Involving External Stakeholders in Project Courses

Problem: The involvement of external stakeholders in capstone projects and project courses is desirable due to its potential positive effects on the students. Capstone projects particularly profit from the inclusion of an industrial partner to make the project relevant and help students acquire professional skills. In addition, an increasing push towards education that is aligned with industry and incorporates industrial partners can be observed. However, the involvement of external stakeholders in teaching moments can create friction and could, in the worst case, lead to frustration of all involved parties. Contribution: We developed a model that allows analysing the involvement of external stakeholders in university courses both in a retrospective fashion, to gain insights from past course instances, and in a constructive fashion, to plan the involvement of external stakeholders. Key Concepts: The conceptual model and the accompanying guideline guide the teachers in their analysis of stakeholder involvement. The model is comprised of several activities (define, execute, and evaluate the collaboration). The guideline provides questions that the teachers should answer for each of these activities. In the constructive use, the model allows teachers to define an action plan based on an analysis of potential stakeholders and the pedagogical objectives. In the retrospective use, the model allows teachers to identify issues that appeared during the project and their underlying causes. Drawing from ideas of the reflective practitioner, the model contains an emphasis on reflection and interpretation of the observations made by the teacher and other groups involved in the courses. Key Lessons: Applying the model retrospectively to a total of eight courses shows that it is possible to reveal hitherto implicit risks and assumptions and to gain a better insight into the interaction...Comment: Abstract shortened since arxiv.org limits length of abstracts. See paper/pdf for full abstract. Paper is forthcoming, accepted August 2017. Arxiv version 2 corrects misspelled author nam

Developing information architecture through records management classification techniques

Purpose – This work aims to draw attention to information retrieval philosophies and techniques allied to the records management profession, advocating a wider professional consideration of a functional approach to information management, in this instance in the development of information architecture. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws from a hypothesis originally presented by the author that advocated a viewpoint whereby the application of records management techniques, traditionally applied to develop business classification schemes, was offered as an additional solution to organising information resources and services (within a university intranet), where earlier approaches, notably subject- and administrative-based arrangements, were found to be lacking. The hypothesis was tested via work-based action learning and is presented here as an extended case study. The paper also draws on evidence submitted to the Joint Information Systems Committee in support of the Abertay University's application for consideration for the JISC award for innovation in records and information management. Findings – The original hypothesis has been tested in the workplace. Information retrieval techniques, allied to records management (functional classification), were the main influence in the development of pre- and post-coordinate information retrieval systems to support a wider information architecture, where the subject approach was found to be lacking. Their use within the workplace has since been extended. Originality/value – The paper advocates that the development of information retrieval as a discipline should include a wider consideration of functional classification, as this alternative to the subject approach is largely ignored in mainstream IR works