donderdag 12 november 2009

Visit to: Dé Onderwijsdagen 2009: Samen Slim Leren

Visit to: Dé Onderwijsdagen 2009: Samen Slim Leren
10 en 11 November 2009 Jaarbeurs Utrecht, Beatrixgebouw

The 10th of November I visited de Surf Onderwijsdagen http://owd2009.surf.nl/owd2009/ (most info in Dutch) where I visited a number of very interesting sessions. Below I made a small summary of my findings.
The 'Onderwijsdagen' are organized by the Surf foundation which promotes "Sustainable change of Dutch Higher Education by use of ICT and a systematic approach to innovation, knowledge development and dissemination".

Contents
-Keynote on Open Resources for Education (VERY INTERESTING)
-Session: "Kijk Mam Zonder Wachtwoord" ("Mama look, without password")
-Session E-Merge by Henk Frencken
-Session "Augmented reality" by Arno Coenders
-Session "ICT voorzieningen in the cloud' (ICT applications in the cloud")
-Keynote Marc Lammers (FIH Mastercoach Olympisch Bondscoach)

Keynote on Open Resources for Education (VERY INTERESTING)
Richard found out that 15 persons in the world where trying to write a similar book on Electrical Engineering at about the same time. They decided to write the book together and produced a raw book of 2000 pages. Everyone (lecturers) can now assemble his/her own book by selecting the relevant chapters/parts of this 'base book' and get it printed for 25$ per copy.
In his keynote he mentions a lot of other very interesting issues on Open Resources, especially the idea of 'Lenses' where institutes or people discuss the quality of certain Open Resources, which can be seen as a great alternative system of Quality control.
Resources:
Presentation:http://www.surfmedia.nl/medialibrary/item.html?id=YJ9ZFMeFacvuPUeQLQ2IR0Em
San Francisco Chronicle: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/22/EDRTUJ346.DTL
New York Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/01/opinion/01tue3.html?_r=1
Connexions website: http://cnx.org/
About lenses: http://cnx.org/help/viewing/lenses

Session: "Kijk Mam Zonder Wachtwoord" ("Mama look, without password")
OpenID is a system whereby you login with a Service provider (Fe. Hotmail) after (via) the log in with an Identity Provider (Fe. Microsoft passport / Live ID). The Service provider does not keep passwords herself, but just trusts the Identity provider. This system ensures that during a session you only have to login ones and do not have to type passwords for each Service provider again.
Surfnet however has formed a 'Federation' with all main Universities in the Netherlands where the Identity check is done at the individual institutes that are part of the Federation. Within this Federation all parties trust each other and open up (some) Services to the other federation partners.
Reason for not wanting to use OpenID is that Universities do not want all User information to be stored with OpenID providers but want to be in control themselves.
Problem is that the Fedration uses another protocol then OpenID and thus does not fit in with publicly available Service Providers like Live@EDU and Google Apps.
Resources:
http://www.slideshare.net/DeOnderwijsdagen2009/411-kijk-mam-zonder-wachtwoord

Session E-Merge by Henk Frencken
E-merge is a regional alliance between TU-Delft, Hogeschool Leiden, Haagse Hogeschool and University of Leiden to work on projects to innovate education by ICT. On http://www.e-merge.nu/ you can find what they are working on. For us interesting is the project on E-portfolio http://www.e-merge.nu/index.php?id=214 .

Session "Augmented reality" by Arno Coenders
This was a very nice presentation on the (future) use of augmented reality in education. Best example is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9KPJlA5yds , a small movie by BMW. Another nice example is http://alien.t-immersion.com/ . If you install and run the application, you can hold the pages of the book in front of the camera which will replace the page (visible on the screen via the webcam) by a three dimensional figure that will move over the screen as you move the page in front of the camera. An example on YouTube is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foAaQsdka0w
Resources:
http://www.slideshare.net/DeOnderwijsdagen2009/716-augmented-reality-arno-coenders

Session "ICT voorzieningen in the cloud' (ICT applications in the cloud") Question in this presentation was whether Universities should move their E-mail to the cloud or not. Both Google Apps and Live@EDU (Microsoft) are offering to host the E-mail of institutes on their computers. Institutes keep a lot of control over the email boxes and can keep using their own URL, so it seems a perfect solution. Microsoft offers the service for free, at least for the first 4 years (what happens then, no one knows).
According to the speakers, Microsoft has the best legal arrangements. This is important because mail is stored on servers in the US where other laws are valid etc. Problem with Microsoft is that they do not comply with the Surf federation login system (see above). This problem is being worked on by Microsoft however. Advice of the speakers is to wait with moving E-mail to the cloud until the federated login is working because institutes do not want to move the credentials of staff and student to an outside organization.
Resources:
http://www.slideshare.net/DeOnderwijsdagen2009/415-ict-voorzieningen-in-the-cloud-uitbesteden-of-niet-andres-steijaert

