highered, Horizon Report

What’s On the Horizon [REPORT] for 2020?

For those of you who read the annual Horizon Report — you know that another one is around the corner. As EDUCAUSE has taken over the helm for the development of this technology forecast/guide for higher education, it has been interesting to see how this report is created as a member of the 2020 HR panel. After a few iterations of input, voting, slacking, emailing, side conversations, and exploring what is going on — it appears we have come to identify a few trends for postsecondary teaching and learning. Here are the six emerging technologies and practices for teaching and learning in higher ed identified for the next report:

  1. AI/Machine Learning Educational Applications
  2. Open Educational Resources
  3. Adaptive Learning Technologies
  4. Analytics for Student Success
  5. XR (AR/VR/MR/Haptic)
  6. Elevation of instructional design, learning engineering, & UX design in pedagogy

These will be flushed out further when the 2020 Horizon Report comes out; however, one critical piece of this document will need to include some examples and exemplars. EDUCAUSE would like to hear from you — the community — of professionals, scholars, educators, students, and more. They would like to learn about your projects or initiatives related to these six areas that best illustrate these technologies and practices in action. If you have any work from, for, and by postsecondary campus stakeholders — let EDUCAUSE know. If your institution or organization is working with any of the six (mentioned above) trending areas, I would encourage you to submit your project(s) or initiative(s) for the 2020 Horizon Report. [Pssst… you are more than welcome to submit more than one project/initiative.]

2020 Horizon Report Call: https://tinyurl.com/HR2020call

Are you piloting a new program? Do you have a research project on the topic you care to share? Or are you faculty evaluating and testing one of these emerging trends or practices? Let them know. Any initiative/project is welcome no matter what the form or stage you are at — seriously! The goal is provide readers of this report a more concrete sense of how these technologies and practices are playing out in higher education. If your work is applicable to any of the six, then you might be invited to author a post for the EDUCAUSE T&L blog Transforming Higher Ed.

Submit your work for the 2020 Horizon Report at: https://tinyurl.com/HR2020call

Deadline: December 4, 2019

Social Media

The State of Social Media @ #edu14

State of #SocialMedia in Higher Ed (2)

Looks like EDUCAUSE 2014 (#edu14) is just around the corner.

I am heading out to Orlando on Sunday and will be sharing my dissertations research at the #edu14 Virtual Seminar with Tanya Joosten (@tjoosten) on Monday, September 29, 2014. Interested in learning more about it? Sign up (HERE) for the online, half-day seminar to help with your social media planning:

Seminar 2A – The State of Social Media Guidance: Implications of Guidelines, Policies, and Practice in Higher Education (separate registration required)

Higher education institutions are using social media to communicate and engage their campus community; however, very few are examining the impact and implications of social media guidance. From research to practical applications, this seminar will detail the current state of social media guidance in postsecondary education and identify key elements of guiding principles that offer suggestions for student support, teaching, training and development, research, infrastructure, and more.

OUTCOMES
Participants will be able to:

  1. Articulate current higher education social media guidelines and policy document trends, categories, themes, and patterns emerging from research
  2. Identify practical components for effective social media guidelines for campuses
  3. Create meaningful guidelines and policies to positively impact teaching, learning, research, and development at your institution

Since I am only at #edu14 for a short stint,  I plan on making the most of my time. Here is my quick hit list of sessions that are in line with my research agenda:

If I was staying longer at #edu14, I would most likely attend these sessions:

Will you be at EDUCAUSE 2014? What is your focus and objective for attending this year? More importantly, will we be able to have a bit of a chat around these issues. I hope so. See you @ #edu14!

EdTech, Professional Development, Social Media

My #edu13 Sampling Tour at @EDUCAUSE

With limited time in my October schedule, I was only able to drop into the 2013 EDUCAUSE annual conference (#edu13) in Anaheim, CA for a couple of days. It’s unfortunate that I was not able to stay longer; however I’ll share my sample of the #edu13 higher education and technology conference. {This is what happens when you are traveling to conferences, writing a dissertation proposal, advising for Spring 2014 registration, teaching a class & training for a marathon all in the same month. Lessons learned for next year.}

I was fortunate to be able to attend #edu13 since Tanya Joosten (@tjoosten) asked me to co-facilitate a virtual workshop on Social Media for Teaching and Learning. Much of this session shared ideas from Tanya’s book, our research article, and our practical application for utilizing social media for learning/teaching. During the session we modeled our teaching/learning expectations by encouraging participants to interact & dialogue with us on Twitter. Our emphasis was not on the tool, but more on the social learning and interactions you can have to augment educational experiences:

Let's get social #edusocmedia ....its not the tech #edu13Here is our digital handout from the workshop: http://bit.ly/edusocmedia13

Before I had to leave EDUCAUSE on Wednesday, I attended the #edu13 Prepare for Lift-Off: Becoming a Successful IT Pilot Site Panel and took a few digital notes: http://bit.ly/pilotpanel

How can the solution improve student learning? Ask @tjoosten @amcollier & @Veletsianos #edu13

During this session, Tanya Joosten (@tjoosten), Amy Collier (@amcollier), and George Veletsianos (@veletsianos) discussed the TOP 10 questions every institution should ask before piloting a technology solution for learning at their campus:

  1. Why should this solution be introduced to the campus?
  2. How can the solution improve student learning?
  3. Does your institution have readiness or capacity to pilot a new solution?
  4. Who is the audience and are the stakeholders?
  5. What is the pedagogical model that will lead to the greatest?
  6. How will a vendor be selected for the new technology?
  7. How would faculty be selected to participate?
  8. How do you evaluate the impact of the solution on the identified outcomes?
  9. How do you diffuse the innovation on campus and beyond?
  10. What are your questions?

