2012 UCISA Technology Enhanced Learning Report

2012 UCISA Technology Enhanced Learning Report for higher education in the UK

by Richard Walker, Julie Voce and Jebar Ahmed

Summary of conclusions

1. Enhancing the quality of learning and teaching remains the primary driver for considering using TEL; the other leading drivers from the 2010 and 2008 Surveys — meeting student expectations and improving access to learning for students off campus remain at second and third place respectively in the rankings. Improving access to learning for distance learners has risen to fourth place in the rankings.

2. Availability of TEL support staff is still the leading factor in encouraging the development of TEL. Central university senior management support and school/departmental senior management support have risen to second and third places in the rankings, overtaking availability and access to tools. The other drivers remain unchanged in their rank order since the 2010 Survey.

3. The top two barriers to TEL development remain the same as those identified in the 2010 Survey, namely lack of time and money. Departmental/school culture — a new response option for the 2012 Survey – was ranked third. Encouragingly, academic staff knowledge has dropped to fifth in the rankings, indicating greater progress with staff training and awareness of TEL.

4. Teaching, learning and assessment remains the leading internal strategy influencing institutional TEL development. The key change since 2010 has been the emergence of the Corporate strategy, which has overtaken Library and learning resources as the second most commonly cited internal strategy. This is particularly noticeable within Post-92 institutions. In contrast, the declining influence of dedicated e-learning strategies is further confirmed. HEFCE and JISC strategies remain the leading external strategies informing institutional thinking on TEL developments.

5. Blackboard Learn is still the most used enterprise or institutional VLE, but Moodle has increased in usage as an enterprise solution and remains the most commonly used VLE platform when departmental/school implementations are also considered. Adoption of other commercial and open source platforms is negligible across the sector, reflecting the further maturing of the VLE market.

6. Evaluation activity in reviewing VLE provision is well established across the sector, with nearly two thirds of institutions which responded to the Survey having conducted a review in the last two years. Institutions using Blackboard WebCT as their main VLE have recorded the highest level of evaluation activity for their platform, in comparison with other VLE groups reflected in the survey data. Change in supplier provision for a supported system tops the list of reasons given for initiating a review.

7. Plagiarism detection, e-submission and e-assessment tools remain the most common centrally supported software in use across the sector. E-portfolio, wiki and blog tools are also well established but support for podcasting tools has declined since the 2010 Survey.

8. Social networking and blog tools remain the most common non-centrally supported software controlled by staff and students. Document sharing also appears to be well established. Comparing centrally provided and non-centrally provided provision, social networking tools appear to be firmly adopted at a local level, but are not a feature of central provision. Blog provision and document sharing tools, in contrast, are well established in both domains across institutions.

9. Although supplementary use of the web to support module delivery remains the most common use of TEL, the proportion of web supplemented modules has steadily decreased over the years since the 2003 Survey when this question was first posed, with web dependent modules involving interaction with content and modules involving interaction with a combination of content and communication tasks both increasing in activity. This suggests that progress has been made in embedding TEL as a key element of course delivery, engaging students in its use as a feature of their learning experience. However, fully online courses have decreased as a proportion of TEL activity over the years and remain a niche area of activity.

10. The leading services optimised for mobile devices by institutions are access to library services, email and course announcements. Timetabling information, access to course materials and personal calendars are also popular mobile enabled services. These developments are being implemented institution wide as centrally supported services, most commonly in support of iPad, iPhone and Android devices. The more interactive tools in support of learning and teaching activities such as collaboration software (blogs, wikis and discussion boards) have not attracted as much investment to date as centrally supported mobile services.

11. Evaluation of the impact of TEL tools and systems on the student learning experience is well established with well over half of the institutions responding to the Survey having conducted studies, but evaluation of pedagogic practices is less common. Scottish universities have the highest proportion of institutions which have conducted evaluation studies of pedagogic practices.

12. The economic climate appears to have had an impact on institutional services with just under half of respondents reporting changes made in TEL support staff provision, with just under a quarter reporting a reduction in the number of TEL staff and ten institutions reporting the restructuring of their departments since the last Survey. The establishment of outsourced support for TEL services remains quite limited though across the sector and has only really been implemented for student email services and to a lesser degree for VLE hosting.

13. There has also been a financial impact on the training and development activities promoted to TEL support staff, with institutions reporting reduced attendance at events and reduced budgets as the major changes since 2010. Whilst national conferences/seminars and internal staff development remain the most promoted development activities, there has been a marked increase in the promotion of accreditation, in particular HEA and CMALT accreditation. Looking to the future, institutions anticipate increased virtual attendance at events in the future.

14. Mobile technologies have moved to the top of the list of the items making the most demand on TEL support teams. E-assessment and lecture capture remain in the list of top five demands, along with VLEs where the focus is now on how institutions change to a new system or embed use of their current VLE within their institution. Web 2.0 is now seen as much less demanding and podcasting has disappeared from the list of items making demands on support.

15. Mobile technologies also top the list of challenges which institutions face, followed by staff development, legal/policy issues and e-assessment, with staff development, strategies/policies and support staff seen as the primary remedies – echoing similar responses to the 2010 Survey.

http://www.ucisa.ac.uk/~/media/groups/ssg/surveys/TEL_survey_2012_with%20Apps_final

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Stephen