and the successful public dissertation oral defense last December.

As my dedication page states, I was inspired to embark on this adventure by my PLN:

“I dedicate this dissertation to all of the innovative, inspiring educators who have enriched not only my learning but the learning of others by unselfishly spending hours of their own time using social media to connect, share, collaborate, and search for ways to improve their practice and in turn increase the learning and engagement of their students.”

The following is an alphabetical list of people whose work I am grateful for. Some of them provided ‘just the right quote’ and others provided vast amounts of research and analysis on the major topics of my study. They are educators, authors, researchers, and/or theorists who have been quoted in my dissertation and who are also interesting to follow on Twitter, and many of them also have blogs. If you are interested in education technology, social media, connected learning, connectivism, communities of practice, media/digital literacy, informal learning, and/or professional development, you might want to check some of these individuals out:

Jason Bedell @jasontbedell
Danah Boyd @zephoria
Harold Jarche @hjarche
Jay Cross @jaycross
Stephen Downes @Downes & @oldaily
Arne Duncan @arneduncan
Bill Ferriter @plugusin
Lucy Gray @elemenous
David Jakes @djakes
Joe Mazza @Joe_Mazza
Rob Mancabelli @RobMancabelli
Scott McLeod @mcleod
Daniel Pink @DanielPink
Marc Prensky @marcprensky
Howard Rheingold @hrheingold
Will Richardson @willrich45
George Siemens @gsiemens
Jeff Utecht @jutecht
David Warlick @dwarlick
Etienne Wenger @etiennewenger
Steve Wheeler @timbuckteeth

Last, but not least, I would like to acknowledge Alec Couros (@courosa). I’m sure he doesn’t remember an email conversation we had in January 2010. I was in my last semester of course work, and I was trying to narrow down my dissertation topic. I wanted to do something related to media literacy, but my advisor was not happy with that choice. I was also thinking of studying technology integration, teachers and PLNs, or specific social networking tools. I was inspired by something Alec had written and decided to email him asking for advice. As you can see, Alec not only answered my email, he helped me narrow down my topic. I believe I can credit Alec with introducing the term informal learning to me. Informal learning became a major topic around which the rest of my dissertation revolved and is even mentioned in the title. Alec is truly one of the most valued, innovative, and inspiring educators in my PLN. He has enriched my learning over the years and continues to do so, most recently through ETMOOC.

Thank you doesn’t seem like enough, but thank you, Alec!

ps It just occurred to me that this could be my True Story of Openess.