Monday 29 November 2010

Web 2.0 Update and Event Coverages

Last week I was unable to find the Maastricht Unversity Facebook Protokoll and today it found me again. So here it is: MU Facebook Protokoll
Comments appreciated. The recordings of the RENT conference are online since two weeks. Last week I got to know it and created this page. It links to the three recordings, two keynotes and one panel keynote session.

Thursday 25 November 2010

Web 2.0 at UniMaas... and the development of what so ever 2.0

Starting with todays cartoon on the last page of the Observant I am compelled to relate it to a particular dilemma regarding MU's use of social media. The cartoon depicts a character who spends his evening updating his inventory of social media channels ending up with no time to study. The apparent grievance or joke touches a point worth considering here. What gives rise to the grievance is not the time consumed by the the cartoon's character but the apparent dissonance between what he says he's doing and what he actually does. Namely nothing! His homework is not finished and he did not study. What should give us a thrill is the fact that the UM website is as far from being done as the character's homework at the end of the cartoon. But instead of looking at the causes of this particular joke only its effects show off in peoples faces.

We all know that keeping an additional communication channel nice and pretty is time intense. And it is important to be on facebook, on twitter, on foresquare, on what so ever 2.0. Of course these tools are for free and therefore are used by everybody. That is the democratization of the net and the main reason behind UM's aspirations to be there is to claim part of this space in order to get the attention of prospective and current students. Primarily for the purpose of recruiting them for one of our programmes. Having said this there is no empirical evidence that it has any effect on recruting other than guesswork to my knowledge. But its like TV, newspaper, radio a legitimate channel to reach out for eyeballs. And there is nothing to support the antithesis either. So we can say, lets try and experiment with this.

But the main problem remains, namely that the primary communication channel of MU is in comparison with other University websites underdeveloped. So whatever hopes are attached to this technologies they are more like phantom pain in their appearance. Like people who lost an arm point to their missing limp as their perceived source of pain, people engaging in a dialogue about web2.0 technologies point to facebook as the sources of pain that needs a cure. This curing of non existing limps is impossible but a welcoming distraction from the homework. And it is exactly the distraction from his homework and from his study that causes us to feel pity for the Cartoon character while at the same time reminds us of our own situation.

A small make-up of SBE's facebook page and some small fixes here and there on the website was among the jobs that kept me from updating the blog. This week a wordpress MU account was launched by the Student Service Center offering students their own blogging environment. Interesting enough it is hosted in the states and initiated by students themselves. The Postgraduate Education Department, if one wants to call it like this, also launched their blog using a hosted solution offered by the same CRM than the Student Service Center. Another one of those novelties I used recently was Eventbrite for the SBE Christmas Party 2010. It's a free service offering you with more or less ease to let people register for events. I also managed to get hold on a webserver "webserver 18" as Walter calls it that will be used in the near future.

Another time consuming activity is the begging for money one. But it relates to a very important point I stressed already over and over again. There are universities that have a web team. And this is reflected in the website of these universities. But here I am my own team. And to extend it I want an student assistant. So if you read these lines, and you are a motivated, structured student at Maastricht University, with the aspirations to work for money one day a week for a year at a very challenging environment just drop me a line. Right here! Together with Julijenne I have 4 departments already in my pocket to pay for you. And the rest follows.

Some meetings where also on my agenda and together with all the above mentioned activities cost about 1/3 of my time. That is definitely too much but I am working on it. Among the meetings where those with people from METEOR, MSCM, AIM, ICTS and Cross Knowledge. Now you might ask, yourself dear reader what this is. Its a private company offering education for highly skilled and flexible knowledge worker. And if this does not sound convincing I can assure you that it is. Its an all in one package including infrastructure (meaning website, learning environment, customer relationship management software), Content (audiovisual educational content designed for distance learning activities in I think 5 different languages) and expertise. Mr. Pieters visited me early and in the exciting discussion I learned a lot about the "state of art" in selling education. The wave upon which CrossKnowledge rides high is the trend from formal to informal education. No flaws, no discontinuity and supported with a broader vision that I can relate to. In fact, it was this meeting that gave me the most joy in the past two weeks.

The big part now for the end. The department websites occupy my the second 1/3 of my time. A third training session just got confirmed today for the 16th of December. I happy with this because it means that all people are trained and have access to their parts of the website. The content is coming in slowly and I better spend more time on writing it myself. The personal pages topic is one which will not be solved soon. In the first step only the important information such as Name, Title, Availability, Room Number, Telephone, Email, and a link to their existing profile pages is oversee able. What I got from one of the meetings was that people of FIN are really happy with their System (ASP) and can be used for all of SBE.

The other points regarding the department's structure are straight forward. A description about their programs (MSc, BSc, Executive, MBA) and their research activities should be doable, I thought. And some sentences about their department's aspirations or mission statement would be already more than other universities' departments have to offer. We are getting there. ...HEELLLPPP!!!

In tandem with the department websites I also redo the METEOR site and draw on my whiteboard the outlines of the whole SBE website structure. Starting with a programme page that displays all programs that we offer is an important improvement that needs to be in place before the next semester starts. A service page, displaying all the services is indeed as necessary. And together with the departmental websites it captures the essence of what SBE does. 

Any Feedback?

Thursday 4 November 2010

Distance and mobile learning

Since the symposium on e learning I spend some moments to gather information about the current activities around this topic. Here is one I lost but found again today. CrossKnowledge offers "distance learning solutions" and I hope to get a presentation about their "products" soon. As an old school guy I like lectures I find on itunesU, youtubes education program or any other portal site where one finds educators talking about their fields of expertise. If you know more initiatives that bear on the same topic let me know!
What the book could not achieve, the internet will never accomplish.

I also updated the link section with one link I find always useful.

Monday 1 November 2010

Design and Content

Today I started on the graphics for the website. Below you see three blocks that I came up with that feature every programme (MABAPHD). What do you think?




A short recap of last week: Tuesday started with an unexpected event - an e-learning symposium.
Something that is technically not possible in GX at the moment is already possible at the Library - Namely to leave comments on articles somebody publishes and get a discussion started. That its (informed) controversy that lies at the heart of a meaningful discussion is worth mentioning. But without the technical possibility nothing is accomplished. The library wall uses wordpress (metamorphosis theme) and offers enhancement while still maintaining the MU look&feel. Among others, Martin Rehm spoke about "finding the carrot to get the donkey going" when motivating students to use web2.0 technologies in the classroom. I also used a quote from Jeroen ten Haaf because it fit's with SBE's values "sharing success".


Success is the ability to go from one failure to another
with no loss of enthusiasm.
- Sir Winston Churchill



Wednesday was time to meet with PGE to discuss some technical problems before I was enmeshed in a meeting about the Department websites. As on many other occasions I observed that many are already overwhelmed by slightly new workflows and changes in their cognitive models. "Its just another thing to check" is a feedback get very often when I introduce people to my weblog. Also the technical training was already too much and will be made much easier with a focus on practical simple to follow workflows. I spend quiet some time on this and hope that it will bear fruit soon. It concerns the ContentTypes and Classifications correctly used in GX that make a lot of trouble. But I will reflect tomorrow on this.


This brings me already to the highlight of last week - my presentation of basically myself in front of the departmental heads. I send them this email afterwards and cannot really go into more details here. Not because its confidential but because it is not so interesting. But everybody seemed satisfied and I am more interested than ever in stress reduction courses for all the people I work with. Since I am the cause of the stress it would fit my purpose to also provide the remedy for it.