This document discusses possibilities for emerging structures and opportunities within ePortfolios Australia. It proposes establishing a Co-Lab focused on research with a global south theme. The Co-Lab would have a small core team to allow for effective governance and would involve multiple projects and an annual meeting. Co-Lab members would collaborate, co-design solutions, explore best practices, and showcase research. The Co-Lab would use a speculative inquiry model and think tank methodology to imagine alternative futures and solve challenges through an agile and responsive process.

1. ePortfolios Australasia –
Possibilities for Emerging Structure/Opportunities
ePortfolios Australia
• Forum
• Webinars
• Social Media
• Advocacy – ePortfolio Initiatives (inter/national)
AAEEBL
• Executive
• SIGS (3):Practice and Pedagogy
• Research, Tools
ePortfolio Ireland
Co-Lab
Digital Ethics
Global
Theme
National
International
Co-Lab and Digital Ethics are situated within ePortfolios Australia Organisation structure
• Co-Lab Focus: Research (global south theme), create new territory within ePortfolios Australia
• Core Lab Team – max. 4 members to allow for effective governance, and run the lab
• Multiple projects – includes member network, align talents to projects, papers and funding
• Annual Meeting
• Webinars-EPAC, AAC&U
• Social Media

2. Creating, designing and
developing an eportfolio Co-Lab
The premise begins with, what if
and, then what?
What if, a group of Australian
ePortfolio practitioners and
researchers got together as a co-
lab?
What might we explore?
What might we imagine and re-
imagine about the scholarship of
teaching and learning?
What might we wonder
together?
Kathryn Coleman, Kate Mitchell (University of
Melbourne), Patsie Polly (UNSW, Sydney) and
Christine Slade (University of Queensland).

3. • In a co-lab, participants are dedicated a co-Lab
(collaborators) members can access communities of
practice. As a co-lab we will be committed to co-
design as we bring together people from across
sectors and communities to:
• collaborate
• co-design potential solutions shared problems
• explore best practice
• interrogate shared problematics
• speculate
• showcase practice and research
What is a
co-lab?

4. Co-design
• Co-design is the act of co-creating with
stakeholders (in our case cross sectoral,
intergenerational) specifically within
the design of the co-lab inquiries.
• Committed to using a speculative
development process to ensure the results
meet the needs and are usable by the co-
lab.
• Co-design may also be called
participatory design- a term which is used
more often within the design community.

5. Practitioner
Researcher
Lived experience

7. A speculative
inquiry
“[Speculative design] thrives on imagination and aims to open up new
perspectives on what are sometimes called wicked problems, to create spaces
for discussion and debate about alternative ways of being, and to inspire and
encourage people’s imaginations to flow freely. Design speculations can act as
a catalyst for collectively redefining our relationship to reality.”
DUNNE AND RABY, SPECULATIVE EVERYTHING: DESIGN, FICTION AND SOCIAL
DREAMING

8. A Speculative inquiry model is a tool for us to
unpack and solve many of the learning, teaching
and assessment challenges we face, from micro to
macro scale, and to envision a new future for
eportfolio from our side of the world.
Asking what if? gives us scope to imagine alternative realities and
futures for some of the problems we face today.
What is your, what if?

9. A think tank
methodology
Agile, nimble, responsive to needs, allows us to
pose a what if, and see what emerges as a co-lab.

10. Image: Global Brand Commerce - Retail Business Transformation Think Tank. A Remodista Program.

11. https://tinyurl.com/y4nbmkrt