Digital Education Leadership: Trends, Concepts and the Future
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The document summarizes current trends, challenges, and concepts in digital education leadership. It discusses negative narratives around online learning and the need to "learn forward" from the pandemic. Key challenges include questioning the purpose of higher education and assumptions around technology. Key concepts presented are the practice of values, liminality and learning forward, and the third space. The document introduces the Digital Education Leadership Literacies for Higher Education (DELLHE) framework, which anchors leadership in ethical and pedagogical approaches.
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Digital Education Leadership: Trends, Concepts and the Future
- 1. Digital Education Leadership: from troubled times towards preferred futures UNESCO Chair in Education and Technology for Social Change International Seminar 2022 “Digital Education leadership: concepts and trends” Barcelona, 17th November, 2022 Dr Deborah Arnold Edul@b research group, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya @DebJArnold / @DeborahJArnold@scholar.social
- 2. What are some of the current trends and challenges in higher education? Which concepts can we mobilise to address these challenges and trends? What kind of leadership do we need? KEY QUESTIONS
- 3. CURRENT TRENDS AND CHALLENGES
- 4. TREND – negative narratives No justification in 75% of papers reviewed (Veletsianos et al., 2022) Photo by Ante Hamersmit on Unsplash The snap-back Pandemic grief and collective liminality Need to “learn forward” (Bryant, 2022)
- 5. CHALLENGES (Alves & Tomlinson, 2020; Arnold, 2022; Lanclos, 2021; Selwyn et al., 2020; Weller 2022) Societal trends and challenges Purpose and value of HE? HE funding / marketisation Global sustainability Access to education Die-hard myths and assumptions The digital native Learning styles Leadership styles Technological solutionism (the “edtech rapture”)
- 6. KEY CONCEPTS
- 7. CONCEPT (1) The practice of values (Mycroft, 2021) Value Practice Values statement equity online assessment What might online assessment look like as a practice of equity?
- 8. CONCEPT (2) Liminality and learning forward Image: @liminal_akiyo on Instagram (Bryant, 2022) Liminality is an unstable and uncomfortable state A liminal state is one of becoming
- 9. CONCEPT (3) Third space Navigating and negotiating liminality Intersection of academic and professional roles Leadership-as-practice Identity Recognition? (Whitchurch, 2008, 2018; McIntosh & Nutt, 2022; Youngs, 2017)
- 10. More on third space http://bit.ly/3EmL4X8 http://bit.ly/3WQjIQs Inside out and outside in: an exploration of peripheral third space
- 11. WHAT KIND OF LEADERSHIP DO WE NEED?
- 12. Digital Education + Leadership (collective, relational, as practice) + Leadership Literacies (mindsets and behaviours) Digital Education Leadership Literacies for Higher Education (DELLHE) Digital Education Leadership Literacies (Arnold, 2022)
- 13. The DELLHE framework Leadership attitudes, mindsets & behaviours which support the uptake of Digital Education LEADINGFUL Digital Education Leadership Literacies for Higher Education (DELLHE) A set of mindsets, attitudes and behaviours which enable HE leaders to address complex problems relating to the integration of Digital Education (Arnold, 2022) (Arnold, 2022; Davis, 2012; Jameson, 2013) Values Third space Liminality and learning forward
- 14. SUSTAINING MINDSETS Environmental concerns Human concerns Financial concerns Awareness of positive and negative impacts of technology Ethics Social responsibility Wellbeing Need to invest in both people and technology Awareness of changes in the external environment / weak signals BEHAVIOURS Environmental concerns Human concerns Financial concerns Embedding environmental concerns in vision and policy Access, equity and inclusion Policies for safe, legal and ethical use of educational technology Digital citizenship Supporting scalable initiatives Organisational agility LEADINGFUL (Arnold, 2022)
- 15. The principles embodied by DELLHE anchor Digital Education Leadership in an ethically and pedagogically sound approach, serving as an effective counter to overly technocentric understandings and practices. (Arnold, 2022, p. 460) The DELLHE concept in a nutshell From DELLHE to postdigital education leadership? (Fawns, 2022; Hayes, 2021; Jandrić et al. 2018)
- 16. THANK YOU! Dr Deborah Arnold darnold@uoc.edu @DebJArnold @DeborahJArnold@scholar.social https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Deborah-Arnold-4
