IT in Education and Staff Development |-------------------------------------| | Paper presented at CAUSE92 | | December 1-4, 1992, Dallas, Texas | |-------------------------------------| IT IN EDUCATION AND STAFF DEVELOPMENT Iain Morrison The University of Melbourne Parkville Victoria 3052 Australia ABSTRACT The University of Melbourne, a large public university, has embarked on implementation of an IT Strategic Plan which envisages widespread adoption of IT throughout the academic and administrative functions of the university. The presentation will report on two programmes commenced in 1990, the Staff Development and Training in IT programme and the Interactive Multimedia programme. These programmes are aimed at providing staff with basic IT skills courses for acquisition of familiarity with new workplace applications, such as wordprocessing, document and information retrieval and new administrative systems and fostering close cooperation with IT, educational and academic departments to explore and develop applications of IT to teaching and learning. ----------------------------------------- Introduction The University of Melbourne is the second oldest university in Australia and has a special place in the Australian Higher Education System and in the Victorian community which derives from its particular academic strengths and history. The University has a continuing commitment to excellence and leadership in education and research and to assist its staff, students and community to develop to their full potential. The University in 1992 continues to exhibit leadership in the acquisition of competitive research grants and in the number of government and industry-supported Cooperative Research Centres in which it is a key participant. With ~30,000 students and over 4,600 academic and general staff, the University is one of the larger Australian tertiary institutions. Until 1987, there were 19 universities within Australia, but at that time the federal government abolished the binary system which differentiated colleges from the universities and initiated a programme of rationalisation through amalgamations and affiliations. There are now ~37 universities in the Unified National System with a wide range of cultures, communities, resources and teaching and research aspirations. The federal government, with state government strategic and policy input, regulates the Higher Education System through 'educational profile' negotiation whereby each institution agrees a funded student load, both undergraduate and post-graduate, on a planned system-wide basis. Federal funds also provide the largest source of research grants and have over the past few years been increasing targetted to encouraging industry participation and to areas of national priority. Overall, throughout the 1980s, the per capita student funding provided by the federal government to institutions dropped in real terms (22% between 1975 and 1987 and another 6% since) and enrolments increased without commensurate increase in academic staff numbers, raising the student/staff ratios. The current economic climate in Australia has tended to increase pressure to further increase intake with most institutions accepting over-enrolments and continuing pipeline effects, beyond funded load, to ensure students have access to tertiary education. Institutions are being encouraged to broaden their income base to other than the federal dollar but there are still severe constraints on how this can be done - there are restrictions on fee- paying Australian students and until very recently in funding for new capital works. The result is that many institutions now have a high exposure to income earned from fee paying overseas students, an educational export earner that is encouraged by the government but which may need to be re-structured into educational partnerships and twinning arrangements to match other national aspirations. In some institutions, federal funds now only meet 50-60% of the operating budget, a dramatic change from even five years ago. The federal government is committed to a programme of increased equity and access to universities and to increasing the participation rate across all age groups. The government has, for a number of years, been pro-actively exploring new initiatives to increase access to education, including the use of new technologies and delivery modes. Given the high current unmet demand for places, the "Clever Country" initiative, and the almost certainty that resources will not increase commensurate with enrolments, it is clear that the government and the institutions are looking to new teaching and learning methodologies and to increased use of IT to enable the planned objectives to be met. National Initiatives Since the mid-1980s, the federal government has pursued the objective of retraining and up-skilling of the workforce on several fronts. Under the jurisdiction of the industrial commissions, award restructuring and wage increases have been linked to structural efficiency principles supported by broadbanding and multi-skilling. Staff education is now recognised as a life-long process and job-related skills need to be continually upgraded/renewed. In 1990, the federal government instigated the Training Guarantee Levy whereby companies and institutions, with an annual payroll greater than a quite modest threshold, had additional tax levied unless proof was supplied that the company had engaged in an approved programme of staff education and skills development of an equivalent value. Educational institutions were not exempt but could normally acquit their obligations through