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Issue Contents
Community + Web 2.0 = Learning? Patricia McGee
Have you heard of Immem.com, Last.fm, or Mog.com? Do you use howdoisaythis.com or squidoo.com? Are you a member of Second Life, Everquest or Gala Online? Well, chances are, the students at your institution, the children you know, and at least some of the people you work with are members of these or a myriad of other online communities that mix information, communication, and interaction in a virtual frenzy. The proliferation of social networks and online communities has been facilitated by the rapid development of Web 2.0 applications. These new tools are strictly web-based, typically free to the user, support collaboration and interaction, and are responsive to the user. Services such as flickr.com (image sharing), del.icio.us (internet bookmark sharing), or Crowdabout (presentation sharing and annotation) engage us because they allow use, manipulate, and organize information, something difficult to do in the 20th century world of Web 1.0. The appeal of virtual communities is staggering. Consider that Facebook™ has 69 million members and Myspace™ has approximately 110 million members (Techradar, 2008) - populations larger than many countries. Technology has provided a means for interaction and communication that unites, and possibly addicts, us to knowing who is doing what, when, where, and how, not unlike having a personal journalist at our fingertips - a journalist who searches for just what we want to know about those people, things, and events who interest us. The self-forming communities that have emerged in this decade had triggered a desire to harness and utilize the power of community for learning. For higher education, there are questions about how most successfully to accomplish this. According to Lave and Wenger (1998) communities are formed around a shared common interest and are situated in a vehicle through which members are able to communicate and interact on a regular basis to discuss some form of practice. Garnering the potential power of community for learning is a challenging task. If communities are prescribed, will and can they be successful? We impose community upon learners in the form of a "course" but the continued post-course community among students is perpetuated by social connections, which may be invisible to faculty and staff. It is the social nature of community that is appealing while impossible to prescribe. Tools that support instant, satisfying, and documented interactions among communities are truly irresistible. For example, Twitter™ can tell us where our friends are and what they are doing in real time via our computer, phone, or even a Chumby™. On the other hand, some institutions are banning social network sites in an attempt to curb plagiarism and unethical exchange of answers. The question is: Where does the community reside and who should control it? Fred Stutzman sees Web 2.0 communities as object-centric (its all about the materials in the community) and ego-centric (its all about the user). Michael Anderson of the UT Telecampus adds a third type: environment centric (its all about what the environment affords the member). The tools may appear to drive community, but given the long history of communities healthily sustained by just email, the tool is not the enabler. We cannot forget it is the nature of the human mammal to congregate and interact: we are inherently social. If we draw upon our basic instincts to find a shared need and interest for community, then forming the community will naturally follow. The question really becomes: How can we facilitate the natural formation of community regardless of the technology available to us? References:
A Letter to Sloan Consortium Members and Friends Frank Mayadas, John Bourne and Bruce Chaloux For a number of years now, the Sloan-C Board has discussed the possibility of incorporating Sloan-C as a 501(c)3 non-profit that serves an international membership. Our thought has been to then evolve Sloan-C to becoming a stand-alone self-sustaining organization, in recognition of the fact that the Sloan Foundation would eventually want to re-direct its program priorities into new areas. Over the past few months, with the assistance and concurrence of the Foundation, we began a process to lead to incorporation and self-sustainability. In this message, we want to report on progress towards those goals. On Feb 15, 2008, "The Sloan Consortium" (Sloan-C) was incorporated in the state of Massachusetts for the express purpose of continuing the services and products, long supported largely by the Foundation and intended for members, that relate directly to quality online learning. The plan, as envisaged today, is for the Foundation to continue to provide support for Sloan-C in decreasing increments over the period 2009, 2010 and 2011. Thereafter, sustaining support from the Foundation will come to an end and we will be on our own. These plans are tentative right now, and in discussion with the Foundation, but we expect a firm plan to be in place by June. As of now, the existing Sloan-C Board is designated as an interim Board. Due to technical and legal reasons, Frank Mayadas is resigning as Founding President of Sloan-C , though he will remain a member of the interim Board. Looking ahead, a new board of directors will be nominated and elections held in 2009, with the new board assuming office in 2009 or 2010. Bruce Chaloux will assume interim presidency of "The Sloan Consortium" (Sloan-C) to assist in the transitioning to an elected board. The current staff of Sloan-C, hosted at Olin and Babson Colleges, will continue to operate the various services and products it presently provides to the online education community, under guidance from the President and the Board. We look forward to continuing the emphasis on quality online education begun by the Foundation, and in which we partnered for many years. There is however, a difference going forward, in that we now become responsible for increasingly generating our own support, which means a concerted marketing effort on our part to maintain current paying members and attract new institutions to the Sloan-C community. Those reading this message are already a welcome part of our community, but you can have a larger role in this new Sloan Consortium: have your school sign up for the annual Sloan-C Premium Membership, the College Pass, and Online Teaching Certificate programs. Information about membership can be found at the Sloan-C website (http://www.sloan-c.org/join/index.asp) or feel free to contact our staff at Premium@sloan-c.org. Paying memberships will be central to maintaining and expanding the services and products that Sloan-C offers (e.g. the JALN, Sloan-C View, workshops, conferences, listserv, effective practices, catalog, reports and website). Welcome to a new era, which will in some ways resemble the old era, but which in many ways will be different as online education moves ever deeper into the academic mainstream and work-force development programs, as blended and local programs grow rapidly, corporate e-Learning forms closer partnerships with academe and we begin to make closer connections to online education in K-12. We see an exciting decade ahead of us, and we'll need everyone's enthusiastic help and participation! Can We Offer the Best of Both Online and Face-to-Face Worlds? HyFlex Courses May Help Bridge the Gap Brian Beatty, Ph.D.
