A workshop to bring together experiences from the Universities of Loughborough, Strathclyde and Middlesex to inform the implementation of Wimba at the University of Winchester, and provide JISC guidelines for taking into account PEOPLE in IT implementation projects.
WELCOME – thanks for coming… Would just like to introduce the project briefly, and ID some of the key activities that we’ve been doing Project: Part of a JISC funded bid with a focus on: Institutional strategies Leadership Organisational Development Change management – allowing embedding of new ways of working The identification of appropriate staff development to support effective working. The focus: Is to share knowledge, not only amongst the 4 institutions represented here today (welcome formally shortly), but also with the wider HE community via JISC, who have identified that there is a requirement for guidelines for IT implementations with regards to PEOPLE and not just TECHNOLOGY, as we are asking people to change their working habits. Conferences: At recent conferences, this kind of discussion is very common, that projects need to be problem-focused as to what is required (rather than adding another layer of work), that staff need to be involved in the process – and we can’t expect them to use everything (so it’s about finding the right tool for the job) – and there’s a number of different projects going on in different universities re: this, so the time is very ripe!
Where does Wimba fit in? The idea is that experiences provided by the Organisational Development Group (Jose Chambers is involved) will be applied and testing to support our implementation of Wimba. You know that there was a 1 year pilot project for Wimba, and that nearly a year ago we took on board a 3 year licence. Once I came on board in October 2009, started to liaise with Wimba, and we’ve had a number of training sessions, but there’s still a lot that needs to be done. What is Wimba? If you’re not familiar with the software, it’s largely ‘synchronous’ (whereas e.g. email can be asynchronous) software, which allows contact with a much wider audience – Wimba Classroom allows a presentation to be available online, the lecturer can talk to it the same way that they would to any other PPT – the lecturer can choose to open up other areas, e.g. edit/overwrite on the board, chat area, and ‘feedback’ area – and all these talks can be archived. Pronto we need to get most people using it or it won’t really work – a great substitute for email in getting tasks done quickly – and also I love the ‘office hours’ where you can say to students that you will be available at a certain time, they ”queue” to “talk” to you, and you can ‘promote’ them to your office when ready – students often have dealt with queries before then as they have to say why they are queuing and often ask each other! Wimba voice offers options to provide podcasts and audio feedback – or just a cheery vocal “hello” on your Learning Network pages.
We conducted a staff survey before the end of term, rather a low response, but of those who did there’s a clear interest in Wimba – but it IS about finding the right TOOL for the job – so the PURPOSE of the product within each module needs to be identified… Within Blended Learning need to be demonstrating thought leadership and showing how various tools are being used… there’s much more to be done here, but…
As most people use the Learning Network, we have used that as the central hub of all activities, sending out messages/invites via the Forum (as well as advertising on the portal), and a series of information/useful hints/tips, etc. are available, and we now have around 150 people signed up for this (with only 200 academic staff, that’s pretty good!), and there’s some discussion ongoing in the forums, but have some other ideas for the summer….
One which I’ve been testing is adding information to a blog, as the Learning Network material was getting rather unwieldy… and this can be classified by categories. Here – can see workshops planned for the rest of the year, advertised within the Staff Development handbook (and online, and plan some paper sendouts too!) CET Lunch (March) was a success, although it was those who are already keen on using e-tools who attended, and there was general consensus that this information needed a wider spread… great discussions going! So, providing a series of workshops on Wimba tools (as well as other social media tools), and expect to add more ‘experimental times’ where people can be guaranteed someone to practice on! Can see here links to Twitter & Facebook which are experimenting with…. Getting named personnel within IT has also been key with this, as it ensures that the technical testing can be done, so that rollout becomes smoother (our academics don’t want to test the system – and everything that adds a barrier in the way, is one more thing that puts them off it…) So, now you can see where we are with this… let me introduce our visitors for the day…
Andy: Director of Capability Enhancement, given talks all over the world, key in staff development, and a member of the Leadership Foundation of HE. Andy is going to talk to us about change management with regards to IT projects, as he has lots of experience in this field. Andy was the key driver behind this bid. Donna: Donna is Innovation and Projects Co-Ordinator at the University of Strathclyde, which has already done a project entitled “Work-with-IT: A JISC study into the technology-driven evolution of working practices”, and she’ll be filling us in on some of the findings from this project. Donna has Masters qualifications in Politics and Computing Science, and has worked in both private and public sector organisations. Marina: Marina is Staff Development Officer in IT at Middlesex University. Marina is on holiday, but has provided us with material for discussion, as they are working their way into developing an IT Skills Framework at the institution, so we look forward to receiving the benefit of her advice. University of Winchester If we could just introduce ourselves to our visitors that would be great!
Please do sign up for the project Wiki – Andy will need to approve you, but it would be great to have more contributions. So first, we’d like to look at Marina’s material…