Association for Learning Technology
Fortnightly news Digest 243 issued on 17 February 2012

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* Research in Learning Technology – 
http://www.researchinlearningtechnology.net



Table of Contents
1. ALT news
2. ALT events
3. News
4. Other events
5. Calls for proposals
6. Funding calls
7. Job vacancies
8. ALT Online Newsletter - links to articles from the most recent issue
9. Current issue (20.1) of the ALT Journal - Research in Learning 
Technology


1. ALT News

1.1 Submissions now open for ALT-C 2012 - a confrontation with reality
* The 19th international conference of the Association for Learning 
Technology will be held at the University of Manchester, UK, 11-13 
September 2012.
* The conference themes are Problem solving, Mainstreaming, Openness and 
sharing, sustainability, and Entrepreneurialism.
* To submit a proposal go to http://goo.gl/RuUEu
* Submissions will close at Midnight GMT on Monday 27 February 2012.
To access the detailed call for Abstracts go to http://goo.gl/lYgY5.
To access the detailed call for Proceedings Papers go to 
http://goo.gl/btuIr.

1.2 JISC Developing digital literacies programme
You can now access ALT’s professional association page under the 
programme including ALT’s report on baselining digital literacy 
provision via the JISC Design Studio http://goo.gl/9Vm0V .

1.3 How Learning Technology is used in schools - your views are needed
With the schools-based NIACE, ALT is working with the Department for 
Education to encourage public discussion about what technology can do 
for learning, through the website http://schoolstech.org.uk, whose 
establishment the Education Secretary welcomed in his speech at BETT - 
http://goo.gl/RAfmO - calling for "a serious, intelligent conversation 
about how technology will transform education". Readers - be they 
parents, teachers, researchers or from industry - can make their views 
known at http://schoolstech.org.uk.

1.4 Digital Inclusion and Learning - Call for Papers for a Special Issue 
of Research in Learning Technology
* Guest Editors: Jane Seale, Professor of Education, Plymouth 
University, UK; William Dutton, Professor of Internet Studies, Oxford 
Internet Institute, University of Oxford, UK.
* Deadlines: Abstracts can be submitted to Jane Seale for informal 
feedback until 1 March 2012.; Papers should be submitted via the online 
submission system by 1 May 2012.
For the full call go to 
http://www.alt.ac.uk/publications/rlt/callforpapers20.4

1.5 Any employee of an ALT member organisation is entitled to join ALT 
individually at no cost as an Associate Member. You can do this in 
seconds from http://goo.gl/fOCYC

1.6 ALT Special Interest Groups (SIGs)
ALT Special Interest Groups bring together individuals or organisations 
within ALT around a common theme. Here are links to each of our active SIGs:
* Inclusive Learning SIG (ILSIG) http://goo.gl/CQNQX;
* Learning Environment Review SIG (LERSIG) http://goo.gl/3MgBO;
* Video in Education SIG (ViTAL) http://goo.gl/oqV7n;
* Games and Learning SIG (GLSIG) http://goo.gl/01OtH;
* Politics and Critical Theory SIG (PACT) http://goo.gl/Hhzjp;
* White Rose Learning Technologists' Forum (WRLT SIG) http://goo.gl/LLmJM.


2. ALT events

2.1 To what extent should learning design be supported computationally?
Book for this 90 minute webinar-based discussion between Diana 
Laurillard and Stephen Downes, to take place between 17.00 and 18.30 GMT 
on 22 February 2012. Go to http://goo.gl/qbGxg.

2.2 Making a difference: How can we demonstrate the impact of learning 
technology research?
A free workshop with with Jane Seale, member of the REF Education sub 
panel, to be held on 20 March 2012 at London Metropolitan University.
For more information and to book go to http://goo.gl/1Vgjp


3. News

3.1 Influence the way in which the Ufi Charitable Trust employs its 
funds to achieve its mission - a 10 minute survey
The Ufi Charitable Trust (UCT) is a registered charity. On the 5th 
October 2011, the UCT announced the sale of Ufi Limited. The Trust 
intends to apply the proceeds of the sale - which exceed £40m - to the 
mission of achieving "a step change in adult learning and employability 
for all in the UK, through the adoption of 21st century technologies". 
This 10 minute survey provides you with an opportunity to influence the 
way in which UCT employs its funds to achieve its mission.
http://goo.gl/nuLjz
The closing date for completion is 6 March 2012. Please feel free to 
pass this email on to others in your own sphere of influence who may be 
interested. If you are a Twitter user, you may also wish to use the 
following text in a tweet:
===
10 min survey to help a charity decide how to spend >£40m changing adult 
learning by the use of learning tech http://goo.gl/nuLjz
===