traditional study leave programmes. Educational institutions were however, de facto, approved providers and companies could acquit their obligations through attendance at appropriate courses or by donation to an institution as long as the funds were used to construct training facilities. This led quickly to a number of growth activities at the margin particularly in 1990 and 1991, before the economic downturn, in information technology related areas where the growth in services was anticipated, staff skills were being upgraded and companies were re-equipping. The University, in order to better support the strategic move to a more devolved management structure, upgraded its Staff Development and Training programme to better empower and train supervisors and middle- managers and upgraded the IT skills programme. After review, the federal government in 1991 produced a set of quantitative measures, or performance indicators (the Linke Report), claimed to be relevant to the process of effective management of the higher education sector. In 1992, the government formed the Committee for the Advancement of University Education (CAUT) and will shortly announce the award of a number of National Teaching Development Grants to individual academic staff in institutions to assist in the development of new methodologies/courses to improve the quality of teaching and learning. A Committee on Quality Assurance in Higher Education will shortly be established. In November 1992, the federal government announced the release of the Mayer report on key competencies and nationally consistent assessment and reporting as part of a concerted national effort to improve post-compulsory education and training. Members of the UNS and professional associations have already expressed some concerns over aspects of the report. Several Distance Education Centres have been established to develop and exploit alternate modes of educational course delivery and, in the Open Learning Initiative, the government is seeking "to tap into the potential economies of scale available from wider (satellite broadcast) delivery of a very substantial body of materials currently available in the DECs", and thereby meet cost-effectively unmet demand nationally and overseas. In the second phase of the OLI, the government has foreshadowed, in a request for consultancy, the use of a national communications network for the provision of open access to information resources and student services. There is amongst UNS members a feeling that the rapid explosion in technologies has overtaken the original DEC programmes and that an urgent review is required to ensure that all universities do in fact benefit from identification of and access to best educational practice. Strategic Planning Throughout the 1980s, the University engaged in a number of IT planning exercises. The first, in 1984, focussed on the "Future of Academic Computing" and set up the framework for the development of the University Network and supercomputing facilities for research support. The University Network, now nearing the maturity stage, links all buildings on and near campus through a 100-megabit/sec FDDI optical fibre ring and those departments close to campus and to several kilometres distance through infra-red laser and microwave technologies. In 1987 and 1988, the second and third reviews, respectively involving Wordprocessing and the central Computing Services, recognised the need to adequately support desktop services to the increasing number of microcomputers in department offices and on staff desks. In 1989, the University published its first IT Strategic Plan for the triennium 1990- 92 and formed a new department, Information Technology Services (ITS), charged with implementation of the plan. A new committee of Council, the IT Policy Advisory Committee, was constituted to monitor the implementation of the IT Plan and to continue planning on a rolling triennial basis. ITS was formed by the amalgamation of the academic and administrative computing functions and of the data, voice and video reticulation networks. The Library was independently reviewed in 1991 and a joint Library-IT committee formed to develop a Library-IT Strategic Plan and a basis for consistent planned provision of information services. The objectives of the first IT Plan in 1989-91 focussed firmly on network infrastructure, rationalisation of central facilities and staff development and training. The 1991-93 IT Plan continued this focus with particular emphases on acquisition of common hardware and software platform technologies, service development and a programme to educate all staff and postgraduate students in generic skills that would underpin administrative, research and teaching applications. The IT Plan envisaged that these programmes would be integrative and synergistic. Currently all twenty four objectives in the 1991-93 IT Strategic Plan have either been met or substantially exceeded, in particular: ++ (Recommendation 14). All members of staff be encouraged to become computer literate in the context of their own discipline or work environment through staff development policies and the availability of special courses in Information Technology. ++ (Recommendation 15). By 1993, every student in the University have access to the local area network for the purpose of interchanging information with staff and other students and facilitating access to online library materials. The recommended ratio of laboratory workstations to full time undergraduates is 1:10 ++ (Recommendation 16). Installation of the Interactive Multimedia Laboratory be completed in 1991. The