A prescriptive study of early trends in implementing e-learning in the UK Higher Education Sector (original) (raw)

Does E-Learning Policy Drive Change In Higher Education? A Case Study Relating Models of Organisational Change to E-Learning Implementation

Journal of Higher Education Policy and …, 2005

Due to the heightened competition introduced by the potential global market and the need for structural changes within organisations delivering e-content, e-learning policy is beginning to take on a more significant role within the context of educational policy per se. For this reason, it is becoming increasingly important to establish what effect such policies have and how they are achieved. This paper addresses this question, illustrating five ways in which change is understood (Fordist, evolutionary, ecological, community of practice and discourse-oriented) and then using this range of perspectives to explore how e-learning policy drives change (both organisational and pedagogic) within a selected higher education institution. The implications of this case are then discussed, and both methodological and pragmatic conclusions are drawn, considering the relative insights offered by the models and ways in which change around e-learning might be supported or promoted.

Yearning to learn from e‐learning: the experiences of a University of Glamorgan practitioner

Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education, 2009

On the world stage, the use of e‐learning is not a new phenomenon. However, many teachers within higher education favour, and are most comfortable with, the “talk and chalk”, face‐to‐face mode of plying their trade. For them, facilitating learning within virtual learning environments (VLEs) is often alien, and technically and pedagogically challenging. This paper outlines the trials and tribulations of a higher education institution (HEI) practitioner when engaging in the design, use and development of virtual learning environments as a departmental ground breaker within his institution. A model is proposed that will help other practitioners who view conversion of their teaching and learning from the traditional “talk and chalk” mode to a VLE as perhaps daunting and frightful.

Critical success factors for e‐learning and institutional change—some organisational perspectives on campus‐wide e‐learning

British Journal of Educational Technology, 2007

Computer technology has been harnessed for education in UK universities ever since the first computers for research were installed at ten selected sites in 1957. Subsequently real costs have fallen dramatically. Processing power has increased; network and communications infrastructure has proliferated; and information has become unimaginably accessible through the Internet and the World Wide Web. However, perhaps because higher education institutions are resistant to change, educational technology in universities has not managed to match the ubiquity of technology in everyday life. The reasons for differences between everyday experiences and those higher education and may lie in higher education practice. Higher education practice reflects the wider agendas of institutions manifested through their organisation, structure, culture and climate. These factors may particularly impact upon the potential for higher education to embrace and manage change in its educational activities; especially technology enhanced learning such as blended learning and e-learning. This paper briefly reviews the progress of educational technology, then identifies critical success factors for e-learning through an organisational perspective derived from studies of six UK higher education institutions.

Staff development and wider institutional approaches around technology enhanced learning in higher education institutions in the United Kingdom from the heads of e-learning perspective

2015

This thesis presents the findings of a mixed methods study conducted in the context of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). More specifically, it focuses on the Heads of e-Learning (HeLs) perspective of the needs of tutors who teach in blended and online environments, the ways HEIs in the United Kingdom (UK) address these needs and on institutional issues around the deployment and support of Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) by campus-based institutions. The HeLs’ perspectives are also compared to Laurillard's conversational framework for the effective use of learning technologies. The literature review in the area of staff development on TEL offers an analysis of the key issues and provides a useful backcloth for this research; the TEL context in UK HEIs is discussed, the terminology is clarified and learning theories are briefly looked at, prior to the more detailed description of staff development models and approaches around TEL. The research design follows a mixed methods...

Take the High Road: National Programmes for the Development of E-Learning

2016

The central question addressed by this paper is the effect of national initiatives in e-learning within the Higher Education sector. Two national programmes for the promotion of e-learning in UK higher education are described, and some tentative lessons are drawn from their comparison. One is the English Benchmarking and Pathfinder programme, still ongoing, in which £8M has been distributed widely across over 70 HE institutions, and the other is the £6M Scottish e-learning transformation programme, involving six large-scale collaborative projects. The scale of these two

Paradoxes and Dilemmas in Managing E-Learning in Higher Education. Research & Occasional Paper Series. CSHE.7.03

Center for Studies in Higher Education, 2003

The new information and communication technologies (ICT) affect currently most spheres of life, including all educational levels. Their effects are most likely to grow in the future. However, many predictions in the last few years as to the sweeping impact of the ICT on restructuring the teaching/learning practices at universities and their high profit prospects have not been materialized; and several large ventures of e-learning undertaken by the corporate world, new for-profit organizations and some leading universities failed to yield the expected results. This paper examines eight inherent paradoxes and dilemmas in the implementation process of the ICT in various higher education settings worldwide. The paradoxes and dilemmas relate to: the differential infrastructure and readiness of different-type higher education institutions to utilize the ICTs' potential; the extent to which the "old" distance education technologies and the new ICT replace teaching/learning pr...

The Role of Lecturers and University Administrators in Promoting New E-Learning Initiatives

International Journal of Virtual and Personal Learning Environments

This article examines the role of lecturers in encouraging and supporting students likely to be predisposed to challenges related to incomprehension, incapacity and isolation embedded in the virtual learning environment. This article used a constructivist lens to gain through interviews an understanding into the intuition, thoughts, ideals, beliefs and inclination of lecturers about the nature and extent of their supportive role in the e-learning environment. The key findings revealed that the role of lecturers in promoting e-learning is varied. The discrepancy seems to be emanating from the lack of clear understanding of the meaning, the depth, the breadth and thrust of e-learning pedagogy at the University of South Africa (UNISA). The UNISA Strategy 2015-2030 introduced incremental changes in the form of Open Distance e-Learning (ODeL), which highlights the infusion of e-learning in the Open Distance Learning (ODL) context. Given its ODeL mandate, and the prescripts of the UNISA S...