This document summarises the key points of the JISC report on on-line innovation in higher education and begins to identify and elaborate the main points for designing a learning and teaching strategy. This document largely selects and paraphrases key sections of the reports. Notes are added in brackets. Key issues and concepts are highlighted.

Executive Summary

Currently the UK lags behind its most significant international comparators in generating and making available high quality modern learning and teaching resources. What is required is a world class ICT infrastructure tailored for the needs of HEIs which can be personalised for students lecturers, researchers and administrative staff. (What needs a good deal of elaboration here is what is meant by personalisation).

The UK should and could be world leading in on-line learning, but this will depend to some extent on managing and curating research data more effectively. This relates to two key themes of the report - the linking of research and teaching and the necessity to develop and make accessible, within and beyond the HE sector, high quality open learning resources. The development of a new and innovative approach to virtual education depends on the development of a core of open learning resources organised in a coherent way to support on-line and blended learning by all HEIs and to make it readily available in non-HE environments. This points to another key theme of the report, the role of HEIs in contributing to non-traditional students, professional development and life-long learning. Few if any HEIs could achieve this on their own but "it should not cost more to make course material openly available on professionally managed repository platforms". There could be significant additional costs in describing and formatting research data so that it is usable by others. A review should be undertaken to identify key players in HE e-learning and in the linking of research and learning. (Would Leeds impress here? It is not the case that course materials are necessarily produced with wider production values in mind and there are copyright issues. Leeds University needs to consider how active a role it wants, if any, in contributing to the proposed repository of freely available learning resources. This project will investigate the current level of involvement that Leeds has in open learning content initiatives).

The report recommends that the way forward will be to establish a small number of centres, probably made up of big clusters of HEIs catering for similar student populations, with expertise in educational technology and e-pedagogy that will be charged with changing the culture across HE, developing a comprehensive staff and students skills training programme, and creating a nationally co-ordinated collection of open learning resources. Building an effective and competitive on-line learning capacity for undergraduates and postgraduates will meet the changing needs of students and stimulate growth in both HE and the skills sector. (Leeds University needs to consider how best it can position itself to take advantage of the opportunities that may arise from the formation of these proposed composite expert centres. This will involve some estimation of our current expertise and activity in comparison with other HEIs).

There should be encouragement and support for linking library, information and IT services in the development of strategies for research, learning and teaching.

Introduction

Internet 'literacy' skills are not adequate. In addition on-line resources and associated information and data management, are insufficiently exploited. It it necessary to develop the competencies and skills in teaching and support staff.

ITC needs to be more effectively exploited to enable UK HE to remain at the forefront in research, learning and teaching. This applies to campus based HE that needs to combine e-learning with traditional approaches (i.e. blended learning) and distance learning delivery. HE is increasingly relevant to learning and content holding institutions across the public sector, reaching citizens throughout their lives.

There is a lack of vision. The library as an institutional strategic player is often overlooked  because the changes and new capabilities in library services over the past 15 years are not sufficiently recognised and there are not always effective links between the strategies for research and learning and teaching. (Leeds has a good record to build on with these particular issues).

Learning and Teaching

Today's children use the Internet as an integral part of their lives. Web 2.0 technologies are inherently interactive allowing responses and contributions. Elders will often lag behind. The interactive capacity of these technologies will increase.

The longer term future of HE. Continued expansion offering more 'layered' and tailored courses provided by a range of institutions from research-led universities to skills-based courses provided and accredited by non-traditional providers. There will be less dependency on public funding and more from the private sector. This will be reflected in the thinking and composition of the HE sector.

The traditional UK student base may not increase due to demographic and financial factors although schools are endeavouring to produce more high quality students. There is a huge and largely unmet demand for HE from SE Asia and the developing world. Growth can also come from professional development and adult education but critical will be the ability to attract international students. However, this attractiveness will depend on retaining a reputation of excellence for UK students. (Where would Leeds like to fit into this scenario? It is unlikely that any one institution will be able to exploit all the new 'market' opportunities).

UK HEIs must be flexible, innovative and imaginative. It is a requirement that a body of research and expertise is adequately funded to create innovative approaches. It is also necessary that teaching staff and their students are adequately skilled in making effective, imaginative, widespread and critical use of ICT facilities and high quality open learning content. E-learning offerings will be developed that are appropriate for an institution's student body. Research led HEIs will integrate research outputs into learning and offer on-line resources and services to part-time and distance, including overseas, students. (Leeds?) Other institutions may provide mostly on-line service to non-traditional students who seldom, if ever, visit the campus.

UK is not doing enough to provide a more-or-less complete on-line educational experience to students who cannot enjoy a conventional campus based learning experience, particularly where demand form students outstrips supply - the emergent economies of SE Asia and South America and other developing countries. The UK is doing very little. Some HEIs could be encouraged to make virtual education offerings for this largely untapped market of national and overseas students, exploiting open learning content. To this end a few exemplar universities should be encourage, including the OU.

