The event will again bring together expertise and knowledge to a combined audience of over 700 senior managers, academics, library professionals, teachers, policy makers and IT experts from across education in the UK, and internationally.
Next year’s conference will showcase the best in UK digital talent and products by bringing together experts and providers from the higher education, further education and skills sectors to share ideas and best practice. Tips, tools and contacts will be provided to allow attendees to return to their universities and colleges enthusiastic and ready to put their new ideas into action.
Martyn Harrow, chief executive, Jisc says: “The concept of a digital festival environment will give delegates the unique opportunity to share and learn from each other, meet our experts and discover how together we are contributing to making the UK the most digitally advanced education and research nation in the world.
“This is chance for professionals to get together and discuss real solutions that improve teaching and learning and enhance the student and research experience. Come along and see for yourself. You can sign up now to receive priority notification of the registration launch due to take place in the autumn – we expect tickets to sell fast so don’t miss out!"
Join the conversation on Twitter now using the event hashtag #digifest14 – tell us what do you think has been the most exciting educational technology (#edtech) development in the last decade.
For more information please contact events@jisc.ac.uk
MOOCs undermine the public higher education sector - University World News: http://t.co/VNoWCbwwqr #mscidel
After much deliberation, Sarah Porter head of innovation has chosen to leave Jisc in order to pursue her research innovation interests in higher education and work with higher education institutions on developing their digital strategies.
Sarah has brought tremendous commitment and passion to Jisc over the last twelve years. She initially joined from the University of Oxford where she led a team of e-learning developers and directed Jisc’s work on managed learning environments.
It was 2004 when Sarah was appointed to lead the Jisc innovation group. The group’s agenda focused upon identifying opportunities for the UK to maximise the potential of technology to support better learning, teaching and research. Sarah has encouraged experimentation and new and innovative approaches to technological development, including most recently the Summer of Innovation project, which is inviting students to submit innovative ideas on how the student experience can be improved through technology.
Under Sarah’s leadership, and with support from Jisc’s funders, the UK and countries from overseas have benefited from programmes in:
• E-learning
• Leading work in digital libraries
• The creation of many millions of digital content assets
• The creation of new virtual research environments
• National services to support research management.
Some of her key successes have been the Sustaining Digital Resources series carried out jointly with Ithaka; work on supporting technical standards with CETIS and UKOLN; taking forward the UK’s engagement with open educations resources (OERs); promotion of the service oriented architecture and the e-framework with Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands and Canada.
Professor Martyn Harrow, chief executive of Jisc said: “We will all greatly miss Sarah’s leadership and vision. Jisc has made tremendous progress through its innovation programmes that has put the UK in a leading position with its use of technology in education and research. We will build on this precious legacy as we move to Jisc’s new future.”
After much deliberation, Sarah Porter head of innovation has chosen to leave Jisc in order to pursue her research innovation interests in higher education and work with higher education institutions on developing their digital strategies.
Sarah has brought tremendous commitment and passion to Jisc over the last twelve years. She initially joined from the University of Oxford where she led a team of e-learning developers and directed Jisc’s work on managed learning environments.
It was 2004 when Sarah was appointed to lead the Jisc innovation group. The group’s agenda focused upon identifying opportunities for the UK to maximise the potential of technology to support better learning, teaching and research. Sarah has encouraged experimentation and new and innovative approaches to technological development, including most recently the Summer of Innovation project, which is inviting students to submit innovative ideas on how the student experience can be improved through technology.
Under Sarah’s leadership, and with support from Jisc’s funders, the UK and countries from overseas have benefited from programmes in:
• E-learning
• Leading work in digital libraries
• The creation of many millions of digital content assets
• The creation of new virtual research environments
• National services to support research management.
Some of her key successes have been the Sustaining Digital Resources series carried out jointly with Ithaka; work on supporting technical standards with CETIS and UKOLN; taking forward the UK’s engagement with open educations resources (OERs); promotion of the service oriented architecture and the e-framework with Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands and Canada.