- 17. Alves, M. G., & Tomlinson, M. (2020). The changing value of higher education in England and Portugal: Massification, marketization and public good. European Educational Research Journal, 1474904120967574. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474904120967574 Arnold, D. (2022). Supporting Leadership Development in European Universities: A Mixed Methods Study of Digital Education Leadership Literacies in Higher Education [Doctoral thesis, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya]. http://hdl.handle.net/10609/142686 Bryant, P. (2022). ‘…and the way that it ends is that the way it began’: Why we need to learn forward, not snap back. Peter Bryant: Post Digital Learning. https://peterbryant.smegradio.com/and-the-way-that-it-ends-is- that-the-way-it-began-why-we-need-to-learn-forward-not-snap-back/ Davis, H. (2012). Leadership Literacies for Professional Staff in Universities. [Doctoral thesis RMIT University]. https://researchbank.rmit.edu.au/view/rmit:160335 Fawns, T. (2022). An entangled pedagogy: Looking beyond the pedagogy – technology dichotomy. Postdigital Science and Education, 0123456789. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-022-00302-7 REFERENCES
- 18. Hayes, S. (2021). Postdigital Positionality as a Leader and Policy Maker. In Postdigital Positionality. Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004466029_008 Jameson, J. (2013). E-Leadership in higher education: The fifth “age” of educational technology research. British Journal of Educational Technology, 44(6), 889–915. https://doi.org/doi:10.1111/bjet.12103 Jandrić, P., Knox, J., Besley, T., Ryberg, T., Suoranta, J., & Hayes, S. (2018). Postdigital science and education. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 50(10), 893–899. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2018.1454000 Lanclos, D. M. (2021). From 2016 to 2021 and how much has changed? Four Still Provocative Things, Apparently. https://digitalispeople.org/from-2016-to-2021-and-how-much-has-changed-four-still-provocative- things-apparently/ Mycroft, L. (2021). The Practice of Values. https://loumycroft.org/2021/01/24/the-practice-of-values-2/ Veletsianos, G., Barbour, M., & Moore, S. (2022). Why it’s wrong to blame online learning for causing mental health issues during COVID-19. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/why-its-wrong-to-blame- online-learning-for-causing-mental-health-issues-during-covid-19-191493 REFERENCES
- 19. Weller, M. (2022). Metaphors of Ed Tech. In Metaphors of Ed Tech. Athabasca University Press. https://doi.org/10.15215/aupress/9781771993500.01 Whitchurch, C. (2008). Shifting identities and blurring boundaries: The emergence of third space professionals in UK higher education. Higher Education Quarterly, 62(4), 377–396. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468- 2273.2008.00387.x Whitchurch, C. (2018). Being a Higher Education Professional Today: Working in a Third Space. In C. Bossu & N. Brown (Eds.), University Development and Administration. Professional and Support Staff in Higher Education. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-1607-3_31-1 Youngs, H. (2017). A critical exploration of collaborative and distributed leadership in higher education: developing an alternative ontology through leadership-as-practice. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 39(2), 140–154. https://doi.org/10.1080/1360080X.2017.1276662 REFERENCES
Hinweis der Redaktion
- In this short intervention, I’m going to talk us through three key questions, first of all looking at some current trends and challenges, then identifying three concepts that can help us understand and address these challenges, which will lead us into some reflections on the kind of leadership we need (and want) for digital education.
- So, to begin with, some trends and challenges…
- George Veletsianos and colleagues found problems in 75% of the papers they reviewed. Peter Bryant talks about the snap-back, which he frames as demeaning remote learning as a poor substitute for the on-campus experience. One explanation he gives is that of pandemic grief, where in a state of collective liminality, people just want to get back to the way things were before. We’ll come back to this concept of liminality in a moment
- If we look at the big picture, the challenges we face are part of wider societal trends, which impact the perceived value of HE and the way it is funded. And we cannot ignore global sustainability concerns, in a world of finite resources, and the consequences of war, pandemics and climate disruption on access to education. And let’s focus on some of the die-hard myths and assumptions in our own field of digital education, which we constantly need to need to dispel. The digital native myth is still alive and kicking, just like learning styles. I’ve put leadership styles here too, as it’s something that bugs me particularly! While it’s not so much of a myth, it does reduce much of the thinking about leadership to a focus on the individual. We also need to challenge technological solutionism in which technology can solve all the problems. Martin Weller uses the metaphor of the ‘edtech rapture’ to describe this. You can probably think of several more such myths and assumptions yourselves!