Student Experience

Most universities now have VLEs. To some extent this allows students to learn and interact with their peers and teachers almost independently of time and place. This ready access to content is not matched by training in the traditional skills of finding and using information and in 'learning how to learn' in a technology, information and network-rich world. The Google and Facebook generation are at ease with the Internet and WWW but they do not use it well. There are issues of plagiarism, shallow searching and uncritical use of sources. Many staff are also not skilled in the use of the Internet, do not fully exploit the potential of their VLEs, are pushed beyond their comfort zones and are often not able to impart new skills to students.

The report includes a chart identifying where students are pushed beyond their comfort zone. This includes submitting assignments on-line, using and making podcasts, and making wikis. There are other things they are more comfortable using and doing but are not familiar with. These include using VLEs, posting questions to tutors, emailing teachers, and using their existing on-line social networks to discuss university work. (Some of this does not necessarily agree with my experience and I will collect information and views on this from students at Leeds).

The use of Web 2.0 technologies is greatly improving the student learning experience at many HEIs who are enhancing their teaching practices as a result. A large majority of young people use on-line tools and environments to support social interaction and their own learning provides an important context to think about new models of delivery. (Informal and vicarious learning).

"Web 2.0 ...is an interactive and participatory experience ...gives a whole new meaning to 'community of scholars and...internationalisation" B Gourley. There will be opportunities and demands not witnessed before and a need to understand to benefits of these technologies to improve learning effectiveness, engage with pedagogic practices and meet changing student expectations. http://www.clex.org.uk.

Effective use of e-learning and pedagogic approaches will differ for different sectors of HE. Research led universities need to link research resources with teaching and learning. (This implies outputs and content rather than staff expertise as researchers - overly narrow approach). HEIs that attract a large number of P-T and distance students - often use e-learning well. FE colleges will need to ba able tao access the same resources as HE students. (Role for HE as open content providers). HEIs that provide entirely for distance learners, e.g. OU. International and intranational taught Masters courses (e.g. Leeds Disability Studies MA by distance learning). Career professional development where HEIs could seek a greater share of the market.

No 'one size fits all' solution or approach to e-learning and e-pedagogy. Generally a move towards a more student focused and flexible system which will assist servicing an increasing international and competitive market. This require a cultural change for teachers, institutions and learners especially with regard to sharing and re-use of learning materials. Institutions will need to work together but to their own agendas.

Students will have changing expectations in the future. HE should also have some input into what needs to be delivered in schools, not just in the use of technologies but also to ensure they are intelligent users of information, knowledge and data. These are skills to carry through university and beyond. (Life long learning and 'expert' learner agendas).

Students expect and value on-line resources but also expect contact with teachers and professors. HE must provide a blended learning approach. The provision of high quality learning materials will free up staff time for contact and on-line teaching functions can be enhanced. The appropriate use of ICT in a blended learning approach can help address some of the issues arising from decreased staff/student ratios. (At Leeds blended learning involves a considerable amount of face-to-face contact with on-campus students. The communication and collaboration facilities provided by Web 2.0 technologies can provide contact, communication and interaction with off-campus students).

Open Learning Content

The UK is lagging behind in creating and providing open source learning materials. In the UK most on-line material should be openly available to all. Apart from benefits to students and teachers this would be a valuable marketing tool to attract overseas students who can be local or distance learners. It can stimulate virtual learning by a variety of educational institutions and providers and facilitate life long learning, both formal and informal. It would help prepare student prior to entry to HE. (But materials made available freely will be used by institutions we are in competition with and students, UK or overseas, will use them when registered with institutions and providers other than those that provided the OS resources - the problem of freeloading. Many HEIs will see their quality materials as giving them competitive advantage. However, the OU's OpenContent initiative may contradict this view).
 
There is a need for a mechanism to assure standards and quality. Free on-line materials are only the beginning of education. Effective use of ICT is needed to inspire, enthuse and engage students as well as facilitating understanding and the creation of new knowledge. (Use of OS resources still needs integration in a coherent course narrative with locally produced linking and wrap-around materials, tutoring and learning support, assessment and accreditation processes and some ICT infrastructure for delivery).
 
There are obvious reputational and visibility benefits to institutions involved. Research indicates that most students use OS materials in the context of course they are taking. Good courses do not rely on textbooks but will assume textbooks have been read and only use on-line material. There are necessary academic and on-line tutoring and support skills required to exploit OS resources effectively. Building on the work of others is a normal aspect of research. The same process can use OS learning materials to create new materials. (But 'scaffolding' activity may refer directly to structured reading of text book materials).
 
