Top 11 AllofE Events of 2011

In honor of the last business day of the year, we would like to reflect on AllofE’s top 11 events of 2011. This year has been by far the most exciting yet and it looks like next year will be even better. Please take a look at some of our greatest highlights of the year!

#11 – New Additions to AllofE’s Extended Family: 2011 blessed us with three weddings, one engagement, and one birth. We welcome the new spouses, soon to be spouses, and the baby.

#10 - Community Support: AllofE Solutions became a sponsor to the Basehor-Linwood Education Foundation’s 8^th Annual Golf Classic this year. We also volunteered at the local Jubilee Café to feed those in need and adopted a family for Christmas through the Adopt-a-Family Program.

#9 - ContentM and SMASHUP implementations: Massachusetts Secondary School Administrators Association (www.MSSAA.org), Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletics Association (www.MIAA.net), University of New Haven (http://social.newhaven.edu), Kent State University (http://social.kentstate.edu), House of Apparel (www.houseofapparel.com), and Derrick Thomas Academy (www.derrickthomasacademy.org) – just to name a few… all using our new panel and social media apps.

#8 - UMKC Charter Schools Organization partnership to implement eCurriculum for member schools: AllofE is working very closely with Kansas City area charter schools to integrate technology into their curriculum management processes. The system is configured on a per school basis and allows the school to manage the what, when, and how of classroom instruction as well as map the curriculum to Missouri GLE’s, Show-Me Standards, and Common Core Standards.

#7 - Released version 2.0 and 2.1 of Interactive Campus Mapping System for nuCloud: AllofE Solutions is pleased to announce a new strategic partnership with nuCloud, LLC for the development of the second version of the nuCloud Interactive Campus Tour mapping platform, which was released in early Q1. The new version features a completely redesigned back-end that leverages AllofE’s robust development framework. It moves away from the previous Flash environment and takes advantage of the latest Google Maps API to provide customers with an unparalleled ability to easily create unique, content rich, affordable virtual tours and maps in a familiar interface.

#6 –Members Only System for Massachusetts Secondary School Associations: We are working closely with MIAA and MSSAA to build a new Members Only system, which allows schools to manage facilities scheduling, forms, rosters, schedules and athletic events. This project is slated to go live in spring 2012 and will be used in almost every secondary school in Massachusetts.

#5 – Blew bubblesheets out of the water with new version of ExamN: ExamN now supports scanner-independent bubblesheet processing, common assessment management, and alignment to the Common Core and ACT College Readiness Standards. Some of us now eat, sleep, and dream about better ways to process bubblesheets. Yes, we are nerds at heart.

#4 - eCurriculum for Higher Education: As part of the eCurriculum HE product launch, we partnered with 5 Health Science programs at the University of Bridgeport and the Physician Assistant Program at the University of Colorado, Denver. The system is geared towards accredited programs in the Health Science area to help them map curriculum to the standards and competencies required for the accreditation process.

#3 - CatalogM: This year, we launched an online catalog management system that allows universities to easily update and structure an online course catalog, without compromising the print catalog. Pittsburg State University launched their catalog this year, and we have recently started projects with a few universities whose catalogs are slated to go live for the next academic year.

#2 - Brandbase goes International: With the acquisition of Image Impact in early 2011, Repucom America consolidated two of the sports industry’s leading media and brand valuation measurement companies. Brandbase, the system that had been envisioned, designed and developed by AllofE, was a key part of Image Impact's success and dominance of the U.S. market. It was selected to become the world-wide delivery platform for sponsorship data and intelligence. Brandbase International was launched in a matter of months and is currently used by practically all of the world's major networks, sports leagues and sponsors. This includes organizations such as MLB, NBA, NHL, NFL, NASCAR, UFC, PGA Tour, LPGA, Bristish Premier League, NBC, CBS, ESPN, Univision, and more.

# 1 - Matrix: This year, we launched Matrix, the premier data warehousing and dashboard system for K-12 school districts. With the product launch, we have implemented the system for the Affton, Blue Springs, Independence, and Parkhill school districts in Missouri; Basehor-Linwood in Kansas; and Waukegan in Illinois. Yes, data is exciting to us and sometimes people just don’t get data so we wanted to invent something that will truly revolutionize the level of data intelligence and decision making abilities for K-12 districts.

Thanks for the great year everyone! As they say in German, “Einen guten Rutsch ins neue Jahr!” which is me wishing you “a good slide into the new year!” I hope that everyone celebrates my birthday…er…New Years Eve, safely and happily!

Happy Holidays!

I still can’t believe Christmas is this weekend!

Please enjoy some photos from our office holiday party. From the delicious food and drinks to Pictionary and Just Dance, I’d definitely say it was a success! I wish everyone a safe and happy holiday weekend!

Meet Brandy Groff!

All week long the kitchen has been filling up with party supplies and the fridge has been getting stuffed full of food. Tomorrow it will all be gone though because tonight is our office holiday party! Tracy and Stacy arranged and rearranged the basement until they found just the perfect placing for all of the tables and decorations (and it looks awesome! - I'll share pictures later). There will be lots of yummy food, gift giving and games! It should be great fun!

So today I’m going to tell you a little bit about myself. As you probably know, my name is Brandy Groff and I’m from Iola, KS. I graduated from KU with a BA in German Language & Literature and also in Global & International Studies, plus a minor in Business. I am an Administrative Assistant, but my work extends far past secretarial duties. I work with social media, community outreach, website redesign and much more. I’m currently helping my manager do research related to getting our non-profit foundation started! What I like the most about AllofE is having so many different things to do, being able to learn new things and being able to work with such lovely people. In order to be fair on the next part, I randomly selected questions from each former employee highlight questionnaire and answered them myself. Continue reading if you are interested in seeing how I answered them!

• What are some of your hobbies and interests? Traveling! (meeting new people, trying new foods, learning new things - just everything that goes along with it!), reading, writing, scrapbooking, playing tennis, spending time with friends & family, and volunteering.
• Pepsi or Coke: Neither, I pretty much only like Diet Dr. Pepper, but I need to stop drinking so much of it!
• Ninja or Pirate: Pirate for sure.
• What is your favorite music genre? I really like several different kinds of music. Depending on my mood, I can jam out to pop, country, rap, jazz, classic rock, etc but my favorites are probably alternative rock, indie rock and hip hop.
• Night Owl or Early Bird: I can be both, but I prefer to be an early bird.
• Would you rather be on Dancing with the Stars or X-Factor ? I absolutely hate singing because I know how awful I am at it and I wish I could dance, so Dancing with the Stars.
• If you had to trade lives with an animal for a day, which animal would you choose and why? Well...the first thing that comes to mind is a squirrel. They can climb anywhere and do crazy acrobatic tricks lol. I once saw a squirrel lounging on a narrow horizontal rail with his whole tail, belly and head resting on the rail and his legs dangling off each side. He was just sleeping like that! It was the cutest thing ever. I ran to get my camera and when I came back he had scurried away.
• What are your top 3 favorite smells? Fresh cut grass on a cool spring day, fresh air after it rains or in the mountains, and coffee in the morning.
• What was one food you hated as a child, but love now? Oh I have three big ones...onions, mushrooms, and spinach! I eat them all so much now.
• Take a bath in a tub full of jelly fish or sun bath at a bee farm with a sweet scented tanning lotion? Bee Farm for sure...I’m not sure I could survive in a tub full of jelly fish and if I did, I would not want to have to get peed on by all my friends and/or family. That would just be awful and awkward.
• Eat snails or eels? I don’t think I could eat either and if I tried, I’d immediately throw them back up.
• What do you think of this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zljRWsJ6c2o ? “Ahhhhhhhhhh!” I hate how they support and encourage unhealthy eating by giving free meals to people over 350 lbs. I wish that the names of the burgers, like “Triple Bypass” would deter people from eating them instead of encourage them. Of course I understand how people have a craving for unhealthy fast food from time to time, but I don’t think it should be a regular meal choice or that people should think of their health as something they don’t need to care about because there are medicines and surgeries out there that may provide a “quick fix.”
• What is your favorite restaurant in Lawrence and why? I have more than one! Rudy’s Pizzeria, India Palace, Zen Zero, Panera and Chipotle.
• Mac or PC? PC, but I could probably learn to like a Mac too if I had one.

Meet Katie Bradshaw!