- So now let’s look at a series of key concepts to help us understand and address these challenges.
- One concept which I find particularly useful comes from the work of Lou Mycroft. She has developed what she frames as ‘the practice of values’ whereby we begin by defining a value we hold dear, and then test it against a particular practice, to formulate a values statement. Here I’ve taken the example of the value equity, along with the practice of online assessment. Which gives the value statement, or question What might online assessment look like as a practice of equity? I find this an extremely powerful means through which we can open up deep reflexion on possible futures.
- Such opening up towards possible futures puts us in a liminal space. Take a look at this image of a liminal space – how does it make you feel? Remember what Peter Bryant said about the snap-back and collective liminality. As he says, a liminal state is one of becoming, and liminality is an unstable and uncomfortable state. As liminality is unstable, there is always a risk that we revert to our previous state, hence this need to learn forward rather than snap back. Which of these routes do we want to take, left or right? What’s round the corner? What does that hole in the ground represent – danger or opportunity? And can we really turn back?
- Perhaps one of the roles of leadership should be to help people, both staff and students, and institutions themselves, to navigate and negotiate this liminality. There is a growing body of research focusing on Celia Whitchurch's concept of third space at the intersection of academic and professional roles. Third space professionals such as academic development staff and learning technologists are much more than support staff, and if we extend our conception of leadership from a focus on the individual to one of leadership-as-practice, this opens up possibilities for considering this third space to be the locus of leadership, rather than being restricted to formal leadership roles. This does raise questions of identity, covered in many of the contributions to the book here, and as I found in my research, formal governance-level leaders need to understand this concept of third space and put in place structures and mechanisms to mobilise its potential and to recognise this different form of leadership.
- If you want to learn more about third space, these are a couple of invited blogposts I’ve written. The first is the text of my keynote speech at the Media and Learning conference, and the second one part of a series on the third space perspectives blog run by Emily McIntosh and Diane Nutt, the editors of the book I showed on the previous slide.
- The trends, challenges and concepts we’ve explored here lead us now to the question What kind of leadership do we need or want for digital education?
- As a result of my doctoral research here at UOC, I argue for the development of Digital Education Leadership Literacies for Higher Education, or DELLHE for short. This concept takes Digital Education to be the use of technology for teaching and learning It understands leadership as being about practice, as being collective and relational And draws on the conception of leadership literacies as being about mindsets (our representations) and behaviours (concrete actions)
- So this brings us to the definition of DELLHE as a set of mindsets, attitudes and behaviours which enable HE leaders to address complex problems relating to the integration of Digital Education, represented by the framework you see here, with its five overlapping dimensions. In the Worldly dimension we find issues of values and culture, vision, policy and strategy, and also pedagogy and technology The Sustaining dimension brings together the human, environmental and financial impact of technology choices The Relational dimension is about both interpersonal relationships and organisational dynamics The Leadingful dimension focuses specifically on the practice of leadership to support digital education, and indeed on our very conceptions of leadership And finally the Learningful dimension, which covers both leadership development and organisational learning. So, how do the concepts I mentioned earlier fit this framework? Values span the Worldly and Sustaining dimensions I think Entangled pedagogy sits at the intersection of the Worldly and Relational dimensions Third space bridges the Relational and Learningful dimensions, with the support of appropriate leadership mindsets and behaviours And as we are taking about liminality and learning forward, to new preferred futures, we can place this right in the centre.
- By way of illustration, these are the issues addressed by the Sustaining dimension, which as you can see reflect many of the challenges I mentioned earlier
- In a nutshell, this is how I summarised the DELLHE concept in my thesis. And the more I read on the topic, the more convinced I am that that this resonates with postdigital conceptions, where we move beyond the technology-pedagogy dichotomy. So perhaps the way forward is to look towards postdigital education leadership. What do you think?