Six ways to ensure sustainability for technology based interventions
Over the last two years I’ve been very lucky in working with some excellent projects in three JISC programmes; Users and Innovation, Institutional Innovation and Building Capacity. This community of projects hold a vast core of information and knowledge about the use of technology in institutions and how to get the most of it. In discussions with various people across the 80 plus projects we put together a small list of things that might help sustain technology based interventions. Read more
Maybe 42 is no longer the answer
The seeds of many initiatives present in institutions today were sown in 1998 when Dearing published his report into higher education, which was to have wide ranging ramifications across the higher education sector for the following decade. It included reference to ‘systems for teaching and administration’, the ability to ‘teach across continents’ and we also saw the emergence of ideas that lead to the Open Educational Resources programme. Chapter 13 of the report deals solely with C&IT (Communication and Information Technology). In many ways, with regard to C&IT, Dearing showed great foresight and vision for the affordances that technology could bring to the sector.
Following his comments in the report and a discussion around the fundamental importance of technology in institutions Dearing made recommendation 42:
We recommend that all higher education institutions should develop managers who combine a deep understanding of Communications and Information Technology with senior management experience.
However, at the time publishing the report C&IT was seen as complex and difficult to comprehend on an institutional scale by some, and as the preserve of the specialist by others. Dearing wanted C&IT to be high on the institutional agenda and recommended the central strategies which are now ubiquitous in the sector. The emergence of e-learning and e-research strategies followed a few years later.
At the time of publication the technology that Dearing was mostly referring to included large complex networking systems, the emergent virtual learning environments (VLEs) and hardware that was bulky, expensive and required a lot of support. Now, the network is well supported and has arguably disappeared into the background; not unlike the road network, we don’t need to know how to build and maintain a road to be able to drive from A to B. VLEs and other learning and teaching packages are maintainable at a distance, allowing academics to produce and edit their own content, whilst hardware is smaller, cheaper and (depending on your green credentials) can be swapped for new if it becomes faulty.
In addition to the growth in institutional technology (such as VLEs) and the changing hardware, the last five years have also seen the influences of ‘web 2.0’ applications. These applications have raised the game in terms of the usability of products, and had an impact on how and where we access resources. It is no longer the preserve of the few to instantly publish material to the web, communicate by voice and video across networks, or build systems for collaboration in teaching and research. Now almost anyone in an institution can do this and using a variety of devices, not just a PC.
At a recent JISC conference showcasing new products emerging from technology projects, Gwen Van Der Veldon gave a keynote about what she expects as a senior manager in an institution. This included the following two quotes which demonstrate a widely held attitude:
“Don’t come to me with new cool technologies; come to me with solutions to institutional problems.”
“If whatever you’re building needs a manual then it’s of no use to me. I need solutions that can be picked up and used with as little learning as possible.”
Visiting institutions for the Building Capacity Programme discussions with members of senior management may not have demonstrated ‘deep understanding of Communications and Information Technology’; they have however demonstrated a profound understanding of institutional issues, the context of higher education in wider socio-economic realities and creativity in addressing these issues. Mostly senior managers have not talked about technology, they have talked about the advantages of technology and how they can meet needs. Reflecting on Dearing’s vision for the ‘Type 42 manager’ it is clear that in the context of the times Dearing was right in his recommendation, but somewhere between then and now we either lost the need for them, or we developed a different kind of senior manager who understands that technology in and of itself is essential not central in an institution.
This post-digital senior manager recognises that with technology we can enhance a wide range of practices across teaching, research and administration, and they understand that it is underpinning almost every process in an institution; but they also understand that the focus needs to be on solving problems and facilitating positive change rather than on finding uses for the latest tech to roll off the conveyor belt.
Engaging staff in technology enhanced learning: Workshop write-up
This is the write-up of a workshop I ran for the HEA’s Gwella programme in November 2009. The programme is a change programme supporting e-learning units to embed technology enhanced learning (TEL) at their institutions. As with all workshops I run, I got the delegates to do most of the work, so a big thank you to them.
There is a predilection for educational and staff developers to take a positivist approach to this kind of workshop, which for delegates can often seem at odds with, what may seem to some people, a deterministic institutional culture resistant to change. After having spent some time on the previous evening and earlier in the day with the delegates it was apparent that there was a huge amount of experience in the room, both in e-learning and wider institutional change processes. To try and explore discussions we don’t normally have I decided that a novel (for me) approach would be to identify those things that are less successful, starting with:
What’s not working?
Immediately eliciting a few comedic responses, or at least in part comedic:
“Making them bring their own sandwiches” Lunchtime sessions are a staple for staff developers, a poor lunch for people who are giving up their lunch hour will normally be met with negative feedback, which may seep into the rest of the session.
“Too much PowerPoint” we’ve all been there, we all know what that means, and yet, it is so easy for us to fall into the habit.
In groups we then started to pick-up some of the more serious issues
“Talking about technology they haven’t got” this had a lot of resonance with the audience, some people expressing annoyance at the ‘Macarati’ who always seem to be sitting and looking smug at learning technology conferences with their powerbooks etc. This is easy to translate institutionally, when many staff we work with in institutions have low powered or out of date laptops. It also manifests when developers start talking about packages they don’t have, such as “well if we had moodle here we’d be able to….” or “if we were allowed to use Skype here…”
“Technology demonstrations where the technology fails” or “telling them that this technology is cutting edge”
Giving the wrong expectations, such as “doing a session where the title doesn’t reflect the session” or “using a clever title that obscures the meaning”
One of the problems that some sessions suffer from is “a lack of authenticity”, where learning technology is being discussed in the abstract, or the session convener is not using the technology themselves, it may also be that the delegates need a strong discipline focus, after all each of the disciplines [feel they] have unique needs. This latter issue can sometimes be overcome by co-presenting with someone from the discipline. Similar issues include “learning from the session not needing to be applied until a much later date” and “session is not pragmatic enough”.
What we say and what they hear
Following the ‘not positivist’ approach, we had a discussion around how we interact (as technology evangelists) with senior managers, we put some examples up of what we say, and what the SMT [might] hear.
Technologist: “We need to move to a more learner centric, open source VLE”
SMT: “They want and excuse to get rid of xxx and spend all their time playing with code”
Technologist: “We should be investing in mobile learning and augmented reality”
SMT: “They want an excuse to buy an iPhone”
Technologist: “We should be podcasting all our lectures”
SMT: “Maybe I can cut staff”
Though these are partly tongue in cheek, they serve to illustrate the point that if we want change in TEL to happen in institutions it needs to align not only with the needs of staff who are teaching, but also with the strategic needs of the Senior Managers.
Confessions of a Staff and Educational Developer
We picked up some of the things that we know don’t work in workshops at the outset of the session, but as developers we also have to work in many other ways, having many tools at our disposal for making learning and teaching interventions. Here we “fessed up” to our ‘worst’ intervention.
I started the confession session by owning up to giving some staff the ‘tools’ to assess the accessibility of their materials in one northern institution – this, firstly, led to a fixed approach to accessibility, closely followed by the ‘ratting out’ of co-workers who didn’t have accessible materials.
Other confessions included:
“Developing a 40 page L&T strategy that nobody read” – could have had a one page summary.
“Running a session called ‘Pedagogical Modelling’” not ideal for staff who just want to use technology in their teaching, no one turned up.
“Showing someone how to put a quick link into the VLE for a resource, ended up by having 75 resources for one module”
“Running a session based on a technology that we didn’t have, nor were we going to get it”
What does work?
It would have been cruel and unusual to have left a session based only on the negative aspects of what we do (although some delegates thought they might try that in their host institutions), so after reflecting on the fact that we had looked at issues around our weaknesses and some of the threats to what we do and we finished by focusing on our strengths and the opportunities that afforded. We also recognised that the answers to supporting change lay within the room. So, what does work?
These were some of the suggestions from delegates:
“Focus on the issues that people want addressing, not technology”
“Understand the pedagogical goal”
“Demonstrate that interventions on the PGCert influence student feedback”
“Work with the Senior Management Team – see them as allies”
“Accept that academics are tribal, work in the context of their discipline”
“When you can work one to one, and when you can’t, relate what you’ve learned working one to one”
“Make the process a dialogue”
Introducing the Building Capacity Programme
One of the key success criteria of any project is the degree to which people use it and its outputs. The new Building Capacity programme is focusing on recent and existing JISC projects and services and helping HEIs to implement the outputs and outcomes of relevant projects in their institution in response to their own strategic drivers
How will it work?
The programme is aimed at senior managers (Pro Vice Chancellor level) who will sponsor an institutional change programme by applying a combination of appropriate JISC outputs, outcomes and services (products) to the issue. The programme will provide a small amount of funding to seed the change process and enable local contextualisation of JISC products.
For example, if an institution wishes to address aspects of social mobility it may decide to use a combination of outputs from Innovation Projects, such as the TAG project at UCLAN (methods for providing online pastoral support), the CoGenT project, at the University of Gloucestershire for developing workforce development curricula, the Mining Course Management Systems at TVU for accessing student retention data and the JISC TechDis service for accessing advice on widening access. The funding can be used to deploy and contextualise the projects and outputs in the institution or it may also be used to bring in projects to act as consultants, where the required input is over and above the stated project remit.
What sort of issues will the programme look at addressing?
In providing this funding and mapping JISC products to issues we have identified the following high level issues as indicative of the areas we are interested in:
- Economic recovery and public funding
- Quality standards and reputation
- Research funding and governance
- International competitiveness
- Social mobility
What will the programme deliver?
