New Frontiers
This article, written by Liz Lightfoot, appeared in the Guardian Newspaper on the 10th March 2009, in a supplement called New Frontiers (Networking) and is an account of how ISIS Training are using E-Learning and E-Portfolios to deliver their qualifications.
It’s a brave man who admits his mistakes. Step forward Mick Gilroy, the e-learning manager for ISIS training, the company which provides work-based learning and assessment programmes.
With 368 apprentices and other learners at 157 employers spread across rural Lincolnshire, the company saw the potential of an e-portfolio to dramatically cut down on travel times for both students and assessors. But the first software it bought had a vital flaw – it did not allow instructors to put learning materials on to the portal.
“It was a unanimous decision to abandon it,” says Gilroy. “We went back to the drawing board and learned by our mistakes. It was a valuable learning experience.” It was also an expensive error. “We still had to send out books and photocopied documents – the very things we were trying to get away from,” he says.
“It’s tempting to rush out and buy an e portfolio system without thinking enough about how it will be implemented. A lot of the systems out there are designed for specific purposes which might not be relevant to the specific needs of your organisation,” he says.
Since then ISIS has become one of the leaders in the field of e-learning. Apprentices not only access the learning materials from their workplace or laptops, they can send in documentary evidence of their progress in the form of documents, photographs, sound recordings or video footage.
As a key part of a network set up by Becta and the Learning and Skills Council, ISIS is helping other colleges and training providers to learn from its experience. Though its name – the Technology Exemplar Network – may sound complicated, the idea behind the scheme is simple: Instead of each inventing the wheel and finding its own lonely way through the fast moving world of technology, colleges and training organisations are encouraged to communicate and help each other. In other words, it’s a swap shop of techniques and solutions and a peer support system.
ISIS is one of 10 training companies or colleges granted “exemplar” status in February 2008 in recognition of the effective ways it was already using technology to improve both the management systems and the experience of learners. The following May another 52 other companies, colleges and charities involved in education were added to the network as “developing providers” after showing a commitment to improving their use of technology.
“There’s nothing special about it. We don’t pretend we have done anything startling. Just because you are an exemplar it doesn’t mean you haven’t anything to learn from others in the network,” says Gilroy.
The advanced technology has brought in new learners such as Victoria Steels, an accounts office supervisor at the Gelder Group, the Lincolnshire based construction company. After years in the job, she is taking a team leader qualification with ISIS to enhance her cv and keep up to date. “It’s something I have wanted to do for a long time to make sure I am doing the job as best I can and to give me confidence,” she says. ISIS’s e-portfolio system has allowed her to fit in the course with her work and other commitments. “It’s a lot easier because I can do bits in my lunchtime and bits at home and when I am doing something relevant at work I can scan it in as part of my evidence,” says Steels who has just designed a new appraisal system which will form part of her coursework.
Smaller “mini” networks of exemplar and developing providers have sprung up, based either on geographical factors or on similarity between their functions. The developing providers do not have to copy the exemplars – of three which looked at ISIS’s e-portfolio system recently, two purchased similar systems and the third decided it needed a different set up.
Another exemplar scheme which has proved popular with developers is Alton College’s traffic light system for tracking student progress – both students and tutors can see at a glance if grades are dropping from green to the amber or red zones. Brockenhurst College’s electronic self assessment report system, which integrates the management information system and learning platform, is saving thousands of pounds worth of paper formerly used for tracking and reports and is being widely copied.
Derwent College for students with learning difficulties and disabilities in Oswestry, Shropshire is part of a mini network around the exemplar National Star College. Russell Pentz, said the scheme was more than “just another funding opportunity which ends once the money is spent” because the links would continue.
From the National Star college had come the idea of a secure website for leavers to help them make the transition to other colleges, work, home or supported accommodation. “We took that concept and developed it in our own way using free web share technology from Ning, the social network site, which took off the adverts for us when we explained what we were trying to do,” he said. Other ideas being piloted and developed are e-guides providing virtual access to other colleges and opportunities to talk to students in similar circumstances and e-portfolios so the students can keep track of their work and progress.
Technology is not just about computers in the classroom but the way in which electronic systems are embedded in “a holistic, strategic approach” to teaching and learning, says Jon Gamble, the LSC’s director for adults and lifelong learning. The early findings from the evaluation of the Technology Exemplar Network show it exceeding expectations. “It’s far more than a project which will die when the money runs out. It has ignited real enthusiasm and become a culture in itself.”
For a relatively modest budget the network has put the authority and responsibility in the hands of the colleges and training organisations, he says.
“Whether or not more money can be put in to support the system, the culture of networking and forming strategic alliances to learn from and support each other will continue because there is a genuine enthusiasm for it.”
By Liz Lightfoot
