EDUCAUSE | Professional Development

Registration Now Open for EDUCAUSE 2008--Learn What's New This Year

cluckett — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 17:53:40 -0500

EDUCAUSE 2008, "Interaction, Ideas, Inspiration," will bring together several thousand people from across the higher education IT landscape October 28–31 in Orlando.

Hear EDUCAUSE President Diana Oblinger share what's new at the conference this year.
View the general session keynote speakers on the EDUCAUSE 2008 homepage.
Register for the conference and preconference seminars.
Explore hotel options and make reservations.

This leading event in higher education technology will focus on the following eight tracks:

Emerging Technologies and Trends
Enterprise Information Systems and Services
Information, Access, Digital Content, and Libraries
Leadership, Management, Planning, and Partnerships
Research Computing, Networking, Infrastructure, and Middleware
Security, Policy, and Privacy
Teaching and Learning
User Services

Participants may wish to register for half- or full-day preconference seminars on Tuesday, October 28. The seminars cover a wide range of topics and present a unique opportunity to discuss an issue of particular interest in depth with both leaders in the field and like-minded colleagues.

Ideas for getting the most out of your conference experience

llarsen — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 11:53:53 -0500

Ideas for Getting the Most Out of the Conference Experience

[These ideas were generated by participants in the 2008 Southeast Regional Conference pre-conference orientation session.]

Require conference attendees to write-up their conference experience. What did they gain from attending the conference? How did it help them individually and how will it help the institution?

Prepare before attending the conference. Pose questions you want answers for before you get there and then make sure you have answers before you leave.

Look for collaboration opportunities within new arenas.

Bring and exchange business cards. Write a snippet of the conversation on the card and follow-up when you return to your desk later.

Title 3 requires trip reports and demonstration of how information from the conference was shared. Ideas include scanning conference print materials, reporting at a staff meeting, poster sessions in the break/lunch room.

Go to a session on an unfamiliar topic - hear something different and broaden your learning

Gather informal groups together at the conference to share problems. This can be done at anytime including lunches, breaks, and dinners.

Get together with people who are your "opposite" and get out of your "silo" - This helps us understand other people's (unit's) issues

Additional information is available at http://net.educause.edu/SERC08/Program/14929?PRODUCT_CODE=SERC08/BRK13.

Eminent Physicist Offers Career Advice for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology

catherine — Thu, 08 May 2008 05:53:36 -0500

Last Tuesday, I was privileged to attend the WiSETI Annual Lecture, given by Prof. Christine Davies at Robinson College, Cambridge, and sponsored by Schlumberger. WiSETI, the "Women in Science, Engineering and Technology Initiative" at the University of Cambridge, aims to advance the aspirations and careers of women in science- and technology-related professions. This annual invited lecture is a highlight in the WiSETI calendar, and a great opportunity to learn about frontier research from an eminent woman professional in the field. WiSETI lectures are also notable for including a more personal element in the discussion: it is common for invitees to discuss how they have managed work/life balance, and to offer insights into their personal career histories and trajectories. This event was no exception.

Davies is Professor of Physics and Research Group Leader of the Particle Physics Theory Group in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Glasgow, and is the recipient of many scientific honours and awards for her pioneering work in theoretical particle physics. (A query to the Spires database for papers authored by Davies returns an impressive 156 results!). Her lecture, titled "My Life Among Quarks", told us something of her work developing the theory and analytical techniques of Quantum Chromodynamics, or QCD. QCD describes interactions in the subatomic world, specifically, between gluons and quarks. Davies uses lattice field theory, a method that makes use of numerical simulations, run on computers.

One of the most intriguing aspects of Davies' talk was to hear her discuss how limitations to microprocessor power had impacted on her team's work, inspiring technical approaches that were as "conservative" of computing resources as possible. I found this insight into the technical aspects of Davies' work intriguing (and a welcome alternative message to the Moore's Law-inspired claim of neverending IT resources!). A key message I took away from the talk was that Davies' attention to minimal resource consumption had actually inspired creative problem-solving techniques.

So: to career advice for women in SET. Personal messages from Davies' experience included: the importance of accessible professional role models for women scientists (crucially, Davies came from a rural farming family, in which "the men farmed, and the women went to university"); the way that early independence can kick-start a research career (in Davies' case, this meant the ability to set up her own research group); and learning to juggle personal and work life. The last lesson may be the most crucial, but also the most stubbornly individual, and certainly, the hardest to learn.

Volunteer with EDUCAUSE--Apply Online by May 15

cluckett — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 11:48:04 -0500

Network with colleagues and grow professionally by participating in EDUCAUSE as a committee member, conference blogger, proposal reviewer, session moderator, photographer, or ad hoc volunteer. To be considered in this year's volunteer cycle, apply online by May 15.

EDUCAUSE Southwest Regional Conference Think Stop #1

llarsen — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 15:37:43 -0600

EDUCAUSE Southwest Regional Conference Think Stop #1

Question: What do we need to do to recruit, retain & develop our IT professionals?

Responses:

How do infrastructure support staff survive in a development group?
It doesn't matter what organization you are recruiting for you need to find people who 'fit.'
Be clear about needs & impact you're striving to have; communicate that clearly & widely.
Once you get the right people on the bus you need to procure the resources to keep them! If they are "right" others will notice reasonably quickly how "right" and under resourced you are!!
People "buy in" to what they help build - involve everyone in "planning for success."
Pay incentives for single employees & value (in $) benefits for married/family employees as compared to local (competitors) employers.
Develop program initiatives your staff can relate to and feel good about. Employees want to feel like they are part of the community.
Please offer workshops/seminars by ITIL consultants as general sessions or as tracks in the business aspect of IT.
Hurry up and retire already.
Pay competitively.
Recognize their accomplishments. Give them the freedom to do their jobs.
Talk with them, find out what they want, what they think they can contribute. Tie that into the org goals/missions.

