Back in March 2024 I attended the UCISA 24 Leadership Conference in Edinburgh. There was a range of interesting sessions, and for some I made some sketch notes.
One of the sessions I attended was AI Today: Myths, politics and visions for the future.
In this session, Dr Eleanor Drage, Senior Research Fellow, University of Cambridge walks us through the key myths about AI and why the images we use to represent it matter. She explains what companies can learn from how AI relates to politics, and how feminist and anti-racist ideas can make AI better and safer for everyone.
I made a sketch note of the talk.
As I expected in this session it covered a lot of the AI issues that would impact on educational institutions.
Shorter week this week with Easter Monday. Headed to the office on Tuesday after the long weekend and did some writing and planning. In the end (with what it being school holidays) I was in the office every day this week. With many people in Jisc on leave this week, and the same can be said for much of higher education it was a rather quiet week, which gave me time to focus on getting some research, analysis and writing done.
I did write a blog post about lecture capture and how you could do things more creatively.
The idea of capturing a lecture isn’t new. Even before the advent of dedicated lecture capture systems being installed across the campus some lecturers (and some students) would record the lecture onto cassette tape.
I have been thinking of using Jisc’s Digital Elevation Tool for FE in the Intelligent Campus space. So this week I started planning what needs to happen to make that happen. This involved looking at the scaffolding that the tool has and what would need to be in a campus version of the tool.
The idea of capturing a lecture isn’t new. Even before the advent of dedicated lecture capture systems being installed across the campus some lecturers (and some students) would record the lecture onto cassette tape.
Though we talk about the lecture in higher education, there isn’t really a standard lecture across the different cohorts and subjects of the undergraduate degree. A mathematics lecture is not the same as a art history lecture, nor is it akin to a lecture in macroeconomics. Even within mathematics different topics will require different approaches.
In reality modern lectures are not really monologues anymore, lecturers will be bringing in visuals, video, interactions, engagement, discussion, and Q&A sessions. However these are not easily captured and as students engage with lecture recordings, they will focus on the core of the lecture which will be in essence a monologue and aspects of the discussion.
Are lectures still valuable? Lecturers and students seem to think so. They are quite a cost-effective way of teaching.
There is something also about the eventedness of the lecture. The coming together of a group of people for a common purpose. The social interactions that happen before, during, and after the lecture. The sharing of an event is something that is more challenging to recreate from a recording.
However there is still value in recording a lecture. The facility to review and replay a lecture has value for some. For those that missed the lecture, the recording is probably a better choice than not seeing the lecture. For those with different needs, for example English is not your first language, having access to the recording will help if they didn’t get it the first time, or missed the lecture. You can also add close captions to a recorded lecture, making it more accessible than it was in its original format.
Of course a recording of a lecture for many is not as good as the live lecture itself. A lecture recording is a compromise, you can’t put your hand up when watching a recording for example. You miss out on those social interactions that happen in the live in-person experience.
Finally is a lecture recording the best way to record the lecture. Is there a way of capturing a lecture differently?
The first thing to reflect on, is the video or images needed? Could you remove the visual element (or provide it in a different format) and focus on the audio only? Make this an audio recording for example. Well, possibly make some of the lectures audio recordings.
Rarely when accessing content on different media, do people listen to monologues. That’s not to say there isn’t value in a monologue, but a recorded monologue misses out on the affordances that you can have when creating a recorded piece for a course. Also the mental discipline to listen to a one hour (or even two hour) recorded lecture is challenging for some. Reflecting from an audience perspective, it might be better to create two or three shorter audio recordings rather than one big one. It might result in a fresher better recording than one which tires itself out. Also think about the student, will they have the time to listen to a 60 minute recorded lecture? You may think you are an amazing and engaging presenter and raconteur; the reality is maybe do something shorter and to the point. Breaking the podcast into two shorter recordings may allow them to be more accessible to the students, they could listen to them as they do something else, physical exercise for example. These could be released together or split during the week and again and follow it with a week long asynchronous online chat discussing the topics and content. Visual resources could be provided in advance or alongside the audio recording of the lecture.
Another option is to think differently and instead of recording a lecture, create an audio recording that is more akin to a radio programme or a podcast. The format and structure of a podcast or a radio recording is different to that of a lecture. Often they take form of a conversation or a panel discussion with multiple participants. This can be challenging to organise, but is something to reflect on.
Capturing a lecture isn’t a new idea, however capturing a lecture may not be the optimum way of delivering a recorded version of the in-person session.
Back in March 2024 I attended Wonkhe’s Secret Life of Students at the Shaw Theatre in London. There was a range of interesting sessions, and for some I made some sketch notes.
There was part of one session which focussed on quality and included insights into AI and plagiarism.
It wasn’t a lengthy presentation, so it’s quite a minimalistic sketchnote as a result. I do like the fact that the Matrix inspired background worked well for a sketchnote; over the plain background I usually use.
Back in March 2024 I attended Wonkhe’s Secret Life of Students at the Shaw Theatre in London. There was a range of interesting sessions, and for some I made some sketch notes.
I did attempt to do a sketchnote on one of the sessions, but it didn’t come together.
Looking over the programme I am not even sure which session this was for!