UK HEIs must address the demand for virtual, largely on-line education in the UK and elsewhere. This is also essential for facilitating lifelong learning. The diversity of needs, particularly international, must be met with diversity of provision. HEIs already committed to e-learning should be encouraged, where appropriate to their context, missions and communities, to develop ways to address these needs and develop their international reputations. Clusters of institutions focusing on the on-line education needs of different constituencies of students should pool expertise and stimulate innovation. (Leeds needs a clear understanding of its "context, mission and communities" to make decisions about developing strategies to do this).
 
UK needs a core of open access learning materials available to all universities. National centres of excellence will engage with other institutions, provide quality control, essential updating, skills training, and research and development in educational technology, e-pedagogy, and educational psychology. All HEIs should exploit virtual education as appropriate to their students' needs and their learning strategies.
 
A review should be carried out to identify key players in HE. A comprehensive national resource of freely available open learning content, based on an appropriate infrastructure, should be established. A discussion is required about digital literacy and how to embed good practice across all educational sectors including staff and trainee teachers.

Research and Innovation

The main driver of ICT in research led universities has been the needs of research. Massive amounts of data are being produced and there is little evidence that the UK is gearing up to exploit this. This partly due to our loss of focus on e-science. The Office of Science and Innovation (OSI) is developing an e-infrastructure for science and innovation many features of which are equally applicable to a learning and teaching environment. The diagram in the report representing the main features of a science and innovation e-infrastructure can easily be modified to represent and e-learning infrastructure. It is necessary to look across research and learning to ensure techniques developed in one environment are applied to best effect in the other. There needs to be continued and increased investment in content digitisation in support of both research and learning.

Management and Administration of Institutions

The main point of this section of the report for the purposes of this project is the note that despite on-line resources and e-learning being massively beneficial to work-based learning, too little is being done in HEIs to exploit this despite some progress.

Issues of Scale

It is taken for granted that most students are ardent users of social networking through Web 2.0 technologies. HEIs are beginning tailoring there offerings in the light of this assumption but generally are not catering sufficiently for students changing expectations based on their experience. The question is how to move on form the pockets of activity by enthusiasts to achieve wider institutional impact. More should be done to provide students with services based on their ICT experience and expectations and that places them in the role of active, skilled and collaborative creators of knowledge rather than just consumers of information. (In my experience they are not).

Annex A

Development of e-learning tools. Research shows that there are tangible gains from employing e-learning - improved retention results from improved personalisation and mentoring afforded by technologies like e-portfolios. E-learning also offers enhanced recruitment. Main findings of s survey of HEIs show important gains are in recruitment form new markets, creating competitive advantage, and enhancing the quality of learning and teaching and the student experience. Main obstacles seem to be lack of staff knowledge and lack of time.
 
There is still an opportunity for institutions to engage further with Web 2.0 technologies to enhance student learning but in a way that is driven by students themselves. But staff require support to be able to do this. And students need help to understand best practice for checking validity and quality of Internet resources.
 

How ICT can Support Improved Pedagogies. Improvement in pass rates (10%); in learning styles, insight and reflection; in skills, employability and confidence; in satisfaction, motivation, attendance and retention; in recruitment through greater accessibility and reaching new markets.

 
It may not always be appropriate to think in terms of improved pedagogies but rather in terms of improved learning opportunities. Connectivity; access to global scholarly resources and networks. Flexibility; choices on place, pace, time, mode. Interactivity; rapid feedback, discussion. Learning design tools can improve gaining the advantages and planning, regardless of the pedagogic approach.
 
Improved pedagogies; specific pedagogic approaches. Three broad pedagogic approaches: associative, constructive and situative. These can be mapped onto different technical requirements.
 
Social learning environments and collaboration tools can support peer learning and team work. Web 2.0 technologies like wikis, social tagging, shared bookmarking and reviewing can support shared knowledge building and scholarly collaboration. Inquiry-based learning is enhanced by a range of e-learning technologies such as web searches, bibliographic tools, data sets, etc. (Are these 3 examples supposed to be, in order, examples  of the 3 broad pedagogic approaches?).
 
Improved opportunities to engage in learning can be provided with learners in the driving seat, in line with learner's needs and preferences. But to achieve this learners will need some new skills as well as the traditional ones. Learners need to acquire an increasingly complex range of skills for effective lifelong learning, including information literacy skills and e-learning skills. Despite most students access to and familiarity with on-line forms of interaction there is still a large skills deficit in e-literacy skills. Most learners look to their institutions to help them develop the skills of discovering, evaluating and using information in academic contexts and in using the technologies to achieve deeper learning goals. These skills are best acquired if integrated into curricula and practiced in ways that are relevant to learners' subject interests and long-term learning goals.