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BOSTON, MA, Jan. 8, 2003-Outside The Classroom, Inc. announced today that it has named electronic learning industry pioneer Susan L. Katz to the new position of Vice President of Sales. Previously responsible for the dramatic growth in sales of Blackboard, Inc., the world's most successful e-education infrastructure company, Katz joins Outside The Classroom at a time when its flagship online alcohol education product, AlcoholEdu, is achieving rapid acceptance by hundreds of colleges and universities nationwide.
"Susan Katz is not only the most talented sales executive in the online education industry, but also a seasoned educator who truly understands the needs of the university administrators and students who subscribe to AlcoholEdu," said Brandon Busteed, CEO of Outside The Classroom. "She will be critical to fulfilling Outside The Classroom's mission to provide colleges and universities with the cornerstone of their comprehensive prevention programs."
At Blackboard, Ms. Katz managed a sales organization responsible for sales growth greater than 300 percent over a two-year period to more than $70 million, as the company was setting the standard for online learning environments implemented by colleges and universities. She said the challenges and opportunities at Outside The Classroom are similar.
"The market for dynamic prevention products and services is growing extremely rapidly, and Outside The Classroom is perfectly positioned to meet the rapid growth in demand from colleges and universities for online, interactive solutions," Ms. Katz said. "With AlcoholEdu, Outside The Classroom is poised to help educators solve one of their most vexing cultural problems-the plague of binge drinking and alcohol abuse on campuses-by using online education to effect real changes in students' behavior."
AlcoholEdu is an online course that students take in the privacy of their dorm rooms. Presenting valuable information in a non-opinionated format about the medical and social affects of drinking, the course empowers students to make more informed decisions. Prior to the introduction of AlcoholEdu, not a single university in the U.S. mandated alcohol education for incoming classes. Now, more than 35 universities have mandated that their entire incoming freshman classes take the course, and more than 300 institutions have adopted AlcoholEdu for certain segments of their student populations. Additionally, major national Greek-letter organizations have adopted the program and mandated its use by new pledges on campuses nationwide. In all, more than 100,000 students have participated in AlcoholEdu over the past year, making it the most widely used course on the Internet.
Ms. Katz has more than 18 years of experience marketing online software and services, starting with some of the earliest online education services introduced in the 1980s. At Hazeltine/Ford Aerospace Corp., she helped implement the first computer-based training systems for customers including the Department of Defense and Fortune 500 companies. Later, she built and managed sales organizations for Systems Interactive Ltd., a custom courseware development company in London, and Hart Publishing, a subsidiary of Phillips Publishing International, in Maryland.
A native of the Washington, DC area, Ms. Katz holds a BA in Education from the University of Maryland and an MA in Education from the George Washington University, where she is a member of the George Washington University National Council for Education and Human Development. She spent her early career with the Montgomery County Public School system, where she was a professional development specialist and classroom teacher.
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