The role of social networks in students’ learning experiences

The aim of this research is to investigate the role of social networks in computer science education. The Internet shows great potential for enhancing collaboration between people and the role of social software has become increasingly relevant in recent years. This research focuses on analyzing the role that social networks play in students’ learning experiences. The construction of students’ social networks, the evolution of these networks, and their effects on the students’ learning experience in a university environment are examined

Skilling up for CRM: qualifications for CRM professionals in the Fourth Industrial Revolution

The 4th industrial revolution (4IR) describes a series of innovations in artificial intelligence, ubiquitous internet connectivity, and robotics, along with the subsequent disruption to the means of production. The impact of 4IR on industry reveals a construct called Industry 4.0. Higher education, too, is called to transform to respond to the disruption of 4IR, to meet the needs of industry, and to maximize human flourishing. Education 4.0 describes 4IR’s impact or predicted impact or intended impact on higher education, including prescriptions for HE’s transformation to realize these challenges. Industry 4.0 requires a highly skilled workforce, and a 4IR world raises questions about skills portability, durability, and lifespan. Every vertical within industry will be impacted by 4IR and such impact will manifest in needs for diverse employees possessing distinct competencies. Customer relationship management (CRM) describes the use of information systems to implement a customer-centric strategy and to practice relationship marketing (RM). Salesforce, a market leading CRM vendor, proposes its products alone will generate 9 million new jobs and $1.6 trillion in new revenues for Salesforce customers by 2024. Despite the strong market for CRM skills, a recent paper in a prominent IS journal claims higher education is not preparing students for CRM careers. In order to supply the CRM domain with skilled workers, it is imperative that higher education develop curricula oriented toward the CRM professional. Assessing skills needed for specific industry roles has long been an important task in IS pedagogy, but we did not find a paper in our literature review that explored the Salesforce administrator role. In this paper, we report the background, methodology, and results of a content analysis of Salesforce Administrator job postings retrieved from popular job sites. We further report the results of semi-structured interviews with industry experts, which served to validate, revise, and extend the content analysis framework. Our resulting skills framework serves as a foundation for CRM curriculum development and our resulting analysis incorporates elements of Education 4.0 to provide a roadmap for educating students to be successful with CRM in a 4IR world

Personalised trails and learner profiling within e-learning environments

This deliverable focuses on personalisation and personalised trails. We begin by introducing and defining the concepts of personalisation and personalised trails. Personalisation requires that a user profile be stored, and so we assess currently available standard profile schemas and discuss the requirements for a profile to support personalised learning. We then review techniques for providing personalisation and some systems that implement these techniques, and discuss some of the issues around evaluating personalisation systems. We look especially at the use of learning and cognitive styles to support personalised learning, and also consider personalisation in the field of mobile learning, which has a slightly different take on the subject, and in commercially available systems, where personalisation support is found to currently be only at quite a low level. We conclude with a summary of the lessons to be learned from our review of personalisation and personalised trails

A gentle transition from Java programming to Web Services using XML-RPC

Exposing students to leading edge vocational areas of relevance such as Web Services can be difficult. We show a lightweight approach by embedding a key component of Web Services within a Level 3 BSc module in Distributed Computing. We present a ready to use collection of lecture slides and student activities based on XML-RPC. In addition we show that this material addresses the central topics in the context of web services as identified by Draganova (2003)

Pedagogic approaches to using technology for learning: literature review

This literature review is intended to address and support teaching qualifications and CPD through identifying new and emerging pedagogies; "determining what constitutes effective use of technology in teaching and learning; looking at new developments in teacher training qualifications to ensure that they are at the cutting edge of learning theory and classroom practice and making suggestions as to how teachers can continually update their skills." - Page 4

Development of an e-portfolio social network using emerging web technologies

Dissertação de mestrado em Informatics EngineeringDigital portfolios (also known as e-Portfolios) can be described as digital collections of artifacts, being both a product (a digital collection of artifacts) and a process (reflecting on those artifacts and what they represent). It is an extension of the traditional Curriculum Vitae, which tells the educational and professional milestones of someone, while the portfolio proves and qualifies them (e.g.: annually thousands of students finish a Master degree on Informatics, but only one has built Vue, Twitter or Facebook – the Portfolio goes beyond the CV milestones by specifying the person’s output throughout life and distinguishing them). e-Portfolios augment this by introducing new digital representations and workflows, exposed to a community, being both a product and a process. This approach can be useful for individual self-reflection, education or even job markets, where companies seek talented individuals, because it expands the traditional CV concept and empowers individual merit. There have been many studies, theories, and methodologies related with e-Portfolios, but transpositions to web applications have been unsuccessful, untuitive and too complex (in opposition to the CV format, which had success in various applications, for example LinkedIn). This project aims to study new approaches and develop an exploratory web/mobile application of this method ology, by exploring the potential of social networks to promote them, augmented by emergent web technologies. Its main output is the prototype of a new product (a social network of e-Portfolio) and its design decisions, with new theoretical approaches applied to web development. By the end of this project, we will have idealized a web infrastructure for interacting with networks of users, their skills, and communities seeking them. The approach to the development of this platform will be to integrate emerging technologies like WebAssembly and Rust in its development cycle and document our findings. At the end of this project, in addition to the prototype of a new product, we hope to have contributed to the State of the Art of Web Engineering and to be able to answer questions regarding new emerging web development ecosystems.Os portfólios digitais (também conhecidos como e-Portfolios) podem ser descritos como coleções digitais de artefatos, sendo tanto um produto (uma coleção digital de artefatos) quanto um processo (refletindo sobre esses artefatos e o que eles representam). É uma extensão do tradicional Curriculum Vitae, onde o primeiro conta os marcos educacionais e profissionais de alguém, enquanto que o segundo, o Portfólio, comprova-os e qualifica-os (e.g.: anualmente milhares de alunos concluem graduações em Informática, no entanto apenas um consebeu o Vue, o Twitter ou o Facebook - o Portfólio vai além dos indicadores quantitativos do CV, especificando e qualificando a produção da pessoa ao longo da vida e distinguindo-a). Os e-Portfolios expandem este conceito com a introdução de novas representações digitais e fluxos de trabalho, expostos a uma comunidade, sendo tanto um produto como um processo. Esta abordagem pode ser útil para a autorreflexão individual, educação ou mesmo mercados de trabalho, onde as empresas procuram indivíduos talentosos, porque expande o conceito tradicional de CV e potencializa o mérito individual. Existem muitos estudos, teorias e metodologias relacionadas com os e-Portfolios, mas as transposições para aplicações web têm sido mal sucedidas, pouco intuitivas e muito complexas (em oposição ao formato CV, que tem tido sucesso em várias aplicações, por exemplo no LinkedIn). Este projeto visa estudar novas abordagens neste domínio e desenvolver uma aplicação exploratória web/mobile que melhor exprima os e-Portfolios, explorando o potencial das redes sociais para os promover em conjunto com tecnologias web emergentes. As principais produções esperadadas deste trabalho são um protótipo de um novo produto (uma rede social de e-Portfolio) e documentar novas abordagens teóricas aplicadas ao desenvolvimento web. No final deste projeto, teremos idealizado uma infraestrutura web para interagir com redes de utilizadores, as suas competências e comunidades que os procurem. A abordagem ao desenvolvimento desta plataforma será integrar tecnologias emergentes como WebAssembly e Rust no seu ciclo de desenvolvimento e documentar as nossas descobertas e decisões. No final deste projeto, para além do protótipo de uma plataforma, esperamos ter contribuido para o Estado da Arte da Engenharia Web e responder a questões sobre novos ecossistemas emergentes de desenvolvimento web