During JISC's transition period to move the organisation towards a new legal entity, a Shadow Board is being formed to help manage the process.
After successful recruitment of four of the six Shadow Board members, JISC is seeking two additional experts: a further education principal and a university vice chancellor to complete the Board's membership.
Professor Sir Timothy O'Shea, Principal and Vice Chancellor, University of Edinburgh; Chair of JISC and Chair of the Shadow Board says: "We are very pleased to be able to announce the appointment of four members of JISC's Shadow Board and welcome their insight and expertise in taking a reshaped JISC into the future. We are, however, still seeking two additional members so that all of JISC's interest groups are represented. If you think you have the drive, enthusiasm and passion to support the UK's education and research communities with their teaching, learning and research aims we'd like to hear from you."
The Shadow Board will be in post for the length of JISC's transition period which could be between one and two years.
Richard Boulderstone is the British Library's e-strategy and information systems director. Richard brings with him nine years experience of working at the British Library including leading their efforts to create a large-scale digital object management system that will become the primary repository for the Library's, and hence the UK's, legal deposit collection of electronic resources. Formerly a Chief Technology Officer and Product Development Director at a number of international information providers, he has led the creation of many information-based products - both in the UK and USA.
Professor Paul Jeffreys is IT director at the University of Oxford where he drives the overarching IT strategy which enables the University to make optimal use of IT in a rapidly-developing environment. He sees his role as ensuring that the University's IT services continue evolving to meet new needs, whilst providing a secure and reliable service which maximises energy efficiency and value for money.
Professor Noel Lloyd CBE is retired Vice Chancellor at Aberystwyth University. He was awarded the CBE for Services to Higher Education in Wales. Prior to holding the posts of Vice-Chancellor, and Registrar and Secretary, he was previously Pro Vice-Chancellor, Dean of Science and Head of the Department of Mathematics at Aberystwyth University. He has served on various Research Council committees and editorial boards, and was editor of the Journal of the London Mathematical Society from 1983 to 1988. He has been a member of the HEFCW Quality Assurance Committee, and was a member of the board of the mid-Wales TEC and then of the mid-Wales ELWa Regional Committee. At present he is Chair of HEW (Higher Education Wales), and a Vice-President of Universities UK. He is a member of the board of the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA), chairing its Health and Safety Committee, and serves on the board of the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA), chairing the Access Recognition and Licensing Committee.
Professor Celia Duffy is director of academic development at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Before joining the Academy in 1999, she lectured in music at Goldsmiths College, University of London, worked in commercial software design and started the Performing Arts Data Service at the University of Glasgow. Celia sits on a variety of national boards and committees. She is an elected member and former chair of the National Association for Music in Higher Education, a board member of the Red Note Ensemble, member of the Scottish Funding Council's Research and Knowledge Transfer Committee and was recently invited to be part of an international panel for arts-based research financed by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Science and Research.
If you are interested in applying for one of the two vacant positions and to contribute towards taking JISC into the future, please contact Dr Kathryn Turton, JISC's board and transition manager: k.turton@jisc.ac.uk or apply direct for the role here.
Deadline for applications is 14th October 2011.
#mscidel I am feeling lonely on this hash tag. Any class mates out watching?
A_L_T: RT @mhawksey: Quick (and free) sentiment analysis of @donaldclark's #altc2010 Don't Lecture Me keynote http://t.co/zE0tNBqC
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A_L_T: Vacancy with ALT for an Events Manager - http://t.co/rlX9kIrQ - closing date 7 October. Please highlight to suitable people.
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JISC is pleased to announce the launch of a free online seminar series in which experts will lead discussions and share advice on technology issues for education and research.
The regular ‘webinars’ will be short sessions of 45 minutes to 1 hour focused on providing practical advice on topical issues and participants can join the session without having to travel anywhere, using just a computer, headset and internet connection.
Register now for the first webinar in the series on how to meet the research data challenge on Wednesday 12 October 2011 at noon. The webinar will share advice from Sarah Porter, JISC’s head of innovation, and Simon Hodson, JISC’s programme manager.
