JISC Supporting your institution

Meet student expectations with mobile learning

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 11:18:56 GMT

Mobile learning allows the learner to communicate with tutors and peers, as well as access learning resources, while on the move.

Our mobile learning infoKit will guide you through the stages needed to incorporate mobile learning into your organisation’s strategy and put in place a rigorous implementation plan. It includes some quick wins and 10 steps to mobile learning adoption. It will also help you work out the cost benefit of your mobile learning strategy. As most students will bring their own mobile devices, you may be able to divert some of the cost saved on desktop computers to the provision of free technical support to students.
You may wonder how your organisation can support the wide range of mobile devices and platforms students will have. Our briefing paper champions the use of open technologies which enable learners to access networked information irrespective of which platform or devices they are using.
Mobile learning raises concerns around security, privacy and accessibility. We've produced a webcast which addresses these legal issues and guidance on accessibility and inclusion to help you maximise the potential of mobile technologies for learners with disabilities.
Although students may be familiar with using mobiles in their everyday lives, they don’t always know how to apply this to learning. Our case studies show how teaching staff have used mobile technologies to engage students successfully. You can also find more case studies in the mobile learning infoKit and making mobile learning work which addresses the use of mobile for science and engineering education.
Find out about some of the mobile apps and websites we’ve supported. Examples include an app that explores the potential of augmented reality in the teaching of healthcare students and an app that prepares law students for study and future employment.

Engage your students as agents of change

Wed, 03 Apr 2013 10:33:57 GMT

Technology has a key role to play in many innovative learning experiences and students are often quicker to see potential solutions than staff. By delivering as well as developing new experiences, students become agents of change within an institution, ensuring take-up. Our work on curriculum delivery and design has revealed many ways of engaging students in the change process.

For example, the Business School at the University of Exeter used technology to improve the experiences of a rapidly expanding, and increasingly international, student body. Students were engaged in defining and researching problems, developing solutions and implementing them. Find out how they used video, mobile phones and electronic voting systems to record lectures and interact with lecturers. As a result of this work, the use of audience response clickers in lecture theatres with large student numbers is now widespread throughout the school. The Exeter work developed a framework for considering the role students should have in a change project and 8 key factors to consider when engaging students as agents of change. Full outputs from the work, including a series of quick start guides to various technologies used, is available here.
Birmingham City University, as part of its Students as Academic Partners Scheme, has engaged students in curriculum design as well as delivery. In one example, students used technology such as video boxes to devise, deploy and analyse questions about course design. Flip cameras were also used to collect reflections on students’ learning experience. In this way, the student voice was collected and fed into decision-making.
Kingston College successfully engaged students to design and deliver a pre-induction social network site for new business students, KU chat. A previous staff-led attempt had failed. The site used a popular online format to put new students in touch with first year undergraduates who could offer support. 98% of new students using the site found it useful.
For further information see also the workshop held at the JISC conference 2011.

Manage relationships with partners to gain competitive advantage

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 14:07:29 GMT

The Wilson Review of business-university collaboration warned that “an ineffective relationship management system carries significant reputational risk”. Our work can help your organisation apply business processes and tools, such as customer relationship management (CRM) and service design, to avoid this risk and derive maximum value from customer and partner relationships.

We've developed a Relationship management 'just enough' resource to help you get started with managing your relationships with both business customers and students.
Our handbook provides a rich source of guidance on managing relationships with business and community partners. It will take you through the stages necessary to achieve good practice including:
- developing your strategy - assessing how well you’re doing at present and building a business case for future investment
- putting your strategy into operation - how to achieve 'buy-in' and manage change
- practical implementation - new policies, procedures and systems.
A message to come out of our early work is the importance of agreeing clear processes for customer relationship management across your organisation before investing in a software solution.
We’ve also developed resources to improve student relationship management, which is important when designing the high quality services that students, as paying customers, increasingly expect. However, our work has shown that many organisations are not making best use of their existing student information systems. For help, go to the student lifecycle relationship management section of the 'just enough' resource.
We also have advice on how to use student lifecycle relationship management to put students at the heart of improved service design, thus enhancing their educational experience.
Students become alumni who can be influential stakeholders and ambassadors for your organisation. Our alumni engagement projects are exploring how the use of web technologies can benefit relationships with alumni.