Keynote Marc Lammers (FIH Mastercoach Olympisch Bondscoach)
Interesting pep-talk on becoming the best using innovations.
Resources:
http://www.surfmedia.nl/medialibrary/item.html?id=KvGNG40DHlgxgoYFpdZXeYw1

Visit to: Educause “The best thinking in Higher Education IT”-conference in Denver (4-6 November 2009)

Hello all,
From 4-6 November 2009 I visited the Educause conference “The best thinking in Higher Education IT”-conference in Denver. The visit was organized as a trip by the SURF foundation. We travelled with 35 persons, mostly working in organizations for Higher Education. On https://www.surfgroepen.nl/sites/edutrip2009/default.aspx the “Edutrip SURFgroep” you will find small reports from the sessions we visited. Below a small report of the sessions I visited and that might be of interest for some of you


Keynote: Good to Great and the Social Sectors Session Type: General Session.
-E-Portfolio Lightning Round.
-Building a Cost-Effective Cloud Computing Campus Cyberinfrastructure for Education and Research.
-Library Lightning Round.
-Hailing from "Foreign": The Plight and Delight of Embodying Culture Change.
-Keynote: It Is About Time: Getting Our Values Around Copyright Right.
-Developing a Next-Generation Campus Web Portal
-Creating a Global Community: Knowledge Given, Knowledge Gained.
-Embracing the Cloud: New Approaches for Delivering Campus IT Services—Strategy and Policy Development



Wednesday Nov 4th, 2009 8:15 AM - 9:45 AM



Keynote: Good to Great and the Social Sectors Session Type: General Session

“Author of the best-selling Good to Great (and its supplement Good to Great and the Social Sectors), co-author of the enduring classic Built to Last, and author of the recently released How the Mighty Fall, Jim Collins will challenge participants to think about the key drivers that distinguish great institutions from others. Why do some become great? Why do some never transcend mediocrity? Why do some great enterprises fall? And why do some prevail to greatness even in a tumultuous world spinning out of control, characterized by rapid and unpredictable change, risk, peril, luck, and overwhelming opportunity? Greatness, he teaches, is not primarily a function of circumstance but of conscious choice and discipline. Collins will discuss how participants can apply the lessons to their own organizations, leadership challenges, and personal choices. In this session, he will pay particular attention to the challenges facing social sector leaders in higher education.”





Wednesday Nov 4th, 2009 10:30 AM - 11:20 AM

E-Portfolio Lightning Round

This was an interesting view on some different ways of using E-portfolios. I included a Blog of Allan Shawn Yorke which quite accurately expresses what it was all about.


Building Blog-Based E-Portfolios: Multiple Units and Dynamic Platforms. Geoffrey C. Middlebrook, University of Southern California

Design, Implementation, and Maintenance of the Clinical Practice E-Portfolio. Ivy Tan, University of Saskatchewan

Eastern CT SU's Liberal Education E-Portfolios During Trying Times. David L. Stoloff, Eastern Connecticut State University

Implementing Electronic Portfolios by Beginning with Student Assessment. Patrick Lowenthal, University of Colorado Denver
Searching for an E-Portfolio Solution Collaboratively. Lorna Wong, University of Wisconsin System Administration


Resources referred to:

Helen barrett’s videos on eportfolio and digitally Storytelling http://eportfolios.blip.tv/


Eastern Connecticut State University Liberal Education Electronic portFolio (Eastern LEEF): http://sites.google.com/site/easterncsueportfolio/Home

Allan Shawn Yorke’s BLOG from this lightning round: http://www.personal.psu.edu/asg102/blogs/portfolio/2009/11/eportfolio-lightning-round.html


Wednesday Nov 4th, 2009 11:40 AM - 12:30 PM

Building a Cost-Effective Cloud Computing Campus Cyberinfrastructure for Education and Research

Patrick Dreher first explains what different terms are all used in the discussions on ‘Cloud Computing’ like:

HaaS - Hardware as a service

IaaS - Infrastructure as as service

Public cloud

Private cloud

Patrick explains the system they have built. Based on 350 blade servers they run a pool of virtual machines that is being controlled by hardware devices that offer them to the staff and students via a web interface. In the web browser you select what machine you want to work on and for how long (30 minutes to 8 hours). Then an RDP session is started and you are offered the one-time username and password for that machine in the web browser.

