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Louis HD

review of interview
Louis HD Wales
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Contextual information
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Digital Decisions in HE (second interview)
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Interview

Wednesday, August 31st 1pm
Attendees: Fiona Harvey, Louis (HD)
Teams (Lancaster)
Discussion topics
Introduction and explanation (agreements)
Types of student support (transition, accessibility)
How are decisions made institutionally
Influence of networks (HeLF, UCISA)
Influence of EdTech in decision making

Notes

Very strategic (or so it seems) launched straight into how they are an academic as well as QA and on boards etc and is taking decisions.
Digital Strategy Operational Group brought in by the PVC Education as decisions were not being made. Which meets once a month.
Lots of student support before they get there
JISC capabilities.
Lots of tech - but didnt get my point about the influence of edtech for problems you don’t know you have. Insisted that they only use when they have a need rather than knowing what others are using.
Said he follows the lists of UCISA and HelF but not actually meeting with them. Interesting that he wanted to meet with someone at UCL and their VLE so will put him in touch with Aurelie as someone who is involved. He said he was in all the groups but I felt he was very much on his own and was doing rather a lot for one person (as well as being academic and teaching he was leading various projects)
Felt that they were very strategic but I am still not clear about the way that the software is implemented how is it actually used? He felt that confidence was low in terms of skills of Mature Students.
He sort of let on that although alot is in place but the students are not engaged.
Thats a design issue (in my head)

What I could have done better

I think it went smoothly. I was worried about this one because I didn’t know him at all.

What I did well

Covered all the topics and got him talking. He seemed like he was very interested and was pleased to be able to contribute

Comments from the transcript

Noted here that the digital skills were self audited and that they didn’ do it so they are introducing the JISC self audit tool but no plan to do it any differently. Also all digital skills are organised and delivered outside of their programmes as part of their induction at central level via the IT department so detached from their studies and detached from their academic staff.
Also mentioned that mature students have less confidence in using technology especiailly for learning and so would probably benefit from a gentle reintroduction to how to write, research and use the web to do it.
He said that the international and mature students may make poor choices about the kinds of tech they use for their course and many students using mobiles instead of laptop. Which leads me to wonder how they connect the people in IT who must have seen some of this with the academics in their departments. And I wonder how you can decide on the kinds of assessment that would benefit the students if they cannot rely on having access to decent interfaces. (Designing posters, writing essays etc) The decisions about the use of IT are impacted by what they are asked to do as well. And the Digital Badges are introduced but have no value other than to MS or the IT department who say who have done them.
October 15, 2022 at 2:45 PM

Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

All the digital skills are offered as extra curricular activities - detached again from their programme so not seen as important
October 15, 2022 at 2:46 PM

Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

20:54 they dont ask about specific IT or digital skills stuff but it comes up in the NSS and their PTES surveys
October 15, 2022 at 2:50 PM

Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

21;53 mentioned that he has had a question added into their surveys which he is making students fill out about their support for digital skills and that sort of thing but it is external to their programme. I think there is a complete disconnect between the students and how they feel or approach their programmes and those who are deciding how students should access their content. i dont think he said anything about mobile apps or use of mobiles for learning but he did mention the charging stations and that there were not enough of them.
October 15, 2022 at 2:55 PM

Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

26:02 said that the networks were not influencial but then has got JISC skills stuff throughout (as the main part of the plan) But and he made a reference to his isolation, and I wonder how much cliqueness is off putting for him, that it seems to be what HE does. I will have to look at the background to CardiffMet because it seems that he is referring to more FE type activities rather than HE level.
October 15, 2022 at 3:17 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

32.36 they don't analyse open text responses (but I think they must read them) but they don't use them which is awful and odd because you have the comments right there!
October 15, 2022 at 3:29 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

33:13 - they don't tailor their activities or support to the student groups according to the things that had been said by them in their feedback. What is a travesty is the exact issue academic staff complain about is that they give feedback to students but they don't use it and here we have admin/acadmics getting feedback and not doing anything with it because they dont have the capacity to read it which is why he is putting a learning analytics project together (but again, that wouldnt probably use the open text comments)

October 15, 2022 at 3:36 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

34:31 suppliers dont comply with accessibility regs (if every UK HEI pushed then surely...?) <-- my comment in ()
October 15, 2022 at 3:37 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

37:14 disorganised mess (no idea what software is where, who is using what and how to support students which is chaos and completely at odds with regs on supporting accessibility (particularly where they have lots of non trad students and those with needs) and they don't read the comments in the free text responses!
October 15, 2022 at 3:42 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

41:11 The complaints about the systems and the volume of them. There seems to be no plan to change or to manage this. I wonder how many complaints they have (data source?)
October 15, 2022 at 4:24 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

41:23 he said that he was writing a report about student feedback and told me what they said but he said earlier he didn't read the qualitative feedback? so this must be survey questions

October 15, 2022 at 4:26 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

42:58 breakout groups cameras turned off and no one engaging (cameras off by default) he thinks this is why they are not engaging - I think its more complicated than that!
October 15, 2022 at 4:36 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

44:09 seems like an odd thing to say (double siengagement) because they don't want to force anyone to engage online (but why are they online?) flexibility because of their students but then he said that because of the no cameras they are not participating and just doing something else (design issue)

October 15, 2022 at 4:39 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

45:50 students not having the right equipment he said they still havent sorted out but thats because the focus is inappropriate at the beginning. No clear line of connection between student experience (digital) and their academic programme. IT a mess and not accessible
October 15, 2022 at 4:50 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

48:17 he said that students were doing other things rather than attending which is similar to us answering emails during meetings (nope) and again he cannot see that its a design and teaching issue.
October 15, 2022 at 4:51 PM
HF
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Harvey, Fiona (Postgraduate Researcher)

49:17 he just told me that the software isnt accessible and then says he approves the software
October 15, 2022 at 4:54 PM
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