Australasian Council on Online Distance and e-Learning (ACODE)
Abstract
The ACODE E-Learning Benchmarks established in 2004 were last updated in 2007, well before the advent of ubiquitous mobile delivery, the widespread use of social media, cloud-based systems and the more recent phenomenon of MOOCs. In 2013 a project was initiated to update the Benchmarks. This was not a trivial undertaking and it was important to establish a robust process to allow not only for an update but also for a rigorous trial of any changes proposed to the benchmarks.
Subsequently, a group of six ACODE representatives, with significant experience in technology enhanced learning, undertook this task. As a consequence of this review the Benchmarks were renamed to the ACODE Benchmarks for Technology Enhanced Learning. It also resulted in a major trial of the Benchmarks conducted in Sydney in June 2014, where 24 institutions were involved in an Inter-Institutional Benchmarking Summit.
The summit not only proved the validity of the Benchmarks but notionally ushered in a new opportunity for ACODE to be a major player in the Benchmarking space in Australasia. As a further consequence, all the institutions involved in this activity expressed an interest in using the benchmarks in some ongoing way to ensure that their technology enhanced learning practice was undergoing rigorous and ongoing quality assurance.
This Report starts with a brief history of the Benchmarks, then provides a description of the:
• review process the Benchmarks underwent;
• inter-institutional benchmarking summit;
• formal evaluation of the summit; and
• subsequent reflections on the future state of the Benchmarks.
The report concludes with a series of recommendations on how ACODE may approach the facilitation of future Benchmarking activities