Sarah and Simon will give an overview of the key points for universities on managing research data, then discuss what managers can do now and how JISC can help.
The following seminar is on ‘Curriculum design – changing the paradigm’ on Wednesday 2 November at 2pm and will discuss how to join up information about different courses, and how to engage stakeholders in the curriculum.
A_L_T: #ictp Q for those who understand lecture capture. Do any systems create a (zip)file with assets that can be viewed later off line?
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#ededc #mscidel Take a look at my "Life Wall" which I have been developing as an area for tags and clippings.. see http://t.co/qHK5bNkL
A_L_T: Correction + apology! http://t.co/WzWz4Dcd is the link to the #altc2012 programme committee call <-please retweet
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The images have been digitised and catalogued by the British Cartoon Archive at the University of Kent, following a grant from JISC.
The seaside postcards are among a collection of 1,300 cards confiscated under the obscenity laws from 1951-61. Other images available online for the first time include British political cartoons from the last ten years, recent ‘pocket’ cartoons by cartoonists such as Matt of the Daily Telegraph, and images from Reg Smythe’s Andy Capp artwork for the Daily Mirror.
The new images come from the world’s largest collection of cartoons on political and social comment published in British press and held by the British Cartoon Archive. The Archive now offers free and easy access to more than 170,000 cartoons by by over 350 cartoonists, dating from 1790 to 2011 and featuring Prime Ministers from Pitt the Younger to David Cameron.
Also newly available are research and teaching aids on cartoons, including video interviews with leading cartoonists such as Stan McMurtry (Mac) of the Daily Mail, Nicholas Garland of the Daily Telegraph, Peter Brookes of The Times, Dave Brown of The Independent and Nick Newman of the Sunday Times and Private Eye.
Head of the archive Dr Nick Hiley said: ‘Our online catalogue already attracts more than 15,000 visitors a month, looking for cartoons for teaching and research, or just for enjoyment. The sheer volume of material - 19,000 cartoons from the 1970s alone - means that users can see several cartoons from the same day and on the same subject, by cartoonists from quite different newspapers.’
JISC programme manager Paola Marchionni said: ‘It's not just researchers who are demanding access to these collections; increasing numbers of teachers and lecturers are interested in using cartoons as a learning resource. The new tools to help teachers embed the cartoons into their lessons, both physical and virtual, will make these archives even more valuable for teaching, learning and research.’
Dr Hiley added: ‘Among our online cartoons are 1,594 Margaret Thatchers, which, perhaps surprisingly, is more than our 1,225 Winston Churchills. Of course, some of the cartoons of Mrs Thatcher show her dressed as Winston Churchill, but there are not as many as the cartoons showing Tony Blair dressed as Mrs Thatcher!’
A_L_T: Correction + apology! http://t.co/WzWz4Dcd is the link to the #altc2012 programme committee call <-please retweet
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A_L_T: Call opens for expressions of interest in membership of the #altc2012 Programme Committee. Deadline 17 Oct. http://t.co/FssKuHF4
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A_L_T: Management Strategies to Improve the use of LT. ALT & AoC are working together on this 12 Oct London FE event http://t.co/2Qugjdqc
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A new walking tour for the iPhone is set to help prospective students get to know a university virtually and help them settle in once they arrive – helping the institution meet its widening participation targets.
As part of its work to support open innovation, JISC funded the University of Bristol’s MyMobileBristol project in collaboration with Bristol City Council.
Mike Jones, senior developer in IT services research and development at the University of Bristol, said: “We are pleased that it has been so popular - the walking tour achieved 160 downloads from 21 countries in the first eight days of becoming available on the Apple iTunes website.”
The University plans to produce a printed version of the tour for people who can’t access the app, which is designed for iPads, iPhones and iPods.
Mark Newman, senior business analyst at Bristol City Council, said: “"The project to build a mobile website for central Bristol has helped forge greater links between Bristol City Council and Bristol University, created a great resource not only for all students studying in Bristol but visitors and the citizens of Bristol with a bonus of a fantastic Walking iPhones app."
It integrates information from partner websites and provides users with time and location-sensitive data helping them to get around the campus and the city more effectively.
