Group items tagged

"The University of Waikato has an essential role to play in the promotion and pursuit of sustainability, through education, teaching and research, and the implementation of sustainable initiatives on campus. We strive to model a working example of sustainability in action."

This document outlines a proposal for a new Software Sustainability Maturity Model (SSMM), which can be used to formally evaluate both open and closed source software with respect to its sustainability. The model provides a means of estimating the risks associated with adopting a given solution. It is useful for those procuring software solutions for implementation and/or customisation, as well as for reuse in new software products. It is also useful for project leaders and developers, as it enables them to identify areas of concern, with respect to sustainability, within their projects.

Many members of JISC Emerge community are active in exploiting the potential of various Web 2.0 technologies and approaches. But what if the Web 2.0 sceptics are right? What if Web 2.0 services aren't sustainable? What if the social aspect of social networking tools are too intrusive? How should we go about developing a sustainable approach to use of Web 2.0?

Audio of a UK workshop held around issues of sustainability (i.e. without project funding) in releasing OERs.

This resource is intended to distil lessons learned from various JISC innovation programmes into a "Good Practice Guide for Sustaining and Embedding Innovations". It is intended to support project steering groups and management teams in further and higher education in decision-making in this area and focuses on: Changing people and culture.Working with existing institutional structures to influence organisational change.Embedding or aligning with strategies, processes, systems, initiatives and services.Creating usable tools and resources (as part of project outputs) to meet stakeholder needs.Developing commercial and open approaches to sustaining and embedding innovation.

Spaces for Knowledge Generation is an ALTC project which was undertaken as a partnership between La Trobe University as lead institution, Charles Sturt University, Apple and Kneeler Design Architects. The context of the learning experience necessarily changes over time, with technological, economic and social developments influencing the types of learning spaces learners and teachers require to achieve their learning outcomes, and this $220,000 project was designed to inform, guide and support sustainable development of learning and teaching spaces and practices, maximising flexibility so as to be used by as many disciplines as feasible. The project was based on the philosophy that constructivist approaches to learning, as well as to research and study, should make use of technologies and approaches that students favour, and that learning spaces should therefore be organised to accommodate learner-generated aspects of learning. Spaces for Knowledge Generation provides a model for designing student learning environments that is future-focused and sustainable for the medium term.

Feldstein on the commerce and sustainability of open source LMS.

"Individual [OER] projects have been getting institutional buy-in to OER release, particularly where it can be shown to support other, existing, priorities and strategies, such as sustainability, lowering environmental impact, or marketing."<--true of all projects?

"A few changes in my professional profile at UBC in recent weeks… My old Office of Learning Technology has merged with the former Centre for Teaching and Academic Growth to become the Centre for Teaching, Learning, and Technology." So maybe we're just following UBCs lead?

What is the Story of Stuff? From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

"When one uses 'sustainability' in the context of open education, the word usually relates to whether or not an initiative has solid funding or a viable business model..."

NY Times article about the University of the People, which offers degress for free. Volunteer lecturers - which makes me wonder how sustainable this is... Also only offers degrees in computing and business administration

Still to read.

Short post linking to reports on Moocs and where they might lead.

The vision for the Steeple project is to investigate, develop and document sustainable institutional infrastructure to support university wide educational podcasting. Steeple also hopes to instigate a viable community around scalable, enterprise-level solutions suitable for the UK-HE sector in the areas of automated video/audio capture, video/audio processing, and video/audio delivery ("podcasting").

"This web site synthesises outputs from the JISC Learner Experiences of e-Learning programme. The programme spanned two phases over four years from 2005-2009. It comprised nine research projects in total (two in phase 1 and seven in phase two), employed mixed method approaches, and had the sustained involvement of over 200 learners and more than 3000 survey respondents. Five national workshops were run disseminating the methods and findings. The programme focussed on the learner voice. Learners allowed us into their worlds and showed us what it is like to study in a technology-rich age. The projects produced a huge collection of rich, detailed data that sheds light on what learners expect from the use of technology in post-compulsory education and the choices they make about using technology to support their study."

"The Design Studio is a developing toolkit which draws together a range of existing and emergent resources around curriculum design and delivery and the role technology plays in supporting these processes and practices. The Studio will provide access to project outcomes and outputs from the JISC Curriculum Design and Delivery programmes as they are developed and will continue to be sustained as a community resource after the programmes finish."

This web site synthesises outputs from the JISC Learner Experiences of e-Learning programme. The programme spanned two phases over four years from 2005-2009. It comprised nine research projects in total (two in phase 1 and seven in phase two), employed mixed method approaches, and had the sustained involvement of over 200 learners and more than 3000 survey respondents. The programme focussed on the learner voice. Learners allowed us into their worlds and showed us what it is like to study in a technology-rich age. The projects produced a huge collection of rich, detailed data that sheds light on what learners expect from the use of technology in post-compulsory education and the choices they make about using technology to support their study.