The major output for the programme will be toolkits that will enable other institutions to enact similar change processes; these will be underpinned with roadmaps and case studies describing the process of how JISC projects were deployed away from the project host institution and how they are being used to address strategic issues.
For more information, get in touch with Lawrie Phipps
Rethinking Dissemination in Educational Technology Projects
What is the purpose of dissemination? For most of the projects that I have been involved with dissemination is about telling people about the project. But this idea of dissemination can be traced back to when the web was a unidirectional medium; most conferences in this field have been around, at least, since the birth of the internet. For most of the 90’s and the early part of this century to disseminate a project the most effective way was to go to a conference and hope that more than 4 people turned up to your presentation or workshop (I have been to several where that was the case, and in one particular case there were only the 5 presenters giving 3 papers in total and myself as the session chair).
In many of the bids that I’ve read there is an almost Pavlovian response to the question ‘how will you disseminate your project?’ Most bidders give you a list of conferences that they will present at (and assume that they will have their paper accepted – and of course some conferences will take as many papers as they can because they need delegates).
But how does this activity help? The best that can be hoped for is that someone asks you a question, and tells you that they may try your idea in their institution. And most of the time that is only way you’ll know if the project is having any kind of impact.
But what if… Instead of taking the team to XXX conference, which if there are 4 people could cost upwards of £3,000, you used that money to run 4 seminars/workshops in different institutions where you knew that people wanted to try your project? This approach is something that I trialled with my Users and Innovation Programme, and am trying with the Institutional Innovation. Instead of making dissemination a passive or serendipitous activity we are asking that the project identify partners and work closely with them to help them test their assumptions and trial the project.
Of course this relies on having people know about the project, and that was often done by mail list or at conferences. That need no longer be the case. I know the activities of almost all of the projects I manage through their blogs and tweets, and I’ve even been to a few webinars. Regular blogging and tweeting generates and maintains knowledge about the project in the cloud, and when it comes to finding willing partners it is easier than finding them in a bar at an event. Of course what I’m really talking about here is the idea of generating ad hoc communities around projects and clusters of projects which makes the embedding and sustainability of projects easier and more cost effective than turning up to a 3 day conference and hoping for someone who’s really interested showing up to your 20 minute presentation.
Go to conferences, for whatever reason, but not for the dissemination of your project. With the plethora of online tools and communities now available dissemination is most effectively achieved by careful management of the project’s online identity.
And what of conferences? At the JISC 2009 conference a delegate approached me and said “This event’s been great, a good keynote, not too many parallels and loads of space to network” and it was that last point that was the key. Conferences are still good for networking, as long as they aren’t too big, or even worse a clique; but generally a nice small (100 – 150 delegates) 24hr conference, with long lunch and coffee breaks is still a good way to meet like –minded people. And if you really want value for money, keep an eye on the institutional learning and teaching conferences, I’ve been to a dozen or so and found some real gems of ideas and practices.
Location Independent Working Conference (April 2009)
“…Work is not a place where you go but rather something you do”
Morgan R.E. (2004) Teleworking: An assessment of the benefits and challenges, European Business Review
David Morris introduced the day with a series of concise slides explaining the concept and also that his project was a 3 month pilot. A series of presentations took place that gave different perspectives from the institution.
The Basics
- LIW Is a formal recognising that work does not just take place on the campus and supports people in working from other locations.
- LIW staff give up their offices but have “touch down” spaces on the campus.
- Training the staff and managers involved in the pilot was essential.
Some Myths
- Everyone is doing it anyway.
- LIW is for everyone.
- It’s a recipe for avoiding work.
- LIW staff are never around and the rest of us can’t talk to them.
- LIW people get left out.
- Non-LIW colleagues carry the can.
Expected Benefits
Individual
- Improved Work-Life Balance
- Reduced commute time
- Reduced travel cost
- Reduced Stress
- Legitimisation of home working
Employer
- Improved work flexibility
- Improved recruitment (good working environment attractive to potential employees)
- Reduced absenteeism and stress
Environment
- Lower Carbon Footprint
- Reduced congestion and transport burden
- Improved teaching quality and innovation in teaching
The Process
At Coventry all staff went through a process to support them and the scheme. This involved Consultation with staff > Briefing Sessions > Expressions of interest > Decision Making (is LIW appropriate for members of staff) > Training > IT Consultation (what staff needed) > T & Cs (formal LIW Policy) > Set up and Start up
At Coventry….
120 people attended briefings, 52 expressed interest, 35 participated (25 academic, 10 non academic)
Lessons they learned
- Have a senior champion – who believes in it
- Create LIW spaces, both big and small (promote cross dept etc)
- A formal system is essential
- Training is important
- Dispel the myths
- Process for storage of University owned material.
