Welcome to EdTechEnergy!
My name is Melanie Wiscount and I’m a teacher and educational technology instructional coach with a total of 19 years’ experience in rural and suburban education, and the last 10 years teaching and coaching teachers in urban education. Inside those 19 years, I taught grades 6-8 for five years and grades 9-12 for 15 years. Since 2006, I’ve coached teachers on how to use educational technology (EdTech) tools in their middle and high school classrooms with HIGH student engagement is the result! Now, I’m inside my dream, serving Secondary Ed (grades 7-12) teachers across the world to become their very BEST when using technology to energize their teaching and student learning.
I’ve also taught for 4+ years in higher education in both private and public universities and community college, teaching education courses at the undergrad, masters, and doctoral levels. Now, I work as a Learning Designer at a public university and loving creating the most engaging learning experiences for our professional students.
Quick trivia…I’m obsessed with everything organic, kayaking, iced coffee, gardens, my Harley Softail motorcycle, life-long learning, sunrises, and non-fiction books. Oh, and I love watching Ted Lasso…and I don’t usually watch TV! :)
Melanie Wiscount Ed.D.
After 20 years in business, I changed my career to education. Experimenting with technology in my instruction, student learning, and assessment started inside my first LMS (Moodle at Hershey Middle School and mandatory starting in 2006, and, yes…I smelled chocolate EVERY DAY when leaving school), gave me the EdTech “byte” to learn and do more. When my students started asking their other teachers why they didn’t use the same technology as I did in my classroom, the principal asked me to start providing EdTech PD after school. And there IT began.
In 2007, I started an Ed.D. educational technology and leadership program at Wilkes University in PA, and one of my favorite years teaching in higher education was the 2008 spring semester when I served as the student-teacher supervisor. I had my student teachers teaching their mentors EdTech tricks—what a spin on the student-teaching norm. :) All these ingredients led me in the right direction and years later, in creating my best (and always getting better) EdTech coaching version of myself to offer teachers, and in the end, their students.
If you’d like to feel competent, confident, and comfortable with tech in the classroom, or you want to see incredibly high student engagement in your classroom, I’m here to serve and make these feelings and results for you a reality. Plus, let’s save time while increasing student engagement, interest, attendance, participation, achievement, and performance.
Check out what makes me happy, supportive, and positively positive in helping you grow your expertise and empower you when using the power of technology in your virtual, hybrid, hyflex, and physical classrooms. I’ll be your #1 cheerleader (yep, got that experience, too) to pep up and guide you to be an EdTech expert in your classroom, grade-level, department, or for your entire school if you wish. After EdTech-coaching teachers for almost 17 years and now coaching professors, some educators feel the urge to become educational technology experts themselves, so, fair warning, that may also happen to you, too.
My mission is to equip teachers with the know-how to tech-energize their teaching and student learning. Digital has the power to push everything in “increase mode”. I’ve seen it happen over and over again with our students when using tech in the classroom.
After my years of education, I’m ready to change more than just my classroom, school, or district with technology. I want to help change the world and reform education to appeal, captivate, encourage, engage, and inspire students to well academically, become life-long learners themselves.
When I am not immersed in my EdTech bubble of joy, you may catch me either on the water in my kayak enjoying the Chesapeake Bay. Or I may be in the garden, kitchen, or the local consignment store, or bird watching from my deck or the neighborhood pier. If I’m in a quieter mood, I’ll be hunkered down with a great book wearing a bulky cozy sweater or wrapped in an extra-soft blanket in front of my fireplace or outside by my open firepit.
Five Things Most People Don’t Know About Me:
1. Started Kindergarten when I was four years old.
2. As a certified scuba diver, a night dive in the Virgin Islands is still my favorite dive.
3. Mentored three winning student app teams who each won 1st place.
4. Jumped out of an airplane at an altitude of 10K feet on 10/10/10, my birthday, at 10 a.m.
5. Follow a pescatarian diet, meaning I can enjoy all the blue crab I want!
My EdTechEnergy Office —Annapolis, Maryland, United States along the Chesapeake Bay, one row back from waterfront
Let’s Connect
What gives my EdTech vibe value besides my
education & experience?
—educational certifications I earned
& awards I received:
Earned 2015 Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching Mathematics and Science (PAEMST)and awarded by former U.S. President Barack Obama
Earned International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) certification in 2019
Selected as Fund for Teachers recipient and traveled to London to meet with Queens’ College Computer Science Professors and study Python education.
Earned the Canvas Certified Educator (CCE) certification with High-Quality Assessments specialization
Earned the Quality Matters Online Teaching certification
Earned the Microsoft Certified Educator (MIE) certification
Selected as an MIE (Microsoft Innovative Eductator) Expert since 2015 (8 consecutive years)
Earned MOS (Microsoft Office Specialist) 2016 Excel, PowerPoint, and Word certificates
Earned a Highly Effective rating each of my nine consecutive school years in the District of Columbia Public Schools IMPACT Teacher Evaluation Program
