A Few Words

Welcome to a special issue of the newsletter and below you will find details of the consultation on synthesis along with information on the Workforce development on-line seminar this Friday. If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact either myself or anyone from the team. Looking forward to seeing you on Friday.

Best wishes

Emma
emma@jisc-ssbr.net

Consultation on synthesis

The support and synthesis team has been working on an overview synthesis of the Lifelong Learning and Workforce Development programme. The synthesis report, “Institutional Innovation Issues from Three Perspectives the Learner, the Employer, the Institution” can be found here (http://inin.jisc-ssbr.net/files/2011/01/Synthesis3stage1thematicreportFinal.pdf).

We are gathering views and responses to our work. It is not even necessary for you to have read the report to answer some questions we have about key issues emerging (but the report might help explain why we are asking these questions).

To gather views we have constructed a questionnaire. We would be very grateful if you could take about 15-20 minutes to engage with the process and give us some guidance. Thank you very much.

The questionnaire is here: [Link]

Workforce development on-line seminar

Friday 25 March, 1200-1300

The fourth and final seminar in our innovations series takes two perspectives on workforce development: that of the learner and that of the institution.

We will be focusing on technology developments in this seminar, however, it must be noted that the field is complex and currently a climate of political uncertainty is pervasive. On the one hand, never has there been a greater need for innovative approaches to personal, professional and institutional development, and yet in recent years never has there been such uncertainty as to the direction this might take.

We look forward to you joining the seminar on Friday http://ssbr0311.inin.jisc-ssbr.net/

George

Dr George Roberts
Senior Lecturer, Educational Development Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development
groberts@brookes.ac.uk

A Few Words…

Innovation in higher education can be seen in different lights. In the final synthesis of this programme we are looking at it from three vantage points: the learner, the institution and the employer. We have produced about 15 briefing papers now on topics ranging from mobile learning to mentoring in the workplace. We are finding that each topic can be seen from these three perspectives. We can see e-portfolios, for example, from the point of view of the learner: the individual who uses an e-portfolio to evidence statements or stories about their profession or employability, or who uses an e-portfolio system as a tool with which to produce and tell those stories. We can see e-portfolios from an institutional perspective: the education provider who uses an e-portfolio system to enable students to produce richer records of achievement than allowed for by a bare transcript. Or, who promote an e-portfolio system as an assessment tool; who may or may not integrate it with other institutional systems: records, VLE, etc. Or, from the teacher’s point of view who will have to implement yet another application, come to master it themselves and use it in a scheme of work.

Be sure to visit the SSBR blog “Developing Themes” where you will find our latest synthesis work.

George Roberts
groberts@brookes.ac.uk

Read the rest of this entry »

A Few Words…

Hello and happy New Year. Welcome to the last three months of your institutional Innovation projects. The Programme is having wide and significant effects across the sector thanks to the good work you are all doing with your projects. At a recent JISC Institutional Innovation Working Group meeting I set out four of the ways in which the support project might be, in a small way, contributing to the success of the Programme. First through developing and implementing a Benefits Realisation programme (http://br.inin.jisc-ssbr.net/), projects have been enabled to extend and/or implement their work in other institutions and contexts. Second through direct support to the projects, and particularly through the encouragement of inter project collaboration via Assembliss (http://assemblies.inin.jisc-ssbr.net/) projects have been encouraged to think and work across boundaries and to make links with other institutions. Third, through Synthesis work (http://inin.jisc-ssbr.net/blog/), which has surfaced and analysed the cross-cutting themes of the programme and produced briefing papers for the JISC to disseminate programme-wide outcomes. And fourth, through the collation of a substantial database of programme outputs (http://inin.jisc-ssbr.net/ssbrdb/) we are working to make your work discoverable throughout the JISC and higher education community.

So, noses back to the grindstone for the last push towards completion. Best wishes and best of luck to your projects. Remember, if there is anything you need, do not hesitate to get in touch.

George Roberts
groberts@brookes.ac.uk

Contacting Projects…

Ellen and Patsy from the SSBR support team for LLLWFD projects are in the process of contacting projects to arrange phone contact during January. The aim of contact in this final stage of the projects is to get updates of remaining support needs as well as gather information about project outputs and dissemination activities. They are also looking forward to meeting up again with projects, in person, at the JISC programme meeting for LLLWFD projects in Birmingham on 28 January.

Read the rest of this entry »