What if you could offer courses that would meet the needs of both local and distance students--students who love to attend classes in person for the social interaction and those who enjoy learning on their own, in their own environment, and at their own pace (to a certain extent)? What if your institution was able to offer a traditional classroom based degree program as well as a robust online degree program without doubling the cost of delivery due to parallel resource needs? What might that look like? Institutions can begin pragmatically by considering the four E's of a culture of compliance: Evaluate, Educate, Expect and Enforce. Evaluate your institution's policies and practices. To what extent do they exist? Do they suit the needs and demands of the types of programs you offer? Educate your faculty, students, administrators and staff. What kinds of information and materials are already available? Are people aware of them? Do they use them? What else might be useful? Expect compliance to be the norm. Do those in positions of authority and responsibility model compliance? Is an honest effort made to resolve questions as they arise? Is there an accessible and user friendly vehicle for getting questions answered? Enforce the rules by taking appropriate steps when necessary. Are the policies and practices nothing more than window dressing? Are they enforced consistently and in good faith? In the end, creating a culture of compliance not only serves the needs of the institution but better prepares students for the many ways in which they will continue to encounter information technologies in both their personal and professional lives. It also has an additional advantage. Acting proactively diminishes the likelihood of a visit from the AAP (or one of the other similarly disposed groups) that in its own way is contributing to an increased cultural literacy in the legal uses of copyright protected works in the digital age and prompting some of the rest of us to stand up and take notice.
Learn From the Experts - The Sloan-C 2008 Workshop Series Copyright Compliance for Online Educators - April 2 - 11 As an online educator, you need to know how copyright affects you when using materials to supplement your online courses. You also need to know how your original works can be protected. In this workshop, Linda Enghagen, of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, will take you through the key copyright issues that you and your colleagues should be aware of when preparing and delivering your online courses. Click here for details and registration. Accommodating Students With Disabilities: Leveraging the Online Learning Environment* - April 9 - 18 Think accommodations for students are covered in an accessible course platform? Think again! Online-only institutions may not realize the legal mandates that obligate them to provide necessary support to students with disabilities, and if they DO understand their responsibilities, they may not have a clear picture of how to fulfill the obligation. Traditional institutions of higher education who are making significant commitments to newly-constituted online programs do not understand why their existing disability services unit cannot absorb the need for serving students with disabilities using established policies and procedures. Whichever your setting, the need is significant, the legal mandates are clear... and the information is scarce! This workshop provides information to assist you in serving this often ignored population. *This workshop is part of the Select Series and College Pass Members must use their additional 50 seats provided to take advantage of this workshop. Click here for details and registration. Advanced Techniques with Podcasting for Educators - April 16 - 25 Many educators know a couple, some practice three or four, but this unique workshop experience reveals practical tips to making your podcast a dominate force in your online classroom. The facilitators will walk you through podcasting essentials and help you establish pedagogical linkages. Content is tightly focused on engaging the online learner, so bring your questions as this workshop is designed to be interactive in nature. Prerequisite: Podcasting in Higher Education: Current Trends and Applications. Click here for details and registration. Getting Started: Online Course Development Basics - April 23 - May 16 Based on research and the Sloan-C effective practices, this workshop provides the foundation for designing and delivering online courses. Faculty gain enhanced pedagogical knowledge and learn effective strategies for creative, online classroom facilitation. Click here for details and registration. |
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The Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C), sponsored by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, is composed of institutions and organizations dedicated to continually improving the quality, scale, and breadth of their online programs, according to their own distinctive missions, so that education becomes a part of everyday life, accessible and affordable for anyone, anywhere, at any time, in a wide variety of disciplines. The Sloan-C View is published by Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C™). Responsibility for the contents rests with the authors and not with Sloan-C™. Copyright ©2008 by Sloan-C™. If you have a question or comment, would like to submit an article for publication, or would like to suggest an event to be listed on the Sloan-C View Calendar, please email sloan-cview@sloan-c.org. Materials in the Sloan-C View, unless otherwise noted, may be distributed freely for educational purposes. However, if any materials are redistributed they must retain the copyright notice and use the proper citation. Kindly send an email to sloan-cview@sloan-c.org indicating how you are using the material for distribution. Your privacy is important to us, you can view our privacy policy at www.sloan-c.org/aboutus/privacy.asp This issue is being sent to: %%emailaddr%% If you do not wish to receive future issues, please send a blank email to %%email.unsub%% and your email address will be removed from our list. The Sloan Consortium, Olin Way, Needham, MA 02492-1200 | ||||||||||||||||||