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We look forward to announcing the results on this blog after voting has finished at 0900 on Friday 9th July.
Elizabeth Raymond, Chair
I've been talking with the other students and we've got some concerns too! Some of us work hard in the library and give ourselves every opportunity to study but others think that just because they read something on the bus on the way in that they are learning. It just isn't true. What if the university start expecting more of us too so we can't ever feel like we've switched off because the work is there with us where ever we are.
We think this idea drives the ownership of learning to the students, and particularly those who are used to the technologies. Not only is this wrong in terms of equal access it also disempowers. Furthermore, when I go to an employer with my degree I want them to know that the thinking that's gone in to produce it is from world class thought leaders from our faculty, not some half drunk student on his way home from a club. The more students are encouraged to create content then the less research based and more driven by personal agendas it will become.
Finally we think this is bad for students from less well off backgrounds. The sort of thing were discussing here requires us all to have decent phones with big screens. Not only are the handsets expensive, but the contracts are extortionate. Who's paying.... not the university that's for sure. For most of us with our old mobiles with small screens, WAP internet access and bad batteries this simply isn't going to work.
Oh yeah, one last thing - who supports us if there is a problem - university IT - no, our mobile provider - no, who?!
This isn't a good idea!
Stu Dent
We students lack important academic and digital literacy skills to appropriate free resources and web 2.0 tools for our learning. We need to develop strategies for finding relevant resources. Nowadays, there is a variety of communicative channels, and we need to get support and orientation on to which channel use with peers and teachers for learning purposes. Moreover, many of us are used to adopt multiple digital identities to communicate in online environments. We need guidance and support as to how to manage these important issues.
We learn nowadays in new and different ways while using new technologies. We are used to have laptops, internet connectivity and phones and mp3 players. We use these to learn in a regular basis. So I don’t see how the institution shouldn’t use mobile technology as part of the learning and teaching process.
Nora Brown, Student representative.
Thank you so much to the Chair and the Clerk for facilitating and summarising this debate. I am sure that we would all agree that they have done an excellent job focusing the bloggers.
Likewise I would expect mobile technology to be suitably supported to positively impact on learning at this institution. If phased in appropriately, used only where it is of benefit then teachers and learners may own their learning, take it with them in their daily lives and access support or generate content as they require. There will be less boundaries – and users will decide how far they blur them in their own lives. As with any tool, some may make better use of it than others, but staff and students will progress in an enabling environment. This local authority believes support and funding can be effectively structured; this local authority will contribute towards this project and we ask for the relevant peoples to vote yes!
Voting otherwise will turn away an offer that will be snapped up by another institution. Mobilise yourself to commit to making this a successful pilot. If the leading role is taken up by this institution, then their brand will be associated with offering the opportunity of innovation for the future of learning. All who follow will be looking to them, their teachers… and their students.
Best wishes,
Emma Johnstone.
As a teacher one of my daily battles is with discipline. We already have an extremely fragile set of rules about mobile phone use in class - staff apply it inconsistently - and giving students a cast-iron excuse is just going to make things worse - this is my primary concern.
Now that I've calmed down a little I'd raise these points:
How will this be funded? Once again, ICT gets priority over books (several thousand years of user-testing there), materials, trips and many other vital purchases in an environment where we're bound to see cuts one way of another no matter what the government says.
Training - if we are going to make use of this stuff, can we this time be trained, or will it end up like the IWBs, not working half the time and when they do we use them like blackboards anyway.
Preparation of lessons: After we've had the training will we then be given additional planning time to include the technology in our lessons or will someone at least give us access to some decent ready-made materials? And I don't want page after page of un-annotated web links to spend the next summer holidays ploughing through.
If one or two teachers want to try this stuff out in a contained way then that's not a problem - it's when we get these edicts telling us we need to use these new methods - all of us, now - that the resentment rises. Please can we have some way of phasing these kinds of developments in instead of landing them on our heads with no consultation.
Marshal Anderson (Teacher)