Professor Martyn Harrow, chief executive of Jisc said: “We will all greatly miss Sarah’s leadership and vision. Jisc has made tremendous progress through its innovation programmes that has put the UK in a leading position with its use of technology in education and research. We will build on this precious legacy as we move to Jisc’s new future.”
@John_P_Devaney I'm doing Course Design and Understanding Learning in the Online Environment #mscidel
@StephenWalker @John_P_Devaney I'm hoping to do Course Design & Understanding Learning in the Online Env. Fingers crossed! #mscidel
@John_P_Devaney I'm also doing that one. #mscidel
#mscidel What you doing next semester? (Positive thinking) I'm doing Digital futures for learning. Felt I should give you all fair warning!
#mscidel All very quiet on the twittersphere. Read through my blogs last night. Amazing how much I have forgotten in four weeks :(
2013 sees the launch of the Summer of Student Innovation pilot, to put the power to enhance the learner experience directly into the hands of teams of students, academics and experts across the UK.
Students who join the Summer of Innovation will get the chance to create real technology solutions and have the technology they create adopted by universities, colleges and learning providers. They will also have the option to join events where they can meet the other student teams as well as technical experts.
The Futures Forum, a group of five UK education and research organisations are joining forces to encourage teams of developers and innovators to use their skills to enhance the UK’s higher education experience.
Andrew McGregor, Jisc programme manager and Futures Forum member explains, “We are offering £5,000 per student team, to develop new technology that could improve education, research and their studying life. The teams will be selected through an open call for ideas. Successful teams will also be given opportunities to join workshops to allow them to network with fellow students and experts to further their ideas.
“After the projects have run, the technology developed by the teams will be embedded for a trial period in volunteer education organisations. Products that are successful in the trials will be provided to other interested parties through sustainable routes.”
The Summer of Student Innovation has emerged from the pilot Jisc co-design programme. This programme has enabled Jisc, RLUK, RUGIT, SCONUL, and UCISA to work together to identify a selection of strategic innovations that could benefit the HE sector. The Summer of Student Innovation has been designed as an experiment to see if students can develop technology that can improve the student experience.
To enter your ideas and encourage your fellow students to vote for your suggestions visit the Summer of Student Innovation website or follow #studentideas on Twitter.
Homepage image: CC BY flickr/hamptonroadspartnership
2013 sees the launch of the Summer of Student Innovation pilot, to put the power to enhance the learner experience directly into the hands of teams of students, academics and experts across the UK.
Students who join the Summer of Innovation will get the chance to create real technology solutions and have the technology they create adopted by universities, colleges and learning providers. They will also have the option to join events where they can meet the other student teams as well as technical experts.
The Futures Forum, a group of five UK education and research organisations are joining forces to encourage teams of developers and innovators to use their skills to enhance the UK’s higher education experience.
Andrew McGregor, Jisc programme manager and Futures Forum member explains, “We are offering £5,000 per student team, to develop new technology that could improve education, research and their studying life. The teams will be selected through an open call for ideas. Successful teams will also be given opportunities to join workshops to allow them to network with fellow students and experts to further their ideas.
“After the projects have run, the technology developed by the teams will be embedded for a trial period in volunteer education organisations. Products that are successful in the trials will be provided to other interested parties through sustainable routes.”
The Summer of Student Innovation has emerged from the pilot Jisc co-design programme. This programme has enabled Jisc, RLUK, RUGIT, SCONUL, and UCISA to work together to identify a selection of strategic innovations that could benefit the HE sector. The Summer of Student Innovation has been designed as an experiment to see if students can develop technology that can improve the student experience.
To enter your ideas and encourage your fellow students to vote for your suggestions visit the Summer of Student Innovation website or follow #studentideas on Twitter.
Homepage image: CC BY flickr/hamptonroadspartnership
More than 18 million students, staff and researchers at institutions across the UK could start to benefit from a faster and more secure connection when using their institution’s cloud-based IT services, thanks to a new peering arrangement being signed today between Microsoft and Janet, the UK’s research and education network.
