Hannah Whaley . com

A recent study informs us that 75% of 16-24 year olds feel that they “couldn’t live without the internet”. I hope we can presume that the removal of technology does not pose any actual physiological threat to their well being, and they are referring to the “OMG, like, soooo totally dead” kind of not living. Sadly 16-24 has not been my checkbox of honesty for a while now, but it still made me ponder about a week that I recently spent with very limited access to technology and internet. We found ourselves in a technology black spot in the Lake District with no phone signal, no 3G or Edge, slower than modem internet (3G USB dongle was insistent on using all processor power available to maintain a steady speed of 1kbps) and a TV that was used almost solely for the baby channels (sis-in-law and baby were with us). I did survive, but a series of very minor events led me form a similar conclusion to that expressed in the study:

1. My husband always buys a new PC game for going on holiday, to play when others are reading or generally having downtime. While PC games don’t require an internet connection just to play, it seems they now require a connection to install themselves and do their anti-piracy stuff before they will let you play. Dongle not working, we paid our £1 for 1 hour of wifi at the reception area (several times) and downloaded approximately nothing. After a day of failed attempts, we eventually resorted to finding a McDonalds and buying a Big Mac meal in order to use their wifi. All for something that previously we hadn’t even known required the internet.

2. A chap on local radio said that the new Cheryl Cole video was “not what he’d expected from her at all” which made me curious enough to whip out my iPhone and have a look. Unable to get YouTube, I became irked at every mention of it on the radio thereafter. My hubbie reminded me that I could always watch it when we got home the following week, instantly creating a fine line between passing interest and semi-obsessive Cheryl superfan.

3. Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace prize. Despite the fact that I have followed every minutiae of media effort surrounding him for the last 2 years, I was four days late in finding out this news. Even now, there is a significant part of me that doesn’t really think it happened, because I didn’t *see* it happen online. I didn’t get the realtime reaction and interest on twitter and by the time I was reading about it online, it was very much in the post-analysis phase.

So have any of these things had any significant impact in my life? Of course not, but either I’ve become a product of the spoilt brat culture of modern civilisation and can’t wait for anything, or the promise of ubiquitous computing has arrived and changed the way I expect to interact with the world and events around me. I am going to choose to believe the latter.

In real terms, Husband played his game, I watched YouTube when I got home and world events have now been proven to happen even without my watchful gaze. However, in the not too distant past, McDonalds was merely a place to eat, favourite videos would wait to be viewed on Thursdays on Top of the Pops, and at some point in the week it may have occurred to me to buy a newspaper. It highlights how automated our expectation of access has become and that it now requires a conscious adjustment to live without it. I guess that’s what the teens were trying to tell us in their survey.

There is an exciting new post available within my division of the Library and Learning Centre at the University of Dundee. From the advert:

“A range of enterprising academic software systems are in use at Dundee, and the Systems Developer will be part of a proactive team to further integrate and enhance these systems - ensuring they meet student and staff expectations. The team has an established reputation at an international level and is committed to building on existing work to remain an exemplar institution in this field.

The LLC is seeking to appoint a highly-skilled individual who can demonstrate aptitude in software design, web application programming, scripting, and data reporting. These skills will be used to design and develop add-ons, integrations, new functionality and automations, and contribute to upgrades, testing and issue resolution across all systems.”

I would encourage anybody interested to get in touch or send in an application - this one is a great opportunity for somebody.

Full details and further particulars.

I gave a presentation at the recent Blackboard World Conference (#bbworld09) in Washington DC on ‘Groupwork Assessment’. The powerpoint for this presentation is available on the Blackboard Connections site. The talk was videoed by the 360 people, and you can watch the video here. Thanks to everyone that turned up - and asked questions and spoke to me at the end. The feedback was all positive, and appeared to highlight the genuine requirement for a system of this kind to be more widely available within Blackboard. The rise in group teaching and assessment, and the issues students face with it, appear to be consistent across disciplines, year groups, institutions and continents.

The ability to work effectively in a team is seen as a crucial skill within many professions and industry sectors. There has been a rise in the use of assessed group work in many disciplines over recent years. There are numerous reasons for this increase, including larger class sizes (therefore making it efficient to have group submissions) and a greater emphasis on employability and transferable skills.

Despite this rapid progression, methods for assessing the individual contributions of team members have not advanced significantly causing a feeling of dissatisfaction amongst many students. Faculty are also concerned about the possibility of students gaining high marks because of their team’s effort, when the individual contribution was unsatisfactory.

An approach to collaboration has been developed that teaches about team work by focusing on assessment criteria and peer evaluation aspects of group working. As the amount of group work that students complete continues to increase, enhancing their learning in this area helps them achieve more from project work and benefit from collaborative learning approaches. By ensuring fairer grading for individual contributions to groups, students are less stressed by the challenges of team working and are better able to focus simultaneously on the project deliverable and team interactions.

It has been a busy few weeks, and I thought I would share a couple of recent challenges with you.

I recently spent two weeks in Germany, completing a 2000 mile driving holiday in our Lotus Elise. We spent some time at the Nurburgring - the longest, most challenging and unforgiving racetrack in the world. I chose to drive a lap - a genuinely nerve-wracking experience and not a decision I took lightly given the well documented dangers of the track. Also driving the 13 mile ring was a Lambo, Corvette ZR-1, Ferarri F430 Scuderia, Nissan GTR, and more GT3 RSs than you could shake a stick at - all doing some serious speeds on track. It was an amazing experience, a genuine feeling of accomplishment and I am incredibly glad I chose to tackle it.

This was not the only challenge of the last few weeks. Immediately before I left for Germany I had a job interview, and I have been delighted to accept the position of Assistant Director of the Library and Learning Centre at the University of Dundee, responsible for Research and Systems. I am looking forward to working more closely with the Library and Learning Centre staff to build on existing work and tackle the many challenges being presented within this area - not least the changes in the publishing sector, effective search, integrations, open access repositories and research management initiatives.

This week I am at BbWorld09 in Washington DC and have been presenting on both the challenges with Groupwork Assessment and with effective implementation of content systems for learning and teaching. Common themes from talking to colleagues here have centred on  moving elearning systems forward (the adoption of Bb9) and providing stable, integrated systems that meet our staff and student’s expectations for modern working. It never fails to impress me how much progress there is in the sector year on year, and yet how we feel constantly challenged by the needs and requirements of the university community. I understand how people can feel swamped by this, but it is important to realise just how quickly we can adapt, and how far we have already risen to meet the challenge of achieving 21st century education.

I hope that challenges of all kinds continue to present themselves to me in life, as the biggest challenges tend to bring the best opportunities with them.