objectives were achieved through a process of resource redeployment and professional development and retraining of staff in ITS while reducing the overall budget demand. In 1988, the University developed its first statement of its Aims, Guiding Values and Objectives which provided the framework for its first three-year Strategic Plan. In 1991, a process of review and refinement led to the publishing of a new three-year plan titled - "A Commitment to Quality" in which the University reaffirmed its determination to strive for the highest international standards in teaching and research. In the case of teaching, the University was faced with increasing student/staff ratios, overcrowded teaching and library spaces and tutorial session attendances that almost precluded a quality learning experience for the individual, a prime commitment of the institution. In its 1991-93 Strategic Plan, the University stated as a specific goal that it would: * continue to develop the use of new information technologies in all aspects of the life of the University, including its application in the development of new teaching methodologies, in support of research and in the development of information systems to improve the quality of management In August 1991, the Centre for the Study of Higher Education, within the University, mounted a national conference on the Quality of Education which contributed significantly to the national debate on the issue. The CSHE plays a major role in initiatives to improve the effectiveness of large group teaching with new approaches to teaching and learning and in the use of technology for new delivery modes. Whereas formerly planning focus had been on the input to the educational process, increasingly the quality of the process of learning and the educational outcomes are being assessed both by the federal government and the institution itself. There is national debate on the relevance on the application of a common set of skills and competencies to the university system (as opposed to vocational and professional training) and the University has initiated programmes in Quality of Education and Academic Audit to ensure that course objectives are clearly defined and that the academic processes are subject to audit and feedback, not least amongst the student body. The University has also decided that the quality of teaching is increasingly taken into account in consideration of the work of staff for the purposes of decision making relating to promotion. Basic Skills Programme Prior to 1990, Computing Services provided instruction in the use of central computer systems and packages and in some wordprocessing packages, mostly on a fee-for-service basis. In achieving the technical objectives of the 1989-91 IT Plan, it was recognised that IT deployment on the scale planned could only assist in achieving the institutional objectives if a systematic programme of staff education and generic skills transfer was quickly put in place. With ~6,000 workstations deployed on campus, ~2,000 in ~80 student laboratories and ~4,000 in departmental, staff and postgraduate offices, it was essential to build and maintain a skills set to support word processing and spreadsheet, access to administrative, research and library systems and to overseas databases. In addition almost all staff would be registered for electronic mail purposes and a number of mail gateways maintained. The University was also re-engineering and redeveloping all its administrative computer systems (using the Ingres RDBMS) and wanted to support a mix of functional and client-server access using a common user interface. In addition, the move to broadbanding and multi-skilling implied a workforce with a high mobility and common skills requirement. With over 7,000 staff and postgraduate students, provision needed to be made to educate 2,000-3,000 staff per year. The University established an Information Technology Centre in early 1991, refurbishing an old garage complex with 9 computing laboratories fitted out with a range of Macintosh, IBM and Unix workstations. One of the laboratories was used for open student access and another as an administrative systems demonstration area and graphics visualisation laboratory. The IT Centre was established through a part grant and part loan, with the loan repayable to the University over four years following acceptance of a business plan with objectives: * support for the generic skills programme * support for Training Guarantee Levy activities * commercial courseware delivery for vendors * support for departmental course delivery * provision of multimedia delivery capability It was agreed that no more than 25% of aggregate capacity would be used for commercial activities. In particular the ITC provided a secure and managed environment for faculty and departmental wishing to develop courses prior to seeking ITPAC and Faculty support for the establishment of local facilities. Staff in the newly formed ITS, from all support sections, redesigned and documented courses to meet the generic needs. In addition, given that the University has a heavily devolved computing infrastructure with over 50 large Banyan servers and over ~60 Apple Macintosh departmental file servers, courses were constructed in LAN and Server Management to reinforce prudent data management and administrative practices. In 1992, these practices were endorsed by the Auditor and Council as University policy and are promulgated through a "Defensive Computing Strategy" document. A number of central automated data archival and recovery processes have been put in place to support all