This new agreement enables improved access to infrastructure and application services such as websites, virtual learning environments and research projects.
Connecting the networks privately eliminates the need to traverse data over the public internet. This enables a high bandwidth connection for students and staff to use Windows Azure. Bandwidth is managed, ensuring high-speed delivery with no delay or latency.
The move to peer the Microsoft Windows Azure data centre to the Janet network comes as part of a new strategic alliance between the two organisations, being signed at Goldsmiths, University of London today.
Professor of Computing Science at Newcastle University Paul Watson comments: “Cloud computing has the potential to revolutionise research by offering vast compute resources on-demand. At Newcastle University, we already have over £20M of research projects that are supported by the cloud. However, one of the major barriers holding back further cloud adoption is the time it takes to transfer large datasets from the lab to the cloud for analysis. This new link between Janet and the Azure Cloud removes this barrier, and will allow a far greater range of research projects to fully exploit the benefits of cloud computing.”
The alliance agreement also means any UK education institution can benefit from standard terms and conditions on Microsoft’s cloud-based productivity software suite Office 365, negotiated by Janet.
An early beneficiary of this arrangement is Goldsmiths, which is also one of a select group of institutions responsible for initiating work on the alliance. Basem El-Haddadeh, Director of IT Services at Goldsmiths said: “The work on Office 365 will save the sector considerable time and money in legal due diligence and speed up adoption of Office 365. We’re really pleased with the roll-out at Goldsmiths and our staff and students are already enjoying using the new system. I’m looking forward to the benefits the strategic alliance can bring.”
“Through the peering and strategic alliance, we are demonstrating our commitment to UK research and education institutes’ increasing desire to access cloud technologies and we are complementing our world class fibre network with Microsoft’s leading technologies to support the sector,” said Dan Perry, Director of Product and Marketing at Janet.
Steve Beswick, Director of Education, Microsoft Ltd said: “We are delighted to be working with Janet to provide additional value-added products and services to the research and education community. We have a long-standing relationship with this sector and are looking forward to more collaborative working with Janet to grow our offering.”
More than 18 million students, staff and researchers at institutions across the UK could start to benefit from a faster and more secure connection when using their institution’s cloud-based IT services, thanks to a new peering arrangement being signed today between Microsoft and Janet, the UK’s research and education network.
This new agreement enables improved access to infrastructure and application services such as websites, virtual learning environments and research projects.
Connecting the networks privately eliminates the need to traverse data over the public internet. This enables a high bandwidth connection for students and staff to use Windows Azure. Bandwidth is managed, ensuring high-speed delivery with no delay or latency.
The move to peer the Microsoft Windows Azure data centre to the Janet network comes as part of a new strategic alliance between the two organisations, being signed at Goldsmiths, University of London today.
Professor of Computing Science at Newcastle University Paul Watson comments: “Cloud computing has the potential to revolutionise research by offering vast compute resources on-demand. At Newcastle University, we already have over £20M of research projects that are supported by the cloud. However, one of the major barriers holding back further cloud adoption is the time it takes to transfer large datasets from the lab to the cloud for analysis. This new link between Janet and the Azure Cloud removes this barrier, and will allow a far greater range of research projects to fully exploit the benefits of cloud computing.”
The alliance agreement also means any UK education institution can benefit from standard terms and conditions on Microsoft’s cloud-based productivity software suite Office 365, negotiated by Janet.
An early beneficiary of this arrangement is Goldsmiths, which is also one of a select group of institutions responsible for initiating work on the alliance. Basem El-Haddadeh, Director of IT Services at Goldsmiths said: “The work on Office 365 will save the sector considerable time and money in legal due diligence and speed up adoption of Office 365. We’re really pleased with the roll-out at Goldsmiths and our staff and students are already enjoying using the new system. I’m looking forward to the benefits the strategic alliance can bring.”
“Through the peering and strategic alliance, we are demonstrating our commitment to UK research and education institutes’ increasing desire to access cloud technologies and we are complementing our world class fibre network with Microsoft’s leading technologies to support the sector,” said Dan Perry, Director of Product and Marketing at Janet.
