Janet Strivens and Rob Ward

1. ‘HE5P’Higher Education, Employer and Employee Engagementthrough E-portfolios.A consultative presentation! Janet Strivens and Rob Ward

2. The ‘Employer Engagement Agenda’: key policy drivers • Economic The pressing national need for a more highly skilled workforce in order to compete in the world economy • Social To create a more equal, inclusive and therefore harmonious society

3. Policy themes/enablers • Widening access to ‘traditional’ higher education (contributes to social inclusiveness but also economically driven by the need to ensure all talent is fully utilised). • Upskilling the existing workforce to develop Higher Level Skills through access to HE while in employment (increasingly important as age cohort for traditional entry to HE shrinks). • Personalisation of learning (both improving the quality of the student experience and also aimed at maximising the development of talent/potential). • Technology-enhanced learning (for efficiency gains, to promote inclusivity, to enable better personalisation).

4. Incentives to engage: the employer perspective… • Investing in “human capital” • but know that labour is mobile • May want specific problems solved. • May have agreement with trade union. • May recognise professional bodies. • May want courses to relate directly to work • “bite-sized” short courses • tailor-made foundation degrees.

5. The employee-learner perspective… Employees-as-learners ‘in all shapes and sizes’: • Could have had a range of experiences of formal learning, some negative; • May not be familiar/comfortable with technology; • Could be relatively isolated: learning outside the academic institution/apart from any community of learners; • May want bite-sized chunks, and to dip in and out of learning; • May be seeking to balance training for next task with preparation for further career development in a rapidly changing world.

6. A range of possible relationships for HEIs… • The solution of business problems (quasi KTP). • Accreditation within an occupationally-related curriculum (FD and beyond, linked to professional competencies and professional bodies). • Accreditation within a generic learning framework (accreditation of outcomes from a negotiated/personalised curriculum): • Bespoke training and support, including the accreditation of employer/externally-provided training.

7. Introduction to the Project... Through a process of discussion and development with HEFCE colleagues, Centre for Recording Achievement was invited by HEFCE to develop a bid to carry out a piece of policy-oriented research into the question: “Can e-portfolios support the employer engagement agenda, and if so how?”

8. Project Aims • Collate and analyse existing practices in work based learning e-portfolio practice(s). • Build capacity to develop and promote best practice in using e-portfolio technology to support employer and learner engagement in higher level learning. • Disseminate key lessons and experiences which will inform/shape policy and transfer practice. • Provide an evidence base and national e-portfolio specification to contribute to policy and practice to ensure the effective implementation of the employer/employee engagement agenda.

9. Universities Bedfordshire Bradford Cumbria Hull Leeds Metropolitan Leicester Liverpool Northumbria Plymouth Portsmouth Wolverhampton Other Organisations Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals Greater Manchester Strategic Alliance Institute of Physics Project Partners • Employer Partners (including) • Merseyrail • DeBeers • Hampshire Fire Service • HM Prison Service • Royal Navy • St Mary’s Hospital (Portsmouth) • Price Waterhouse Coopers

10. Literature and practice review (2009) ‘an evidence-informed account of how e-portfolio practice has demonstrated relevance to adult, employment-based learners’. Key findings: in relation to the Literature review: • almost all work-based learning practice reviewed included structured activities cognate with personal development planning processes or portfolio practice; • few instances of technology supported portfolio practice; those identified were typically small scale and mainly represented pilot implementations, resourced through project funding.

11. Project Learning and Achievements (from participants; from centrally generated practice): Using e-portfolio tools and technologies: Functions and benefits, linked to the scenarios/architecture and supported by the evidence from participants. Scenarios, supported by practice. Technical architecture, linked to the scenarios.

12. ‘E-portfolio technology’: your responses welcome! • E-portfolio technology is loosely associated with communication, collaboration, reflection, integration (making connections between things), using diverse evidence and presentation. • Practitioners often fail to differentiate between: - functions of e-portfolio tools - the various purposes of different pedagogic practices • Generic associations between particular pedagogic practices (eg ‘reflective practice’) and e-portfolios have exacerbated this lack of clarity.

13. Communication, collaboration, reflection, integration, using diverse evidence and presentation How important is each of these in relation to work-based learners?

14. Communication – between distributed peers, tutors and workplace mentors. Clearly very important, to maximise learning (these learners may have even more to learn from peers than for traditional students); to align workplace learning with institutional, employer goals with academic. Tools range from email to chat, social networking sites, discussion boards (usually within VLEs). Some ‘e-portfolio technology’ emphasises this functionality, eg ELGG.

15. Collaboration – from commenting on individual work to joint creation. Very important for tutor and workplace mentor to comment on learner’s work. Peers commenting on each other’s work more problematic, varies particularly by level and discipline. Joint creation of work online still rare. Allowing commenting on individual’s work a common and expected function of an ‘e-portfolio system’, associated with users/owners being able to set permisions for viewing. Collaborative work more associated with wikis or tools like Googledocs.

16. Reflection and integration. Seen as very important by some employers/ professions (but not all), esp. higher levels and professional learning, to integrate learning from workplace and from institution, and to extract learning from interaction with peers. Traditionally associated with e-portfolios (evidence base still weak). Activity of regular recording of and commenting on experiences seems to be main focus, therefore blogging tools most relevant. Several e-portfolio systems include blog. (Reflection also associated with planning and identifying skills – no generic tools?)

17. Collection of diverse evidence Becomes important if the assessment regime requires this. Where such assessment exists, it is usually associated with the next point – presentation. Multiple tools allow storage of diverse evidence, both portable (eg pendrives) and online (eg Youtube, Flickr). Some e-portfolio systems facilitate organisation of such evidence eg against standards, learning outcomes etc.

18. Presentation – to assessors or future employers. Sometimes seen as very important, esp. if main vehicle of assessment. Usually associated with previous point (collection of diverse evidence). Sometimes important to allow viewing from diverse locations. Ability to create multiple presentations is the nearest thing to a defining functionality of an e-portfolio system? (esp.if associated with use of diverse evidence). Could be done by the creation of a website (but only a single presentation).

19. E-portfolio tools, as well as having uses in themselves, also play a role in overall institutional (and wider) information systems architectures.

20. There are natural overlaps between the information held on these various systems (see diagrams) • When information systems are designed to transfer information across tools and sites whenever it is useful and appropriate, administrative burden is reduced and educational value may be increased: • Having good transfer of information built in to the architecture means the avoidance of: • rekeying; • errors; • too much effort (meaning it is not done); • out of date and unreliable information; • out of date records of what learner has done • wasteful repetition or alternatively missing things out.