This way you can order for example 20 Windows XP machines with Mathematica software installed for your lecture room the next morning.

All software used is Open Source, so anyone could built this system them self.

Resources referred to:

Campus Cyberinfrastructure (CCI) Working Group http://www.educause.edu/CCI

Wednesday Nov 4th, 2009 2:15 PM - 3:05 PM

Library Lightning RoundThese two presentations were focused on the role a library could play in Information literacy instruction. Megan Fitzgibbons gave a very good presentation on the use of CMAP Concept Mapping software that she used to determine the places in the learning process where the library could support. An example can be seen on page 7 in the resource “Concept_mapping_presentation_slides” at the bottom of this post.


Concept Mapping for Collaboration. Megan Fitzgibbons, McGill University

Based on analysis of syllabi and assignments, concept mapping software is used to visualize and align the learning outcomes of university courses with librarians' information literacy instruction.

Information Literacy in the Curriculum: Faculty Guidance Using Focus Groups. Roseann Bowerman, Lehigh University


Resources referred to:

Concept_mapping_presentation_slides: http://www.educause.edu/sites/default/files/library/presentations/E09/SESS034/Fitzgibbons_EDUCAUSE_2009.pdf

And

http://library.concordia.ca/about/staff/forum/Fitzgibbons_presentation09.pdf


Poster of Megan Fitzgibbons on Concept Maps

http://library.concordia.ca/about/staff/forum/Fitzgibbons_poster09.pdf


Combined presentations: http://www.educause.edu/sites/default/files/library/presentations/E09/SESS034/library_lightninground.pptx


Thursday Nov 5th, 2009 8:10 AM - 9:00 AM

Hailing from "Foreign": The Plight and Delight of Embodying Culture Change
“If you have been brought to an organization as a change agent, how do you lead in a culture that may be different from the one you left behind? What are the obstacles? The panelists, who recently moved into new work cultures, including some abroad, will discuss and extract common themes.”

This session was a wonderful discussion on what is needed and what plays a role when being a change agent in a new environment. One of the panel members was present via videoconference on a laptop screen which worked very well.

Books/Publications that were mentioned as important by the individual panel members:

Scarf a brain-based model for colloborating with and influencing others: http://academy.clevelandclinic.org/Portals/40/SCARF.pdf

Healing the wounds ,david noer: http://www.totalpicture.com/shows/big-picture/david-noer-the-layoff-survivors.html
Bates, A.W. (Tony) (2000), Managing Technological Change: Strategies for College and University Leaders: http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/Bates_managing_technological_change_model


Thursday Nov 5th, 2009 9:30 AM - 11:00 AM

Keynote: It Is About Time: Getting Our Values Around Copyright Right


In this talk, Lawrence Lessig reviewed the progress of the "open access" movement in education. He made a call for educators to finally resolve this issue in a way that enables the potential of technology for education. The way to go is something similar as the Creative Commons for music and art. Each scientist could add a “Scientific Commons” paragraph to his/her publication, allowing others to cite and use texts from the publication as long as they also allow this with the same Scientific Commons” paragraph.


Resources

Session Video and slides: http://www.educause.edu/Resources/EDUCAUSE2009FacetoFaceConferen/ItIsAboutTimeGettingOurValuesA/175767#tabs--2

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Commons



Thursday Nov 5th, 2009 11:45 AM - 12:35 PM

Developing a Next-Generation Campus Web Portal


This presentation was about the creation of a web portal environment to help bridge on- and off-campus worlds, improve access to resources, and allow community members to publish their own information portlets and collections. What they showed was a really good practical and pragmatic portal environment that was very well received by their students and staff.


Resources

Powerpoint: http://www.educause.edu/sites/default/files/library/presentations/E09/SESS074/EDUCAUSE%2BNov%2B2009%2B-%2BNext%2BGen%2BCampus%2BWeb%2BPortal.pptx



Project website: http://www.ithaca.edu/myhome/



Friday Nov 6th, 2009 8:10 AM - 9:00 AM


Creating a Global Community: Knowledge Given, Knowledge Gained

Duke University thinks that to be able to solve global problems students will benefit from an interdisciplinary and international approach. That is why Duke stimulates students to study one or more semesters abroad and has the interdisciplinary focus program.

"Dukes Global Programmes" http://studyabroad.duke.edu/home/Programs

"Duke Engage Programme" allows students to spend a summer abroad on a project on a Duke scholarship.