Steve Beswick, Director of Education, Microsoft Ltd said: “We are delighted to be working with Janet to provide additional value-added products and services to the research and education community. We have a long-standing relationship with this sector and are looking forward to more collaborative working with Janet to grow our offering.”
A major survey of UK Academics released today examines the attitudes of researchers and practitioners working within higher education. It sheds light on their behaviours, including their reliance on digital technologies, the Internet and open access.
The survey, funded and guided by Jisc and RLUK and conducted on their behalf by the not-for-profit research organisation Ithaka S+R, received 3,498 responses, (a response rate of 7.9%). The survey covers a range of areas from how academics discover and stay abreast of research, to their teaching of undergraduates. How they choose research topics and publication channels, to their views on learned societies and university libraries, and their collections.
Overarching themes are an increasing reliance on the Internet for their research and publishing activities and the strong role that openness is playing in their work. Key findings include:
Rachel Bruce, innovation director for digital infrastructure, Jisc, explains: “Across the findings, this survey confirms that the open web is the first port of call for academics starting research. If an article is not available through the library the majority of academics will go straight to the web to look for a free copy, suggesting that open access is becoming a critical component of the research process. It also confirms our expectation that libraries have an important role to play in both surfacing open content on the web and ensuring open content is accessible through library systems.”
Chair of RLUK, Stella Butler, commented: “University libraries have long ceased to be passive repositories of information. Our role as gateways to research findings and as curators of knowledge, including data, is clearly expanding. The results of this survey will help all libraries explore the changing needs of one of our key customer groups and help RLUK re-define the research library model.”
Deanna Marcum, managing director, Ithaka S+R, added: “Across the UK, organisations are deeply focused on the development of new policies and their implementation to transform research and higher education in the wake of emerging technologies and the charge to deliver the impact that the public expects. We hope this survey provides meaningful insight and will help in strategic decision-making as the future unfolds.”
Higher education leaders will gather at a workshop in London on the 20th May to discuss the survey results and consider the ways in which their organisations can align their efforts more closely with what academics say they need.
Homepage image: CC BY flickr/dailyfortnight .
A major survey of UK Academics released today examines the attitudes of researchers and practitioners working within higher education. It sheds light on their behaviours, including their reliance on digital technologies, the Internet and open access.
The survey, funded and guided by Jisc and RLUK and conducted on their behalf by the not-for-profit research organisation Ithaka S+R, received 3,498 responses, (a response rate of 7.9%). The survey covers a range of areas from how academics discover and stay abreast of research, to their teaching of undergraduates. How they choose research topics and publication channels, to their views on learned societies and university libraries, and their collections.
Overarching themes are an increasing reliance on the Internet for their research and publishing activities and the strong role that openness is playing in their work. Key findings include:
Rachel Bruce, innovation director for digital infrastructure, Jisc, explains: “Across the findings, this survey confirms that the open web is the first port of call for academics starting research. If an article is not available through the library the majority of academics will go straight to the web to look for a free copy, suggesting that open access is becoming a critical component of the research process. It also confirms our expectation that libraries have an important role to play in both surfacing open content on the web and ensuring open content is accessible through library systems.”
Chair of RLUK, Stella Butler, commented: “University libraries have long ceased to be passive repositories of information. Our role as gateways to research findings and as curators of knowledge, including data, is clearly expanding. The results of this survey will help all libraries explore the changing needs of one of our key customer groups and help RLUK re-define the research library model.”
Deanna Marcum, managing director, Ithaka S+R, added: “Across the UK, organisations are deeply focused on the development of new policies and their implementation to transform research and higher education in the wake of emerging technologies and the charge to deliver the impact that the public expects. We hope this survey provides meaningful insight and will help in strategic decision-making as the future unfolds.”
Higher education leaders will gather at a workshop in London on the 20th May to discuss the survey results and consider the ways in which their organisations can align their efforts more closely with what academics say they need.
Homepage image: CC BY flickr/dailyfortnight .