The Day closed by looking at the “costs” of LIW
There was a caveat placed on the data in that individual costs can very enormously. In terms of carbon saving it was predicted that a saving of somewhere between 133kg and 785kg.
At Coventry University it estimated that, per member of staff, a notional saving of £1,061 could be made, per annum. This figure includes start up costs of the scheme, office space, heating etc.
Further details http://cuba.coventry.ac.uk/culiw/
An interview with the Project Manager Dina Shah
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irLzkGhj_A4[/youtube]
Leeds Learning and Teaching Conference 2009: Keynote Gráinne Conole
At the Leeds teaching and learning conference today, two of the U&I projects are presenting Reflect and Awesome. But the keynote is by Gráinne Conole, Towards Technology Renaissance.
Renaissance – revival or renewed interest, repurposing or rethinking. How does this apply to e-learning. What are the technology trends? Grainne talked about the increased complexity of mediation, making the key link between e-learning and communication (learning and communication). Refering to LeX research. Grainne seems to be advocating the idea of Digital Natives, Net Generation etc. Good point about the next generation being task-orientated coupled with cumulative.
Shift in communications, “we co-evolve with the tools and practice” email is for filing, twitter is for communicating. Learning in 2008/2009 is more about communication.
Learning Design Research. Grainne’s research is focused on tiangulating the visualisation, Sharing and guiding of design as a way of understanding design. I’d like to have seen something along the Downes’ and Siemans’ Participative design in web 2.0 environments. Good point about the fact that Case Studies are not enough to change practice.
Current Issues
- Transformation – not as great as hoped
- Echoes of past failures
A technology Renaissance? Can we use to technology to ‘tech-enable’ our current approaches? Is this the right question. Again, given the web 2.0 availability, and the knowledge of new learners (be them 18 or 80 ) what would a curriculum designed by the learner look like?
What future for the VLE?
Back in May I wrote, with Dave Cormier and Mark Stiles an article for Educational Developments entitled “Reflecting on the Virtual Learning Systems – extinction or evolution?”; on Friday, we three, present on a panel session about our views and conclusions at the Altered States (online) conference, along with Blackboard and Moodle representatives. Mostly our musings looked at how we thought VLEs would change, concluding that they may become much lighter and slimmer, act more as aggregators, and be controlled by learners, rather than extinction. Like a good presenter I was preparing for my session and reflecting on how we really hadn’t discussed the scenario where VLEs did become extinct (and like the dinosaurs – what had caused the extinction, perhaps the web 2.o asteroid?).
Anyhow, as I was preparing I was d tweeted by dr_neil with a note about his latest blog posting which provided a superb and topical diversion, and I am now shamelessly printing it as prep material for the panel. If you would like an entertaining discussion about the pedagogy of VLEs and the role of senior managers in their procurement, and for those of you familar with the Emperor’s New Clothes (a metaphor used before by Neil and I to describe accessbility standards) take a trip over to Neil’s blog posting The Vice Chancellor’s New VLE it is a hoot…
FOTE 2008: Final Session
Building 21st Century Learning Environments, John Hickey, Apple
Where we need to go – evolution of education
Student as both consumer and producer.
Disconnected in an interconnected world
Students say that going into class is like taking a flight, they have to switch things off and cannot access the outside world.
Students expect an interconnected (academic) life, they see the real world as incredibly advanced, when it isn’t they lose interest.
Technology Brings; Advance > Engage > Outreach
There as been as shift in power in the consumerisation of IT. New drivers for performance, productivity and collaboration include: Facebook, youtube, googleapps etc. IT depts are drilling through to adapt rather than taking it as the norm.
Students’ dorms are like mini IT departments.
Consumer technologies are setting the pace for students’ expectations.
Moving from context (80%) to core (20%). Core is the things that we must do (as HEIs) ourselves. Core is what makes HEIs unique. Apple suggest flipping the model.
Apple’s learning environment is? He didn’t say, I assume from the motherhood and apple pie image that it is all the products they have?
FOTE2008: 3rd Session
Mile Metcalfe, Ravensbourne
Miles started by discussing the college’s move to Greenwich. The innovative ideas for ICT include:
- Flexible Learnings Spaces (you had to hear the visualisation)
- Serendipitous Commons
- Subsidise personal technology
- high end reources integrated with user owned workflows
- Software as a service (google), opensource alternatives to ‘money grabbing’ proprietory systems
The curse of the Mobile – Mobile Phones did away with the need punctuality.
Technology
- The VLE is no longer the whole answer
- RSS, OpenID preserve the VLEpanopticon
- Bounded systems give way to more open collaboration
Some parting shots
- OpenID is far from perfect
- I don’t trust these extra-institutional software as a service
Miles did an excellent and entertaining presentation which is available at http://www.slideshare.net/mmetcalfe/ravensbourne-tomorrow-fote-2008-presentation/