Simon Whittemore, JISC programme manager, said: “This project is an excellent example of a University working in partnership with an external organisation – in this case Bristol City Council - for a shared objective and new business opportunities. The demonstrator delivered is an innovative use of web and mobile technologies that has already brought new benefits to – students, staff and visitors to the University’’.
If you’re interested in applying to run a similar project linking up with business or your local community, JISC has a call out now for bids
The code that the team used to design the software is now open source and other institutions have also been invited to a workshop to see how they could apply this to their own institutions.
The project is one of a series funded by JISC that challenged universities to use their ability to innovate to impact positively on their communities, working in partnership with outside organisations, by demonstrating the potential of integrated web services and online marketplaces.
The MyMobileBristol project also built a mobile website optimised for smartphones to assist people in finding their way around the University precinct and giving them information about buildings and facilities in the University and the wider city.
Download the walking tour from iPhones now
Read about the project on their blog
What are the best strategies for engaging with business and the community? Find out how JISC can help support your institution
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A_L_T: The wireless network just worked: ALT, The wireless network just worked. Association for Learning Technology. http://t.co/Nb0yjYJq
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A_L_T: "The wireless network just worked" - data about wireless utilisation at a big conference #altc2011 http://t.co/xkxlJsjd
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Would you like to help save the UK’s horse chestnut trees from a destructive moth?
A JISC-funded smartphone app developed by the University of Bristol and Hull University, will appear on the BBC’s One Show this evening to encourage everyone to help save conker trees by using their mobile devices.
Horse chestnut trees, whose conker seeds are responsible for hours of autumn fun, are under attack from a moth which arrived in London in 2002 and now covers half the country. The moth’s caterpillars eat the tree’s leaves from the inside.
The research teams at the Universities of Bristol and Hull have devised a mobile phone app allowing people to upload a photo of any horse chestnut leaves they come across, either with or without the indication of alien moths, which will pin-point their location and help to build up a picture of which areas of the country are suffering most, and how bad the problem is.
Dr Darren Evans from the University of Hull said: “This is an exciting opportunity to take part in a real scientific experiment on a national scale. It’s a big mission for which we’re reliant on the public’s help. Dr Michael Pocock from the University of Bristol added: “We’ve developed the mobile phone app to make it even easier for people to take in this research project. We have over 8000 people involved so far and we’re hopeful that they will play their part in discovering more about the threat to the future of our much cherished conker trees.
“We know that the moth moves at about 30 miles a year across the UK’s horse chestnut tree population. We’d like people in south west and northern England, Wales and Scotland to take part our conker tree science project so we can understand how far the moth has travelled, and people elsewhere else to report how bad the damage is in their area,” added Dr Pocock.
David Flanders JISC’s programme manager for the project says: “Science is for everyone and now anyone carrying around a smart phone can take part. The power of involving citizens scientists by utilising new technologies is only going to get more exciting in coming years as every one of us will be carrying around scientific tools in our pockets, which means we can help scientists and have fun doing it.
“The conker tree science - leaf app demonstrates how scientists are going to need to innovate new science techniques around tools like GPS (Geospatial Positioning Software) in combination with their science so we can all be citizen scientists working in a laboratory (virtually) beside them.”
Stephen Fry, one of the most prolific and followed twitterers with just under 3 million followers, tweeted about the app last month.
The study, the largest of its kind in the UK, will give the most up-to-date picture of the spread of the moth. The records will be checked by the project team and then passed to Forest Research to add to its national database, which has been recording the spread of the moth since its arrival and now covers half of the country, including most of south-central England, East Anglia, the Midlands and has most recently spread to Tyneside and Cornwall.
Take part in the experiment and download the app from the project website.
Conker Tree Science is supported by the Natural Environment Research Council (www.nerc.ac.uk) and the development of the Conker Tree Science app is supported by JISC (www.jisc.ac.uk).
ALT, The wireless network just worked. Association for Learning Technology.
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A_L_T: JISC's Malcolm Read has been made an Honorary Life Member of ALT - http://t.co/D45Uac8K
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