Despite the cold weather, we haven’t seen our first real snow yet and that is fine by me! Last week we put up and decorated the company Christmas tree. It pretty much took fourteen people, a plastic pole and 50 branches. Despite having only three strands of lights, we had an overload of ornaments and ribbon to compensate; the beast turned into a beauty. Afterwards we headed to Buffalo Wild Wings to enjoy cheap wings and each other’s company. It was also a dinner that concluded the end of our winter volleyball season, which – needless to say – we were the number one worst team. So we drank a beer to forget. Next season, we’ll aim for three wins; it is important to try to improve your score each season.

Then the next day, Bryce and Morgan treated us to a wonderful Indian-themed lunch as a part of the monthly Cooking with Culture event that we have recently brought into the office. We were all salivating at our desks while the aroma filled the office and hung enticingly in the air for hours…or so it seemed. It tasted as yummy as it smelled! I can’t wait to see which culture will be represented next.

In true blogging tradition, I’d like you to get to know another coworker, but you probably already know a little bit about her if you’ve been reading our blogs for a while. Her name is Katie Bradshaw, formerly known as Katie Brosious. It was her recent marriage and not any obsession with Carrie Bradshaw that led to the name change. Katie is from Keller, Texas, but went to college at KU where she graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Journalism and Master of Business Administration. Katie is a Marketing Analyst and Social Media Director at AllofE. When asked what she likes most about working here, she says, “I have a lot of freedom to do different things and work in different areas – and I get to work on things where my strengths are put to good use.” Katie is currently working on marketing and implementing CatalogM, the MIAA/MSSAA Members Only project, SMASHUP and recruitment. Check out how Katie answered the following questions to get to know her better.

What are some of your hobbies and interests?

I like athletic things that don’t require any hand-eye coordination (since I have none), like swimming, running and biking. I ran my first triathlon in March and plan to do another one next year, and/or a half marathon.

I love traveling and wish I had more time (and money) to do it – so I mostly road trip it up with my husband and Golden Retriever, Murphy, I love spending time with them and visiting our family which is completely scattered across the country from coast to coast, border to border.

What is one thing you wish you had right now?

I wish I had bring your dog to work day every day.

Do you like summer or winter better?

I would say fall if it was an option, but I’ll pick summer over winter.

If you were going to be a musician, what genre of music would you play?

Country (Specifically Texas country. Yeah, I said it.)

What is one of your biggest pet peeves?

When people smack their mouths while chewing gum, or chewing anything for that matter.

If you saw this spider in the corner of your bedroom, what would you do immediately upon seeing it, then how would you get rid of it?

I would go into panic mode, then suck it up with a vacuum, or make my husband get it (more than likely the second option).

What is your least favorite kind of food and why?

I’m a bit of a foodie and like most different things…but maybe Russian or slavic? It’s the least appetizing to me.

Would you rather vacation in South Africa or Vietnam?

South Africa

Eat caramelized maggots or chocolate covered June bugs?

Chocolate Covered June Bugs

What are some of the top things you want to accomplish before you die?

Travel-related: I want to visit every state in the U.S., and go to Ireland, Italy, France, Germany, England, Switzerland, Brussels and Monaco.

Other: I’d like to run a marathon (at least a half), and maybe do an Ironman triathlon someday if I work up the guts and discipline to train for it.

Would you rather live in space or in the ocean (provided that there are living facilities in both locations)?

Ocean, without a doubt.

If you had to choose one restaurant to eat at for a year, which restaurant would you choose?

715 Restaurant in Downtown Lawrence

What is your favorite thing about Lawrence?

I love downtown and the dog park – Lawrence summers when all the students are gone and there’s stuff going on all the time downtown are the best. Also, KU basketball, duh.

Mac or PC?

I prefer Macs at home, but PCs at work.

Thank you, Katie! For those AllofE employees and other locals that will be participating in the Lawrence Jingle Bell Run, good luck and stay warm! Have a great weekend everyone!

Kent State University Launches SMASHUP

Check it out here: http://social.kent.edu/

KSU will be featuring a monthly account on the homepage - this month, they're featuring the Fashion school, which is one of the top in the U.S.! Also be sure to check out their social media directory - they have more than 100 social media accounts, and are constantly adding more. This is definitely a social media friendly school - and we have loved working on this project with them.

What do you think?

Leave us feedback in the comments - we love reading them!