Since I missed out on the live happenings, I made sure to follow the #edu13 backchannel and my tweeps while traveling home. If you don’t have much time or interest in text mining all the many tweets, The Chronicle curated few conversations on Twitter and EdTech Magazine compiled a list of people to follow at EDUCAUSE 2013.

Good morning #edu13

MOOC, Web Design

#EDUSprint 3 – Creating the IT Architecture for the Connected Age

Here’s the recap for the last EDUCAUSE webinar of the EDU Sprint series: #EDUSprint 3 – Creating the IT Architecture for the Connected Age. Today’s session talked about the role of IT on campus, technology planning, and the infrastructure of IT services for digital learning.

#EDUsprint 3 - Is IT Creating a New, Connected Age?

The session discussed the processes, management strategies, and governance structures from the following higher education leaders on the panel:

  • Tracy Futhey, Vice President, Information Technology and Chief Information Officer, Duke University
  • Tracy Schroeder, Vice President, Information Services and Technology, Boston University
  • Ethan Benatan, Vice President, Chief Information Officer, and Chief Strategy Officer, Marylhurst University

Many spoke about how their IT unit is thinking deeper about services to connect to learning and the needs on their campus in a holistic manner. Tracy Futhey shared her ideas around IT services, and how we not only need to consider location within the organization, but more about the delivery and methods for our IT units.

IT Services

Although there was talk about campus-wide strategy, I rarely heard much about bringing others around the table for this discussion. Much of higher education still operates in silos, so the full potential of connectedness and planning technology in learning cannot just occur in an IT unit, academic department or business solutions. I think that more administrative leaders need to bring faculty, staff, graduate students, undergraduate students, IT developers, and external shareholders together for these strategy meetings. in higher education. As our campus environments change, so does the IT needs and services to support learning and engagement.

I did appreciate when Tracy Schoeder shared about the Digital Learning Initiative and Technology Planning at Boston University. Although emerging technological trends evolve, I think that planning and assessment need to be part of the regular planning cycle.

Strategic IT Planning - The BU Example #edusprint I also appreciated that BU puts a focus on the human aspect of their planning, and not just the IT solution. Organizational structures should be assessed and reviewed for the IT architecture, to meet the needs and understand the institutional goals for learning.

Human Architecture for Digital Learning @ BU

Finally Ethan Benatan, started with a few predictions on how IT will change, be challenged, and move in the future – which is always a difficult task. I did appreciate that he shared a design process… and that it was just that – A PROCESS. There will not be a single solution to each campus environment, and it takes some agility and insight to move your higher education institution in the right IT direction and continue to assess your needs.

Here are some new links & reads from the session in no particular order:

Did you miss the last of the 3-day #EDUsprint? No worries. Here are a few resources for you:

You’re very welcome. Happy learning!

MOOC

#EDUsprint 2 – How Technology Can Change Pedagogy

The EDUCAUSE EDU Sprints continues, so why not share what I gleaned from today’s session. With a lot of information being shared, it actually feels like more of a marathon, so here’s the breakdown from the #EDUsprint 2:  How Technology Can Change Pedagogy webinar.

How Tech Can Change Pedagogy

The session was lead by the following panelists who shared their thoughts about gong “Beyond MOOCs”:

  • Hank Lucas, Professor of Information Systems, University of Maryland College Park
  • W. Eric L. Grimson, Chancellor, MIT
  • Susan Grajek, Vice President, Data, Research, and Analytics, EDUCAUSE

Hank Lucas sees great challenges and opportunities with blended learning, online learning, and MOOCs; however he wants to charge institutions with more than the technological trends. Due to these emerging technologies and social platforms, there are many different ways to connect with our students; however we have to be purposeful and think critically about our instructional design.  

The Survivor Model via Hank Lucas

Lucas shares his concept of ‘The Survivor Model’ (screen shot of slide), that outlines how disruptive technologies will impact higher education and learning. [Side note: You will find “disrupt” on the #sxswEDU 2013 bingo card I made back in March.} The language always seems so doom and gloom, especially when asked what the “threat” for learning technology is on our campus i.e. students, adminstration or faculty. Roll the cliche…

Lucas thinks more institutions need to question where they stand with online learning, blended learning, and MOOCs, as “The schools that compete vigorously with faculty who figure out how to add value to their courses will survive and flourish.” And I would agree with one of the final points he shared:

Eric Grimson gave his 2 cents of higher education and learning technology change, which included ideas around learning techniques, active engagement, suggestions for assessment, and a “new” accronym to add to our campus alphabet soup: SPOC (small private online course)

The second segment seemed to dive into ideas and themes being played out in our schema of learning in higher education. Grimson shared ideas and suggestions to help support online learning, which included:

A number of articles were shared in the streams, so here are a selection reads from today’s webinar:

More resources for online learning, instructional design, flipping, MOOC-ing, and then some:

Unfortunately I had to dip out of this session early and I will have to catch the rest of the webinar via the recording – but here are some interesting takeaways I found on the #EDUSprint Twitter backchannel that should be noted: