From flowers to palms: 40 years of policy for online learning

This year sees the 40th anniversary of the first policy paper regarding the use of computers in higher education in the United Kingdom. The publication of this paper represented the beginning of the field of learning technology research and practice in higher education. In the past 40 years, policy has at various points drawn from different communities and provided the roots for a diverse field of learning technology researchers and practitioners. This paper presents a review of learning technology-related policy over the past 40 years. The purpose of the review is to make sense of the current position in which the field finds itself, and to highlight lessons that can be learned from the implementation of previous policies. Conclusions drawn from the review of 40 years of learning technology policy suggest that there are few challenges that have not been faced before as well as a potential return to individual innovation

Assessing creative process and product in higher education

This article examines how Education undergraduates explored their creative processes through the planning and presentation of an artwork. In particular, it addresses how they negotiated the demands of an assessment method which focused on both the reflective process and the finished product. This investigation is part of a more extensive study of creativity and engagement in Higher Education; it is underpinned by the idea that all students have the potential to be creative if they are provided with innovative learning experiences and open-ended assessment tasks. The empirical data was obtained from semi-structured interviews (n=30), students’ reflective sketchbooks and observations. The findings support the view that students are more motivated and engaged when they have access to alternative, creative assessment opportunities which involve experimentation and risk-taking in a supportive learning environment. The data shows that they value assessment methods which enable them to demonstrate their knowledge, understanding and skills in different ways. However, concern about the perceived subjectivity of such an assessment process, and the emphasis placed on meeting the learning outcomes, initially presented a barrier to creative development. One implication is that the conflict between creativity and assessment might be partially resolved if students played a more active part in both the formulation of summative assessment criteria and the on-going formative assessment process

Rural Autochthony? The Rejection of an Aboriginal Placename in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia

This article addresses the question of why the name ‘Mullawallah’, advanced by local Wada wurrung for a new suburb in the Ballarat area, was contested and rejected by residents. It argues that the intersection between corporate profit, government policy and meaning-based issues of belonging should be highlighted for a deeper understanding of practices around place naming. The contextual conditions regarding the democratisation of place-naming policy, overwhelming power of commercial developers to ‘name Australia’ with marketable high status names and a ‘carpentered’ pastoral environment ‘emptied’ of the Indigenous population, created an environment conducive for the contests over naming. The Indigenous people appeared to have been wiped from the landscape and the worldview of settler locals. Concepts of ‘locals’ and ‘rural autochthony’ prove useful for understanding the ambiguities of belonging and placename attachment in Australia. The article argues that cultural politics of naming remains a contested social practice

Pushing the boundaries: a study of higher education students’ responses to a creative, art-based learning experience.

This article examines students’ responses to an open-ended, art-based task which involved the documentation of the creative process and culminated in the production of individual art pieces. It explores how students approached the work, and how working independently in a collaborative, learning space impacted on their personal and professional identities. The findings support the view that students are more engaged with their learning when they have access to challenging, creative experiences which enable them to demonstrate their knowledge, understanding and skills in different ways

Organizing for Prevailing Wage In Florida

[Excerpt] The Broward AFL-CIO had spent a great deal of its time and member unions\u27 money helping to elect several county commissioners. Now it posed the prevailing wage ordinance as a litmus test: Would county commissioners who had benefited from labor backing and had pledged their support to labor at election time, support it? Or would they side with the Board of Realtors, the Associated Builders and Contractors and other anti-union forces

Documents of Performance : the Assignments Book of the Britannia Theatre, Hoxton

Documentary evidence about the financial terms under which nineteenth-century dramatists produced their work is generally available only in piecemeal records that have survived by happenstance. This volume of agreements is therefore significant as it charts more than six hundred agreements made between individual playwrights and the management of one East End theatre, the Britannia, over a period of forty years. The article not only explains its provenance and the nature of the transactions contained within it, but also indicates how supplementary annotations in the Assignments Book reveal how it functioned as a working document.Peer reviewe

Worker Centers: Organizing Communities at the Edge of the Dream

[Excerpt] Through their service provision, advocacy, and organizing work, worker centers are helping to set the political agenda and mobilize a growing constituency to make its voice heard on fundamental labor an immigration reform. This work, in and of itself instrumental to a brighter future for low-wage workers in the United States, is also indispensable to the revitalization of organized labor and progressive politics in America

Hospital information systems : a nursing viewpoint : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Nursing Studies at Massey University

This thesis is concerned with hospital information systems. The literature relating to management information systems is examined in conjunction with the literature which specifically focuses upon hospital and nursing information systems. A field study, using a case study approach, is designed and implemented, its purpose being to analyse five sub-systems of a current hospital information system in use in one Hospital Board. This field study utilises a basic systems analysis methodology focusing upon the problem identification and performance identifications of the analysis cycle. In the problem identification phase forty-two subjects are interviewed, (83.3% of the sample being nurses in management positions). Check lists designed to test the sub-systems abilities to generate, store, retrieve and utilise data, and test the subjects knowledge of the sub-systems are devised and applied. The data obtained from the application of check lists is analysed and data flow charts and in-depth interview schedules developed for use in phase two or the performance identification phase of the field study. In phase two (performance identification) eleven subjects in administrative positions within the Hospital Board are interviewed using the data flow charts and the in-depth interview schedules as tools for eliciting data. Contrary to the author's expectations the field study results reveal a considerable diversity. In phase one the respondents possessed a sound knowledge of the admission/discharge, patient care and nursing management sub-systems. 85,7% of the nurse respondents have knowledge of the patient care sub-system and a further 79.2% have some knowledge of its ability to generate, store, retrieve and utilise information. In common with the administrators the high level of knowledge of retrieval and utlisation (89.2%) would indicate frequent use of the system. By contrast only 5.4% of the respondents in phase one had knowledge of retrieval and utilisation of the staffing information sub-system as compared with 100% in the administrators group. This same pattern emerges for the financial sub-system with 13.5% of the respondents having knowledge of retrieval and 18.9% of utilisation of the sub-system compared with 81.8% of administrators. These results indicate to the author that information systems development tends to be associated with each health discipline rather than with the macro development of a relevant, comprehensive hospital information system. To this end a series of questions are raised and possible answers provided. Finally a model which could become a prescription for future development is presented

FOCUS on technology‐supported learning in further education

This paper introduces FOCUS, a ‘one‐stop shop’ for technology‐supported learning resources designed and developed by a consortium of higher and further education partners. It reports on an investigation of the issues surrounding the adaptation of this HE‐orientated resource to an FE context. This involved piloting FOCUS with FE staff to assess its suitability. The issues raised by this process are discussed and general implications for the adaptation of generic HE resources to the FE sector are identified