3.2 Five Invitations to Tender issued
JISC has just released a series of Invitations to Tender (ITTs) relating 
to studies into key aspects of the Digital Infrastructure. The outline 
details are summarised below; please refer to the ITTs, accessible at 
http://goo.gl/nyv0k for a full specification of the work required.
“Advantages of APIs”
Anticipated effort: 30 Days
Work should complete by Friday 24th August 2012
“Embedded Licences: What, Why and How”
Anticipated effort: 30 Days
Work should complete by Friday 24th August 2012
“Activity Data: Analytics and Metrics”
Anticipated effort: 30 days
Work should complete by Friday 24th August 2012
“The Open Landscape”
Anticipated effort: 60 days
Work should complete by Friday 5th October 2012
“Access to citation data: a cost-benefit and risk review and forward look”
Anticipated effort: 150 days
Work should complete by February 2013
The deadline for bids for all of these ITTs is 12 noon UK time on Friday 
9 March 2012. Bidders will be notified of outcomes by 27th April 2012 
and all work should commence by 14th May 2012.

3.3 Australasian Journal of Educational Technology (AJET) Developments

* AJET Review
This is an external, independent review with the reviewer (Professor 
Paul Bacsich) selected via an international call for Expressions of 
Interest. The review should be concluded by June 2012.The ascilite 
Executive will make decisions about AJET based on the external review.
* Changes to AJET editorial team
Commencing 30 December 2011 an interim editorial team was put in place 
for AJET. This was necessitated by the impending retirement of AJET's 
production editor, Roger Atkinson and the implementation of an online 
journal management system, Open Journal Systems -http://goo.gl/BxFo6. 
Previous editions of AJET will be transferred from http://goo.gl/bmESx 
to the new system.
* Becoming an AJET reviewer
Register as an AJET reviewer at http://goo.gl/BxFo6. Please indicate 
your research interests, as this is critical to the allocation of 
submissions, and provide details of your reviewing experience.

3.4 New ESME online courses
ESME Online: A 12 week overview of key principles and up-to-date 
approaches to curriculum planning, teaching and learning and assessment, 
led by Professor Ronald Harden.
ESME Leadership:  An 8 week Course facilitated by Stewart Mennin 
designed to help participants identify and strengthen their leadership 
skills, understand the dynamics of change, develop dynamic strategies 
for sustainability and enhance negotiation skills.
For full details and to sign up see www.amee.org

3.5 The Open University releases new question types for Moodle 2
The Open University announces the release of a set of new question 
types. For more please visit Phil Butcher’s OpenLearn site at 
http://goo.gl/DLU1l.

3.6 Surpass e-Assessment content achieves AbilityNet ‘Accredited Plus’ Award
BTL Group Ltd announced that accessible e-Assessment content, created 
using the Surpass Assessment Platform, has been awarded ‘Accredited 
Plus’. http://www.btl.com/news


4. Other events

4.1 2012 Follow the Sun: Futures for Knowledge, Online Learning Futures 
Festival, 27–30 March 2012
Follow the Sun 2012 is a partnership between Beyond Distance Research 
Alliance (University of Leicester), the Australian Digital Futures 
Institute (University of Southern Queensland) and Athabasca University.
tinyurl.com/followthesun

4.2 Educational Design Research in Educational Technology: A Way Forward
20 March 2012, Glasgow Caledonian University
Challenge 8 seminar of the Technology Enhanced Professional Learning 
Special Interest Group (TEPL SIG): Educational Design Research in 
Educational Technology: A Way Forward. The keynote speaker is Dr. Thomas 
C. Reeves, Professor Emeritus of Learning, Design and Technology, 
University of Georgia, USA.
More information http://goo.gl/nza7m
Register http://goo.gl/5cusl

4.3 TEPL Webinar - UKOER evaluation and synthesis, 21 February 2012
The topic of the 2nd TEPL Webinar will be Open Education Resources 
project. Lou McGill and Isobel Falconer, from the UKOER evaluation and 
synthesis team, will introduce emerging issues in open practices across 
sectors and invite participants to explore these within their own contexts.
More information http://goo.gl/4SVUg
Register http://goo.gl/OuL9o