"Themed or Focus programs” offer students the opportunity to approach topics from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. http://interdisciplinary.duke.edu/education/focus_programs/index.php ("Duke-China" project is an example)

Because cultural experience of being at Duke is also important ICT has started a program to make that students/staff abroad feel they are at Duke in Durham.

Statement about one of the bottlenecks is: "Bandwidth is the key to everything"

Things ICT worked on:

-Website for International programmes

-Networksystems abroad (with partners)

-Flip Videos (several hundreds) are given to students abroad to do:

-Video journaling

-Video BLOGs

-Video Interviews

This is called "Duke Digital Initiative"

-Campus in a box. Duke is working on a box (suitcase/19" rack) to connect remote sites really physically to the Duke network (firewall etc.)

-Working on tele-presence (see Cisco telepresence magic on Youtube)

Duke has a "Global programme"-steering group to keep communication as good as possible between faculties and ICT etc.

Newcastle University

At the airport of Minneapolis I met Steve Williams, Director of Information Systems & Services Ctaremont Tower of Newcastle University. He also attended the “Duke”-session at Educause and told me that Newcastle University was also stimulating their students to study abroad. http://www.ncl.ac.uk/about/global/

Resource:

Presentation + Slides: http://educause.mediasite.com/mediasite/SilverlightPlayer/Default.aspx?peid=4900dfd224964cc5bc8f1d15a573e40f

Duke study abroad website: http://studyabroad.duke.edu/home/Programs

Approved programmes abroad:

Duke engage programme:

Focus Programs:.


Friday Nov 6th, 2009 9:30 AM - 10:20 AM

Embracing the Cloud: New Approaches for Delivering Campus IT Services—Strategy and Policy Development

This was a crystal clear and good presentation of the CIO of NJIT and an Instructional Designer of NJIT.

Outsourcing, open source, SaaS, and virtualization offer new approaches for delivering campus IT services. Examples at NJIT include Google Mail, Postini, Moodle, iTunes U, thin-client desktops, and Amazon Web Services. The session outlines strategy development and implementation and support issues from a CIO perspective and an instructional/user-support perspective.


NJIT is one of the 3 public research universities of New Jersey and is located in Newark.


A cite from a long time ago: "The network is the computer" SUN computing

“Users need not have knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure in the "cloud" that supports them.”

Things to remind when going to Cloud computing:

-Use local authentication --> Shibboleth

-Locally brand your cloud applications

-Make sure you have a degree of web services expertise (.csv, XML ....) in house

Why Cloud computing according to NJIT?

-E-mail is nowadays a commodity like water and electricity. Commodity suppliers today have a scale we cannot compete with.

-Arizona State University saves $500.000/year by outsourcing E-mail to Google. The Chronicle of Higher Education - 1/11/2008

2 options for E-mail in the cloud

-Microsoft live @edu (only windows operating system, coupled tightly to Microsoft offerings)

-Google Apps (connection to Open Office)

NJIT sees several reasons for putting E-mail in the cloud:

-NJIT is transitioning "Email for live" to "Mail-forwarding" . The existing alumni mailboxes are outsourced to Google mail.

-When hosted by Google you have no worries and costs for mail-hygiene (Virus/Spam/DoS)

Open Source

Old model: "Build or Buy"

New model: "Build, Buy or Befriend"

VLE

NJIT replaced WEBCT for Moodle. They hired "Moodlerooms" to host a pilot now.

-LDAP integration and add/drop is handled via .csv file.

-Mahara e-portfolio is hosted by Moodlerooms (bundled with Moodle) as well

-Drupal Content management is used for Courses, Websites, Video repositories and groups.

-NJIT joined Open Courseware initiative (consortium)

Multimedia

NJIT utilizes Apple's bandwidth by storing their Audio and Video on iTunes. (Check out their Wallstreet metldown series)

Facebook

School on Facebook ( www.inigral.com )

NJIT gives each course a facebook group to socialize and discuss the course.

Youtube

used to store videos . Make sure you tag all videos (Like Newark-....) In our case IHE-hydroinf IHE-water etc....

"Just in time computing" --> a server for every student is possible in the cloud.

Research

-Elastic Computer cloud

"Amazon web services for Education" is not expensive

Local clouds

Managing Virtual Machines saves time and you can expand and contractresources with the application lifecycle. So, at times when system is busy

Resources:

Some definitions: http://www.nice-italy.com/web/nice/cloud

Powerpoint of presentation: http://www.educause.edu/sites/default/files/library/presentations/E09/SESS133/embracing_cloud_ullman_haggerty.ppt