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Following on from the lists of academic tweeters published earlier this month, we have put together a short guide to using Twitter in university research, teaching, and impact activities, available to download as a PDF. How can Twitter, which limits users to 140 characters per tweet, have any relevance to universities and academia, where journal articles are 3,000 to 8,000 words long, and where books contain 80,000 words? Can anything of academic value ever be said in just 140 characters? We have put together a short guide answering these questions, showing new users how to get started on Twitter and hone their tweeting style, as well as offering advice to more experienced users on how to use Twitter for research projects, alongside blogging, and for use in teaching.

Great guide, Nicola, thanks for sharing that.

OER Blog The OER@UCT blog serves as a reflection and collaboration point for staff involved with Open Educational Resources at the University of Cape Town. The project is part of a greater movement toward creating open access to information and educational resources. We believe that no one with the desire to learn should be cut off from educational material simply because they do not have the means to study in a traditional fashion. The internet enables access to information and we want to make sure that high quality learning materials are available to those with a thirst for knowledge.

Example of clicktivism Original email: A recent surge in poaching is threatening to send African rhino populations back to dangerously low numbers. One rhino is killed every 19 hours despite laws that prohibit poaching and sales of rhino horns. Demand for rhino horns is particularly high in Vietnam and China where the powder is thought to cure cancer and other health ailments, though it has no health benefits whatsoever. Sir Richard Branson is calling for immediate action by CITES, a consortium of 175 countries charged with stopping the rhino horn trade. Join him by signing the petition to demand that CITES put pressure on Vietnam and China to ensure that severe punishments for traffickers and sellers are enforced.

Getting started... @JJJ John James Jacoby says codex.buddypress.org is the best place to start. Best advice is to use BuddyPress to compliment an existing site/audience. I'm going to try this out with my social media students - going to use BuddyPress as a pilot for GC 

In order for an interactive whiteboard to become more than simply a projection board, a teacher with a SMART Board interactive whiteboard needs to know how to make use of the interactive features of a SMART Board.

If we want to change www.ems.uct.ac.za to www.summerschool.uct.ac.za we need to do this, if we just change the blog address it says site no longer exists & cannot be found - not what we want at this stage...

"As hyperbolic as it may sound, academic publishing is the curator and guardian of the accumulated scientific knowledge of the human race, 1600 to present. It is also a cornerstone of modern science, preferentially selecting well-executed research through the peer review process. However, academic libraries are facing decreasing budgets, and even highly ranked universities are having to cut back on journal subscriptions. Since these subscriptions account for up to 75 percent of publishers' revenues, the entire system is feeling the pressure of the economic crisis..."

The Virtual Museum (VM) provides the platform for citizen scientists to contribute to biodiversity projects.  This innovative concept was developed by the Animal Demography Unit. For many people, a "museum" is a place to see stuffed animals on display. But the ADU's Virtual Museum is not like this. The scientific part of a museum contains collections of specimens, frequently large numbers of specimens of the same species from different parts of the range, all carefully preserved and labelled with the date and place where they were collected. The ADU's Virtual Museum is like this, except that instead of specimens in draws or bottles, we have digital photographs arranged in a database.

Scientific American has been bringing science to people for over 160 years. Now the magazine is bringing people to science through a new online listing of citizen science opportunities. Early this month, Scientific American Online launched a Citizen Science section of the web site. This is part of a larger Education effort, which includes a number of science activities called Bring Science Home.

Rob Paddock, the Managing Director of GetSmarter, appeared on the morning TV chat show Expresso on 20 June 2012.  Interviewed by celebrity presenter, Liezel van der Westhuizen, Rob spoke about some of the health benefits of continuing education. He pointed out that the brain is just as prone to degeneration as other parts of the body if it is not put to good use. 

he Education Conversations are aimed at encouraging our nation to talk, as well as to create a space for on‐going debate and discussion through which diverse voices can be heard. The conversations will focus on what works and how we can, collectively, advance the agenda for an improved public education system.

If you want to create impressive presentations:)

HERS-SA is a self-sustaining non-profit organisation, dedicated to the advancement of women in the Higher Education sector. For the past eight years this small organisation has advocated for, and contributed to, the career development of women employed in academia via carefully crafted interventions including hosting the first national conference on Women in Leadership in Higher Education and the annual HERS-SA ACADEMY that attracts women from all over sub-Saharan Africa.

Plan to bring this one to life instead of starting a new one:)

Obvious to you, amazing to others...

Welcome to the Opening Scholarship blog, a collection of voices from the University of Cape Town engaged in a variety of ways with openness and scholarship in higher education. Our roles include advocacy, policy, technical, legal, research, advice. We are interested in all aspects of openness in teaching, research and community engagement and we bring a southern perspective to the issues.

RSVP Caroline.Dean@uct.ac.za I want to go to this - do you?

SMART Notebook Express is an online version of the interactive whiteboard software for SMART Boards.  That means that where your computer does not have SMART Notebook installed, but you are connected to the Internet, you can still work with your existing SMART Notebook files (where you can access it on a PC, memory stick or online storage area) or to create a new SMART Notebook file.

Ingrid's site needs some work...make her poetry come alive a bit more. Clip of her literary reading, etc. Came across it when I was looking for a pic of her, remind me to chat to her about this:)