departments. The Computer Skills courses were designed to be modular and to have, as far as possible, similar elements for Macintosh or IBM PC compatibles. This facilitates skill updates and part-time attendance. The basic skills courses are free to all University staff and postgraduate students and, in toto, comprise 30-35 hours attendance in the laboratories. The courses have clearly documented objectives and staff are provided with resource guides, sample scripts and course notes. A short course is provided on using the Australian Academic and Research network (AARNet) to access resources nationally and overseas, for example for bibliographic database searches. A number of intermediate and advanced courses are also provided to build on the generic skills courses such as in spreadsheet, wordprocessing and network administration and a number of presentation aid courses are under development for assisting academic staff. The figures below do not include facilities hirings and course delivery on a commercial basis nor for structured use by University departments or the Interactive Multimedia programme. ITS also encourages self- teaching and work-group based instruction under conditions where appropriate standards can continue to be met, for example where a drafting office wishes to build on generic skills in CAD/CAM outside the mainstream of campus-wide activities. Course delivery in 1990-92 is summarised as follows (BS = Basic Skills; IA = Intermediate & Advanced): ____________________________________________________________________ **IT Training Participants 1990 1991 1992 184 courses 307 courses 255 courses Total BS IA Total BS IA Total Academic 216 596 28 624 277 51 328 General staff 838 1271 211 1482 919 260 1179 Postgraduates 138 517 17 534 426 97 523 Undergraduates 15 6 21 Senior Staff 44 44 Externals 117 28 24 52 24 19 43 Total 1309 2456 280 2736 1661 433 2094 (%) 100 90 10 100 80 20 100 ____________________________________________________________________ An interesting feature of the above is the 'senior's course'. Senior staff were surveyed to assess the 'reach' of the programme and this revealed that ~50 Deans and Heads of Department had not attended the basic skills courses, which may have been due to reticence in the lack of keyboard skills or to lack of time. Special 'fast-track' versions of the basic skills courses were held in the evening at low student/staff ratios in order to encourage participation by this key group. Feedback in terms of improved participation rates by heads and their staff and in relation to course content was very positive. Another key element not included above is staff development and training support for the rollout of new administrative computer systems to user and service departments. ITS staff designed and built the systems in consultation with users and both online and training documentation were generated. Each laboratory session (of 1/2 day) accommodates 15 staff and the delivery on this and the aforementioned programmes is:- ____________________________________________________________________ **Sessions Booked Client 1991 1992 1993+ Academic Depts 88 46 134 Admin. Depts 32 270 135 IMLU 0 75 14 (+) to date ____________________________________________________________________ Administrative systems rollout, for example, would include the 400 staff needing trained in the use of the new student administration system and in structured query languages (graphical query generation and client/server at an advanced level) with approximately the same for the Human Resource and Financial Systems. In 1992, under the National Priority designation, the University was awarded a grant by the federal government, for the CSHE and ITS to jointly develop specifications, systems and indicators (indices) suitable for assisting Deans and Heads to develop Quality Programmes and to incorporate these into staff development activities for senior academic staff. IMLU - The Interactive Multimedia Learning Unit In 1989, ITPAC decided to sponsor an initiative from the Institute of Education to explore the use of Macintosh systems in innovative course delivery, having earlier had experience with Apple IIe systems used in primary education. An Interactive Multimedia Laboratory (IML) was set up in the Institute by ITS and equipped with a small number of state-of- the-art workstations and media devices. Following enthusiastic reception of a number of small scale pilots and prototypes during 1990, the University decided to establish, within CSHE, an Interactive Multimedia Learning Unit (IMLU) with the mission: * to promote and demonstrate to staff the effective use of interactive multimedia as a means of improving the quality of teaching and learning * to commercialise the University's interactive multimedia skills and products and to establish joint R&D projects with other institutions and industry IMLU was therefore established as a seeding agent and a catalyst to help staff in faculties and departments build on basic skills and presentation aids and to develop alternate delivery modes and courseware more suited to the interactive student-centred mode of learning and to large-group teaching and student self-assessment. Taken with other initiatives, such as the delivery of course notes through WAIS (CWIS), IMLU is an important change agent in creating a climate and culture whereby more of the institution's teaching materials are made electronically more accessible whether through local or wide-area networks. Earlier federally-funded projects in the DECs had shown that it was essential in the development of multimedia materials to form project