4.4 Launch Event: SRHE Digital University Network, 2 March 2012
SRHE has recently set up a new 'Digital University Network', which will 
run three events a year, both online and face-to-face. The focus will be 
on critical, theorised and research-based perspectives on technologies 
in higher education. Speakers will be Professor Tara Fenwick and Dr Sian 
Bayne. We hope this event will be of interest to ALT members, and would 
welcome suggestions for future events - the convenors are Kelly Coate, 
[log in to unmask] and Lesley Gourlay, [log in to unmask]
http://goo.gl/dIFrJ

4.5 Learning in Context 2012: workshop on Mobile Learning, 26-27 March 
2012, Brussels, Belgium
The workshop is aimed at educational professionals from industry, formal 
education and CPD who have some experience in the application of mobile 
learning. In the workshop the vision of future applications of mobile 
learning, research questions and case studies are on the agenda. The 
workshop is bi-lingual, Dutch and English. The workshop is organized by 
the Mobile Learning team of CELSTEC with support of the STELLAR network 
of Excellence.
Further information and registration: http://goo.gl/veD4K

4.6 Extending your online courses, starts 25 April 2012
'Extending your online courses is a new 4 week online course from OCSLD, 
led by George Roberts. We will explore a range of up to date tools and 
assess their suitability for use in online courses. We will discuss the 
issues they raise including identity, privacy, disclosure, digital and 
information literacy and the benefit and challenges of online 
communities in education. http://bitly.com/xMKWMp

4.7 HEA Workshop: Making the Most of Open Data in Education Studies NEW 
DATE 23 March 2012
A full-day hands-on workshop at Liverpool John Moores University on 
combining open data with easy-to-use visualisation tools for enhancement 
of Education Studies courses. Free to attend.
Information: http://goo.gl/ZBqDy
Book: http://tinyurl.com/EdStudDataDay

4.8 “Behind the Black Curtain: 10 Secrets for Producing Your Best Hybrid 
Event” and “Small Budget, Big Impact Lecture Capture”
These 21 February 2012 webinars will be presented by three staff members 
from Massey University in Australia.
Register here: http://goo.gl/wNfoF, http://goo.gl/nksHh


5. Calls for proposals

5.1 10th Academic Practice and Technology (APT) Conference: Employer 
Engagement in a Digital Age will be held on July 4th 2012.
Contributions to the conference programme are sought from students, 
practitioners and researchers in all education and training sectors that 
contribute to the discourses, provide case study examples of, or present 
project/research reports aligned with at least one of the conference 
aims. The deadline for receipt of proposals is by midnight Monday 2 
April, 2012.
http://goo.gl/lKqeK

5.2 Call for Papers: 11th World Conference on Mobile and Contextual 
Learning mLearn 2012 - Mobile Learning in Context, 16-18 October 2012 in 
Helsinki, Finland
Submissions are invited for a range of sessions.
Deadline for submissions: 30 May 2012
Conference website: www.mlearn.org/mlearn2012

5.3 7th International Blended Learning Conference - Call for proposals
The University of Hertfordshire’s Learning and Teaching Institute is 
pleased to announce the 'Seventh International Blended Learning 
Conference' in partnership with JISC Advance at The University of 
Hertfordshire, 13 - 14 June 2012. The title of this year’s conference is 
“Reflecting on our achievements – What’s next for technology-enhanced 
learning and teaching?” The conference will once again have an 
international flavour and will also provide a unique opportunity to hear 
from work associated with current JISC projects and programmes. 
http://goo.gl/NglEY


6. Funding calls

6.1 JISC Grant Funding 01/12: JISC Digital Infrastructure Programme
JISC invites proposals for projects to help institutions and the HE 
Sector as a whole develop a digital infrastructure.
Funding totalling £2,280,000 is available to support projects in the 
following areas:
* research data management
* research tools, including research vocabularies relevant to specific 
disciplines
* research information management
* information and library infrastructure
* access and identity management
The deadline for receipt of proposals in response to this call is 12:00 
noon UK time on Friday 16 March 2012.
The full call document can be found at http://goo.gl/QdeKb


7. Jobs

7.1 Edge Hill University
Learning Services (Learning Technology Development Division)
Learning Technology Development Manager
EHA3165
£31,020 - £34,895
Full time, Permanent
Closing date: 20 February 2012
Informal enquiries to: [log in to unmask]
http://www.edgehill.ac.uk/jobs/details/EHA3165

