Here’s the new social network site that you should join up with if you are an Illinois teacher or neighbor.
You can connect with folks like you who share legislative districts to organize joint lobby and political action efforts.
And you can post, read other posts and check on sites that have importance to teachers, parents and community people concerned with schools, education and what passes for reform.
Fred Klonsky 
Fred, just wondering… how much did it cost to set up this website and how long did it take?
And, did you forward the link to IEA?
Brad W. Region 28
The work of setting up the ITNU site was done by Tim Furman at http://www.schooltechconnect.com I believe the cost was minimal. Mainly his time and talent. I have forwarded it to Tim Crawford at the IEA. Tim was the one who set the $24,000 cost to my NBI.
The ITNU community site took about 30 minutes to set up. It’s a commercial service (Ning), that I am using on a free trial. If people find the community valuable, I will fund it personally for a year or longer. The cost for up to 150 members would be under $20 per year total. An organization of 10,000 members would be charged up to $240 per year, which while not free, is certainly a bargain given how well it works. It would take 100 years before the cost would reach $24,000. Even in the short time since I started the ITNU Community, I have learned how to create the exact same thing using– you guessed it– free resources. However, I’m sticking with the commercial service because I’m impressed by it, and as a tech person, I’m learning a great deal from the experience.
I hadn’t even planned on setting up a social network; it was an afterthought. The original project was the ITNU Database, which is up and running and actually totally free and as far as I’m concerned, works like a charm. However, that project is not gaining popularity— I assume it’s because it involves giving one’s email address to a stranger (me). It’s the sort of thing that would be better handled by a state organization that everyone knows. The main thing for me is that I have shown that it’s a thing that can be done relatively easily.
And that, as they say, is that.