groups headed by the academic staff member and serviced by a small group comprising the IT and media specialists. It was also important to avoid continually re-inventing the wheel, given the initial high costs of development. IMLU planned to achieve its twin objectives of staff development and course deployment through the use of such project teams. A Resource Library and Titles Database would be built and linked into US and UK programmes and a number of awareness and facilitation exercises worked through with faculties. IMLU initially had two full-time academic staff members supported by ITS in the IML, used as a development environment, and in the ITC, configured as the delivery facility. Two other full-time staff joined the IMLU team in 1992 alongwith a number of media and IT specialists on secondment. In 1991, the University made available some project development funds and 12 academic activities were seeded and monitored. Approximately half the projects came to fruition inside the allotted timeframe but the others suffered from lack of academic staff time and had to receive further assistance. Based on this experience, IMLU and CSHE bid for and won federal support in 1992 under the Quality of Education programme for large group teaching and multimedia course development. The funds were used to release key academic staff for up to a semester for course design and development and, taken with increasing support being made available by faculties, substantially boosted the programme. Immediate benefits of this strategy have been to enhance our teaching across the science and engineering disciplines, to contribute new methods to architectural design and to complement teaching programmes in physiology and pharmacology practical classes. Students can now replay laboratory work with a much reduced demand on animal tissue and specimens. In Chemistry, following review of a videotape of current laboratory practices and effectiveness and the conducting of a pilot in 1992, all of the first year student intake will have laboratory instruction in a controlled and safe multimedia walk-through in the ITC in 1993. The University will make additional funding available in 1993 for three major new projects in Agriculture, Medicine and Law and, through the 1992 CAUT Grants, hopes to have a number of new seed project started. IMLU, in 1992, has a number of commercial activities in train. In 1992 and following a one semester trial in the ITC, The University, as an extension to its well-established audio-visual facilities, upgraded its Horwood Language Centre to multimedia capability for the support of language teaching and in particular Asian Languages. Summary In a period of rapid change such as the Australian Higher Education System is undergoing, it is important, given the external pressures, not to lose sight of the longer term institutional objectives. The University's commitment to excellence in its teaching and research programmes and to the welfare and development of its students and staff remain paramount. As part of its current three-year Strategic Plan, the University has made a substantial investment in information technology for staff and students, particularly in provision of workstations and teaching facilities and in development of multimedia programmes and projects. An infrastructure improvements programme is underway to upgrade selected teaching spaces with network access and multimedia display facilities. In the not too distant future, it is expected that the need for physical presence on campus for information gathering will diminish as increasing network capacity will facilitate remote study with access to information resource databases. Technology will be used to enhance the quality of rather than displace the teaching and learning processes, particularly for large-groups. With the current concurrence between technologically-driven change in the workplace, the use of technology in the University in the academic programmes, in administrative systems deployment and staff empowerment and in federal government initiatives to try to secure higher and more cost-effective access while retaining quality improvements, the pace of change is dramatic. As always, our ability to maintain and secure the benefits of change depends on the continuing professional development of staff, the fostering of innovation and in cultivating the 'climate-of- change'. The focus of ITS has changed from the traditional computing and data centre one of meeting operational requirements to be more user focussed, to meet current and future user needs through project identification and partnership and to pro-actively design and market professional and staff development IT education programmes. The resource shifts necessary to go through the transition phase need not be large,but the strategies need to be carefully selected. Thirteen ITS staff members have been involved in teaching ITC courses, ten of these allocate 10% or less to training as they have other task commitments. The cost of contracting out the additional courses has been ~$10,000 and postgraduate students have proven very effective in course delivery. In the case of IMLU, the two positions made available by the administration have been augmented through faculty resources and the bidding for and winning, as with ITS, of federal grants. Acknowledgements The author would like to express his appreciation of the efforts of staff in ITS and IMLU who have carried the above projects through over the past three years and of the many academic staff who are taking the ideas and prototypes through to deployment in mainstream courses.