Moving from ‘e’ to ‘d’ – what does a Digital University really look like?

Bill JohnstonSheila MacNeill

Ascilite 2013

Overview

• Background • Introduction and explanation of matrix• Examples of use

The rise of digital

Image: www.centerdigitaled.com

“The new competition, the real threat . . . is the emergence of entirely

new models of university which are seeking to exploit the radically

changed circumstances that are the result of globalisation and the

digital revolution.”

An Avalanche is coming, Higher Education and the Revolution Ahead IPPR , March 2013

(http://www.ippr.org/publication/55/10432/an-avalanche-is-coming-higher-education-

and-the-revolution-ahead)

“There is no doubt that digital technologies have had a profound impact upon the management of learning. Institutions can now recruit, register, monitor, and report on students with a new economy, efficiency, and (sometimes) creativity yet, evidence of digital technologies producing real transformation in learning and teaching remains elusive”

Decoding Learning, the proof, promise and potential of digital educationNesta, November 2012 (http://www.nesta.org.uk/library/documentsDecodingLearningReport_v12.pdf)

What is a digital university?

Where is a digital university?

Image: newsroom.cisco.com

A Digital University: key themes

Digital Participation

Information Literacy

Learning Environments

Curriculum & Course Design

Our model for the digital universityDigital Participation Information Literacy

*Glocalization *Widening access*Civic role and responsibilities*Community engagement*Networks (human and digital)*Technological affordances

*High level concepts and perceptions influencing practice*Staff & student engagement and development*Effective development and use of infrastructure

Curriculum and Course Design Learning Environment

*Constructive alignment*Curriculum representations, course management, pedagogical innovation*Recruitment and marketing*Reporting, data, analytics

*Physical and digital*Pedagogical and social*Research and enquiry*Staff and Resources

Information Literacy

• "Information literacy is the adoption of appropriate information behaviour to identify, through whatever channel or medium, information well fitted to information needs, leading to wise and ethical use of information in society.”

(Johnston, B. & Webber, S. (2003) Information literacy in higher education: a review and case study. Studies in higher education)

Learning Environment:Key features

• prepare students for lifelong, self-regulated, cooperative and work-based learning;

• foster high quality student learning;• change teaching methods in response to students’

increasing metacognitive and self-regulatory skills, • increases the complexity of the problems dealt with

gradually and systematically.

Vermunt, J.D, Student Learning and University Teaching (2007), British Journal of Educational Psychology

Process orientated teaching: key features

• lecturer skills - diagnostician, challenger, monitor, evaluator and educational developer.

• self-regulation for students e.g. collaborative working spaces, complex projects and personal reflective spaces.

• Institutional support to encourage this type of student in a self regulating researcher culture.

And finally

• Take our model• Work with it and build it • Extend our conversation

Contact Details• Bill Johnston b.johnston@strath.ac.uk• Sheila MacNeill sheila.macneill@gcu.ac.uk @sheilmcn

Blog posts: http://bit.ly/wUzP2p http://howsheilaseesit.wordpress.com/Examples: University of Dundee

http://www.slideshare.net/sheilamac/dundee-symposium-31may13-21833957

University of Greenwich: https://journals.gre.ac.uk/index.php/compass/article/view/79/121

Ascilite13 Workshop materials