6th Educators Workshop: Effective Teaching and Training in HCI: Call for
Participation
The A B C (Appropriateness, Benefits and Costs) of D-E-F- (Distributed,
Electronic and Face-to-Face) Learning HCI
Monday March 31st / Tuesday April 1st 2003
Napier University Edinburgh UK
Workshop website: www.hcie2003.org.

****apologies for cross-posting**************************************

You are invited to participate in the 6th British HCI Group “HCI Educators’
Workshop”, being hosted by Napier University School of Computing in
Edinburgh, on Monday 31st March and Tuesday 1st April. Registration is
being handled by Learning and Teaching Support Network centre for
Information and Computing Science (LTSN-ICS).

The HCI curriculum continues to expand, while students are presented with
an increasing variety of ways to learn. Through a mixture of invited
speakers, interactive sessions, and posters, including plenty of
opportunity for discussion and exchange of experiences, the workshop aims
to provide a highly participative forum in which to explore the widening
range, multifarious contexts and innovative methods of HCI teaching and
training.

The workshop will be structured around key themes. Invited speakers will
lead off the discussion, and their presentations will be followed by
interactive sessions. These will be in a panel format that includes three
short papers, followed by open discussion.

There will also be a progress report from the British HCI Group’s newly
formed Education and Practice Group.

Workshop Themes (Outline)
There will four main sessions devoted to the following themes, which have
been identified as being of particular relevance and interest:

·         The HCI Domain
·         Accessibility
·         Graphic Design and Interface Design
·         Current Issues in Teaching, Learning and Training for HCI

Each session will start with presentations from invited speakers. These
will then be followed by an interactive session in which three short papers
will be presented followed by questions and discussion. Workshop posters
will further enhance our consideration of these themes.
There will also be a progress report from the British HCI Group’s newly
formed Education and Practice Group.

Your Contribution

Proposals for papers and posters should be submitted by sending a short
description of the proposed content (maximum 400 words) by e-mail to
Programme Chair (Sandra Cairncross [log in to unmask]). There is no
particular format for proposals. The file medium should be plain text, Rich
Text Format (rtf), Microsoft Word (doc), or Adobe Acrobat (pdf) format.
Preference will be given to proposals related to one of the above themes.

Following review by the programme committee, authors of successful
proposals will be asked to develop their submission into either a short
paper (maximum of 4 pages) to be presented at an interactive session or a
poster (maximum size A2) with accompanying overview (2 page summary).
Posters will be displayed during the workshop.

The short papers and poster overviews will be included in the workshop
proceedings.

Workshop Themes (Detail)

The HCI Domain

This session will focus on the scope and boundaries of HCI, in the context
of what appears to be an ever-expanding body of relevant theory and
diversity of application domains, ranging from usability engineering to
interaction design, from interacting with computers to interacting through
computers, and from work-based to home and leisure-based applications.
Invited speaker: Professor David Benyon, Chair HCI Research Group, Napier
University
Accessibility

How can we best design applications and devices that meet the needs of all
users? How can we help make our learners and trainees aware of these
issues? What assistive technologies can we use to help users with special
needs? How can we make our curriculum more accessible?

Invited speakers: Professor Alan Newell, Head of the Applied Computing
Department, University of Dundee; Dr Alison Crerar, Chair, Edinburgh Branch
BCS, Organiser for Scotland of IT-CAN-HELP a network of IT professionals
helping disabled people with technology.

Graphic Design and Interface Design

Interface design: an engineering discipline or an art? How can graphic
design influence interface design? Do learners need graphic design
principles?

Invited speakers: Professor Brent MacGregor, Head, School of Visual
Communication, Edinburgh School of Art.

Current Issues in Teaching, Learning and Training for HCI

What should we be teaching and why?  How should we be teaching it and why?
What learning pedagogies are appropriate for HCI?   How can new learning
technologies best be used to support our teaching and learning? What is
industry looking for in our graduates? What is industry teaching our
graduates?

Invited Speakers: Dr Janet Finlay, Chair Education and Practice Working
Group, BCS-HCI Group

In addition to presentations by the invited speakers we are also looking
for contributions to allow us to explore and discuss these themes further.
We are keen to encourage contributions from trainers and other practioners
from industry.

Key Dates

·         Monday 17th February  – Deadline for Submissions
·         Friday 28th February – Notification
·         Monday March 10th  – Deadline for early bird registration (cost
£85*)
·         Monday March 17th  – Deadline for final camera-ready or
electronic copy of all   presented papers and posters overviews.
·         Wednesday March 26th  – Deadline for late registration (cost
£100*)
·         Monday March 31st – Conference starts
Workshop Outcomes

By participating in the workshop, delegates will
·         develop a greater awareness of key topics issues facing HCI
educators and trainers;
·         exchange best practice with colleagues from other institutions;
·         identify new ideas to inform their own teaching practice thereby
enhancing the learning of their students.

All delegates will receive a set of workshop proceedings and it is planned
to disseminate outcomes in external publications.

Other Information

There will be time to relax – there will be a whisky tasting on the Monday
evening followed by the workshop dinner.

Accommodation details can be provided on request.

*Registration costs will cover the two days of the workshop, coffee and
lunches, while the social programme will cost an additional £45.
Registration is open to all those with an interest in the workshop themes
and is not restricted to those presenting papers or posters.
Registration forms are available from
http://www.ics.ltsn.ac.uk/events/hci2003/ with. Further details are
available at  www.hcie2003.org.

If you have any questions then please feel free to contact us at
[log in to unmask]
We look forward to welcoming you to Edinburgh in the spring.

Sandra Cairncross and Alison Varey
Workshop  co-chairs

The British HCI Group’s Educators’ workshop has run annually since 1998,
attracting around 40 of the UK’s top HCI lecturers and professors each year:
2002 Department of Information Systems, University of Portsmouth
http://www.tech.port.ac.uk/staffweb/rosbottj/hciWS2002/
2001 Department of Computing and Electrical Engineering, Heriot-Watt
University 2002 http://www.cee.hw.ac.uk/events/HCI2001/
2000 School of Computing, South Bank University
http://www.ics.ltsn.ac.uk/events/hci2000/
1999 School of Computing, South Bank University
http://www.ulst.ac.uk/cticomp/hci99.html


contact details:

Dr Sandra Cairncross
Senior Lecturer and Teaching Fellow
Programme Director Direct Entrant Suite
School of Computing
Napier University
Merchiston Campus
10 Colinton Road, Edinburgh, EH10 5DT.
phone: +44 (0) 131 455 2724
[log in to unmask]