E07 Podcast: An Interview with Michael Zastrocky from Gartner Inc.

gbayne — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 14:22:38 -0600

In this 7 minute podcast, we feature an interview with Michael Zastrocky, Vice President and Research Director of Academic Strategies for Gartner, Incorporated. He presented a session at the EDUCAUSE 2007 Annual Conference entitled, "IT Leadership and the Role of the CIO: The Annual Gartner/EDUCAUSE Update".

Dr. Zastrocky has more than 30 years of diverse experience in higher education. Before joining Gartner, he was a faculty member at several universities, assistant dean, chief information officer, and served as vice president of CAUSE, the international association for managing and using information resources in higher education from 1989-1995 (now EDUCAUSE). He has served as a consultant for a number of colleges and universities and was a vice president of the Kaludis Consulting Group. He has delivered many keynote addresses around the globe and has served as a faculty member for numerous institutes and seminars. He has been widely published on a variety of technology planning and management topics. He has served as a university trustee and a board member for both non-profit and for-profit higher education organizations. Bachelor's degree from Regis University, master's degree from the University of Denver, and a doctor of education degree from the University of Northern Colorado.

E07 Podcast: Brian Hawkins - Learning To Drive (and Other Lessons Learned Along the Way)

gbayne — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 12:11:20 -0600

In November of 2006, Brian Hawkins, EDUCAUSE President, announced his plans to retire from the presidency of EDUCAUSE at the end of the 2007•2008 academic year. At the 2007 EDUCAUSE Annual Conference, he was asked to share the important lessons he has learned in his nearly 40-year career in higher education regarding management, leadership, and professional life. In this 42-minute podcast of that address, entitled "Learning To Drive (and Other Lessons Learned Along the Way)", he discusses issues including personnel management, professional development, and how to map a course for good leadership and a successful career.

IT Security Essential Body of Knowledge: Federal Register Notice Request for Comments

Rodney — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 11:20:50 -0500

A Federal Register Notice has been published for the Department of Homeland Security's "Information Technology (IT) Security Essential Body of Knowledge (EBK): A Competency and Functional Framework for IT Security Workforce Development." The deadline for comments is December 7, 2007.

According to the Notice:

The EBK is not an additional set of DHS guidelines, and it is not intended to represent a standard, directive, or policy by DHS. Instead, it further clarifies key IT security terms and concepts for well-defined competencies, identifies notional security roles, defines four primary functional perspectives, and establishes an IT Security Role, Competency, and Functional Matrix.

More information, including a downloadable version of the IT Security EBK, is available at http://www.us-cert.gov/ITSecurityEBK/

There will be a briefing for the higher education sector with Brenda Oldfield from DHS as part of an EDUCAUSE Live on November 14, 2007, at 1 p.m.

ALT-C Conference Round-Up: Dylan Wiliam's Keynote

catherine — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 11:09:29 -0500

This year's ALT-C conference in Nottingham proved, as usual, a highly engaging conference. The theme, "Beyond Control", generated some very interesting debates around user behaviours and digital literacies, and I was lucky to be present at Dylan Wiliam's stimulating keynote on Tuesday.

Dylan's background in assessment and evidence-informed policy and practice led him to focus on raising achievement in the classroom by creating "learning power environments", drawing on a rich vein of educational research. He looked in detail at the potential afforded by increasingly sophisticated response systems, that are capable of delivering rapid, aggregated, feedback and information on whole-class performance to instructors. He calls these systems "teacher-mediated classroom aggregation technologies". Such systems can help teachers to create excellent conditions for learning, by boosting feedback loops and promoting learner engagement. Dylan emphasised throughout that students' motivation and engagement is essential: "Teachers don't create learning: learners do".

Most of us would be familiar with some of the simpler versions of these technologies, ranging from flash cards at the lowest level through to "clickers" (Dylan introduced one that was new to me, the Anoto pen, a wireless pen that is used with a special coated paper). Dylan's vision is to use classroom aggregation technologies create multidimensional models, using high-level techniques such as Bayesian inference networks, that effectively function as representations of student knowledge. By receiving rapid feedback on students' performance, teachers can build "maps" of student learning and can employ "diagnostic" and adaptive teaching techniques to supplement problem areas and raise performance for all learners. I could see that there are educational research fields and concepts that would be highly relevant to this approach, including recent research on metacognition, and Meyer and Land's work on "threshold concepts".

Dylan's talk was not without provocative moments, including his panning of learning styles (dubbed "completely fruitless", and "a waste of time"). I think his focus on assessment was also foreign to many participants. What I took away from the session was Dylan's advocacy of evidence-centred design, his focus on diagnostic and adaptive teaching strategies, and his belief in boosting learner engagement as a means to raising achievement.

ALT-C Workshop Notes: Runaway Objects

catherine — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 11:17:35 -0500

Workshop notes and resources from the session I ran on Wednesday, "Runaway Objects: Preserving Our Digital Belongings", are now available on the Runaway Objects wiki.

I've included the list of proposed research projects compiled by participants, and a bunch of references and resources. Creating an account at the wiki will enable you to edit pages and add your own comments and suggestions for relevant research techniques, "methodologically interesting" projects to check out, and further reading.

The workshop was aimed specially at new researchers. We discussed issues around the proliferation of "digital belongings" (personally meaningful digital artefacts) in our lives, looked at some relevant qualitative / quantitative methods, and brainstormed relevant issues and research approaches. Despite the 9am start-time, we had a good group (with a diverse background in HE, FE and healthcare / social care) and an excellent session. Thanks to everyone for generously contributing your thoughts and ideas!