My sketch notes are really for me, rather than other people. The process of sketching allows me to digest for myself what is been talked about and demonstrated. The sketch note provides me with a mechanism that provides a process for my interpretation of what is being said and what I understand from the talk. The process of sketching engages me in the talk in ways in which note taking does for others or conversing on social media.
Now in this session, I really couldn’t bring together what was being said in a sketch. There were odd words and phrases, which I noted in my sketch.
Does this mean it was a poor presentation? Well of course not, presentations at conferences are not delivered so I could draw a fancy sketchnote! However the talk didn’t work for me.
Back in March 2024 I attended Wonkhe’s Secret Life of Students at the Shaw Theatre in London. There was a range of interesting sessions, and for some I made some sketch notes.
I attended the session What do we know about what’s shaping how students spend their time?
The latest and most powerful insights on the student condition from Wonkhe and Cibyl’s Belong student survey platform and from across the HE sector.
There was a lot of things in there, about sleep, travel time, working, and time travelling to work.
Of course time isn’t everything, space is important too. Time and space go together. Some interesting commentary about students (who don’t live on campus) needing space on campus to rest or even sleep.
Is UK higher education really the world’s third most expensive way of getting a degree – and if it is, what might the alternatives look like?
One of the key questions that arises from different operating models, are higher education institutions prepared to change, and are they only going to change because they are forced to.
There’s a history of attempts to drive efficiency by sharing services – and precious little evidence of success.
When I started my work in this space, I came to similar conclusions that were in this article. However I do think just because that was the way things were, doesn’t mean that there isn’t opportunities in the future.
Did some analysis of various reports, articles, and links in relation to Optimising Operations and Data. I did a similar analysis of various reports, articles, and links in relation to Intelligent Campus.
I started the planning various reports in relation to Optimising Operations and Data.
I had a meeting about a proposed Intelligent Campus maturity framework.
I did some more field research on the Intelligent Campus.
Back in March 2024 I attended Wonkhe’s Secret Life of Students at the Shaw Theatre in London. There was a range of interesting sessions, and for some I made some sketch notes.
The session which kicked off the conference was What do we know about the conditions that help students thrive?
The latest and most powerful insights on the student condition from Wonkhe and Cibyl’s Belong student survey platform and from across the HE sector.
For many students, university can be a stressful experience, as they worry about money, the cost of living, working, as well as studying and assessment.
A busy start to the week, I was attending HESCA 24 at the University of Loughborough. HESCA is the Higher Education Smart Card Association, primarily a membership organisation for vendors in the smart card and access card space.
There were some interesting talks and presentations. Some were from universities and others were from vendors. As the presentations were about fifteen minutes long, I didn’t make any sketch notes.
I was talking at the final session of the conference talking about the holistic approach to building a smart campus. Got some nice feedback from the session.
This week we also had our Senior Education and Student Experience Group Meeting. As a well as our usual what’s on your agenda discussion, we also looked at what the big challenge is for higher education and discussed two of the future visions I have been writing. Some interesting thoughts and commentary came out from that.
I had an initial discussion meeting with another university about a possible stakeholder workshop. I was also contacted by a colleague in Jisc about a different university for a conversation, who is also interested in this space. There is a lot of interest and demand in this area from universities across the UK.
I continued my work on optimising operations and data, undertaking further analysis of various reports, articles, and links. I did a similar thing with my work on the intelligent campus.
We had a team meeting, though meeting isn’t really the operative word here, much more a structured conversation and chat.
I was in the office on Friday which was quite busy, for a Friday, usually it is quite quiet.
I attended the Digital Elevation Model review meeting with colleagues from the FE side of Jisc.
I was away for the whole week, travelling to London and Edinburgh. On Monday I headed up to London and went to the Fetter Lane office for some meetings.
Tuesday I was off to WONKHE’s Secret Life of the Student Event. This is the third time I have attended the event. This is very much an event, more so a conference, and WONKHE certainly know how to create an engaging show. There was lots of interesting presentations, one feature of the event I liked was how they added a student voice for five minutes in between sessions.
This isn’t the most interactive conference I’ve attended, no workshop sessions, and usually very limited time for questions. However, I still thought it was an excellent conference. Others do as well, as even by the final session, most people are still there. It’s very popular as well, as they were packed out.
After the end of this conference, it was a walk over to Kings Cross (walking next to St Pancras) for a train to Edinburgh. I was quite impressed with the speed of the train, taking just four hours and twenty minutes from platform to platform.
I was up in Edinburgh for the UCISA Leadership Conference. Like the Secret Life this is my third time I have attended. The first conference was in Manchester. I said back then.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I kind of expected that this would be a highly technical conference, about how technology can deliver transformation and I can say that what I experienced was not what I was expecting.
Last year in Liverpool, I thought it was a good conference, I wrote back then.
I did enjoy the conference, not sure if I enjoyed it as much as the previous year, but it was still an excellent conference.
This year, I did enjoy the conference, however I didn’t feel it was as good and as useful as the conferences in Manchester and Liverpool. At the previous conferences I felt there was a good focus on leadership and strategy. This year in Edinburgh, I felt the focus had moved to the technology, notably AI.
Now I realise that I am not the target market for this conference, and they may have been responding to feedback from their core market. I may attend next year, but then again, I might not.
I flew home from Edinburgh.
This week I also had a preliminary planning meeting for Smart Campus workshop I am running in the next month or so.
news and views on e-learning, TEL and learning stuff in general…