7.2 Epigeum
Development
Web Developer
web010
£24,000-£30,000
Full time, Permanent
Closing date: 29 February 2012
Informal enquiries to: [log in to unmask]
http://www.epigeum.com/jobs-at-epigeum

7.3 University of Southern Queensland, Australia
Australian Digital Futures Institute
Executive Director and Professor
101564
Executive Remuneration Package
Up to 5 year full-time fixed term appointment
Closing date: 24 February 2012
http://goo.gl/yDZEd

7.4 There is a regular supply of mainly US jobs in the learning 
technology field at http://www.salt.org/salt.asp?ss=l&pn=joblistall, 
with a helpful RSS feed at http://www.salt.org/Weblink/SaltJobs.rss.


8. ALT Online Newsletter - links to articles from Issue 25, published in 
November 2011

Table of contents for Issue 25 - http://newsletter.alt.ac.uk/tag/issue-25/

Article – ‘ALT-C 2011 – Thriving in a colder and more challenging 
climate’ by Julie Voce
http://goo.gl/LkYl1

Article – ‘What Can We Learn From Stanford University’s Free Online 
Computer Science Courses?’ by Seb Schmoller
http://goo.gl/2ddmW

Article – ‘Developing and Reviewing Online Courses: Items for 
Consideration’ by Clayton R. Wright
http://goo.gl/d2QSN

Article – ‘The elements of e-assessment’ by Sophie White
http://goo.gl/ibx80

Article – ‘Supporting Learners with Activity Data’ by Tom Franklin 
http://goo.gl/cSRhm

Article – ‘Get set, ready and GO! ELT Blogathon 2012’ by Şirin Soyöz
http://goo.gl/AQGox

Article – ‘Future of Technology in Education Conference 2011’ by Frank 
Steiner
http://goo.gl/S0PLZ


9. Most recent issue of Research in Learning Technology, the Journal of 
the Association for Learning Technology (previously ALT-J) – published 
online on 3 February 2012.

Research in Learning Technology is now Open Access and published by 
Co-Action Publishing. Articles from the last 19 years are now freely 
available on the journal's new website where you can also find more 
information about the journal. http://goo.gl/QukuN


Vol.20, Issue 1 - Table of contents

Editorial – “Going for gold: Research in Learning Technology makes the 
switch to a fully Open Access publishing model”
Frances Bell, Seb Schmoller & Rhona Sharpe
http://goo.gl/8r2Du
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/17163

Article – “Open educational resources: staff attitudes and awareness”
Vivien Rolfe
http://goo.gl/FFIaC
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/14395

Article – “Worth it? Findings from a study of how academics assess 
students’ Web 2.0 activities”
Kathleen Gray, Jenny Waycott, Rosemary Clerehan, Margaret Hamilton, Joan 
Richardson, Judithe Sheard and Celia Thompson
http://goo.gl/iJaP3
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/16153

Article – “Viewing mobile learning from a pedagogical perspective”
Matthew Kearney. Sandra Schuck, Kevin Burden and Peter Aubusson
http://goo.gl/DiblL
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/14406

Article – “Beyond marks: new tools to visualise student engagement via 
social networks”
Joanne L. Badge, Neil F.W. Saunders and Alan J. Cann
http://goo.gl/sdmv5
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/16283

Article – “Cross-discipline investigation of the relationship between 
academic performance and online resource access by distance education 
students”
Andrea Crampton, Angela T. Ragusa and Heather Cavanagh
http://goo.gl/E6jn6
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/14430

Article – “The effectiveness of educational podcasts for teaching music 
and visual arts in higher education”
Cheung On Tam
http://goo.gl/muXJa
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/14919

Article – “By design: negotiating flexible learning in the built 
environment discipline”
Richard Tucker and Gayle Morris
http://goo.gl/tKwop
DOI: 10.3402/rlt.v20i0/14404

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The digest returns on 2 March 2012. All news, jobs, events, etc, to the 
form at 
http://www.alt.ac.uk/publications-and-resources/publications/alt-news-digest 
   by 12.00 noon on Wednesday 29 February 2012. This issue was compiled 
by those who submitted content for it, and lightly edited by Anna Davidge.
----
Disclaimer. Reasonable care is taken to ensure that the ALT Digest is 
accurate. But ALT does not vouch for the accuracy of information 
provided on web sites to which the digest links, and opinions expressed 
on those sites should not be construed to be those of ALT.