Jisc welcomes the 2013 Student Academic Experience survey from Which? and the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) and the information it provides about the range of student learning experiences in universities and colleges.
However, with its focus on ‘face-to-face contact hours’, the report may be missing the many ways in which institutions and academics are using technology to guide and support students, and ultimately transform the student experience.
In the digital age, the nature of the student experience is changing rapidly and access to resources and to teaching staff has been transformed. Contact time need no longer mean students and staff sitting in the same seminar room – lectures can be filmed and watched online at a time that suits the learner, academics may engage with and offer feedback to students via email, Facebook and even twitter rather than in time-constrained seminars or tutorials. In this type of model students can engage with digital resources ahead of face-to-face sessions and then use the contact time more fruitfully for discussion and interaction.
"The report's headline figures do not distinguish between different kinds of contact time, so there is a danger that an institution that primarily engages in old-fashioned 'chalk and talk' transmission-style lecturing might appear to be offering more contact hours than an institution that is using technology to deploy resources and contact time more strategically and effectively," said Martyn Harrow, chief executive of Jisc.
"As the student body becomes more diverse, so institutions need to find ways to ensure that their teaching modes and materials reflect different learning preferences and types of study and attendance. Technology offers a range of ways to do this and to enhance student access to resources and staff both inside and outside university owned systems."
Jisc has been supporting institutions to enhance the student experience for over 20 years. It offers advice and guidance on how technology can wrap the institution around the learner, providing accurate and personalised resources and services. It funds projects to help institutions better understand their learners' needs, from learning analytics and comparative course data to creating a seamless student experience.
Jisc welcomes the 2013 Student Academic Experience survey from Which? and the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) and the information it provides about the range of student learning experiences in universities and colleges.
However, with its focus on ‘face-to-face contact hours’, the report may be missing the many ways in which institutions and academics are using technology to guide and support students, and ultimately transform the student experience.
In the digital age, the nature of the student experience is changing rapidly and access to resources and to teaching staff has been transformed. Contact time need no longer mean students and staff sitting in the same seminar room – lectures can be filmed and watched online at a time that suits the learner, academics may engage with and offer feedback to students via email, Facebook and even twitter rather than in time-constrained seminars or tutorials. In this type of model students can engage with digital resources ahead of face-to-face sessions and then use the contact time more fruitfully for discussion and interaction.
"The report's headline figures do not distinguish between different kinds of contact time, so there is a danger that an institution that primarily engages in old-fashioned 'chalk and talk' transmission-style lecturing might appear to be offering more contact hours than an institution that is using technology to deploy resources and contact time more strategically and effectively," said Martyn Harrow, chief executive of Jisc.
"As the student body becomes more diverse, so institutions need to find ways to ensure that their teaching modes and materials reflect different learning preferences and types of study and attendance. Technology offers a range of ways to do this and to enhance student access to resources and staff both inside and outside university owned systems."
Jisc has been supporting institutions to enhance the student experience for over 20 years. It offers advice and guidance on how technology can wrap the institution around the learner, providing accurate and personalised resources and services. It funds projects to help institutions better understand their learners' needs, from learning analytics and comparative course data to creating a seamless student experience.
RT @mafrado: Bonding with avatar can shift perception - Futurity. #virtualworlds #mscidel http://t.co/O8FQiNr3tG
Bonding with avatar can shift perception - Futurity. #virtualworlds #mscidel http://t.co/O8FQiNr3tG
@gabocsek Enjoy Summer! Doesn't it feel good to be done?? Are you taking the summer school writing course? #mscidel
@john_p_devaney #mscidel results available 31 May, subject to confirmation by exam board in June. You can enrol for new courses now in Hub.
#mscidel So when do we get the results of the blogs and assignment? And when do we select our course for next semester? (positive thinking)
#mscidel Finished assignment Saturday. Caught up on three weeks of gardening Sunday. Exhausted Monday. Working Tuesday. :¬S
@bjohnnymac @JanetBenson77 Happy holidays to all of us! #mscidel