Informing principles

LTSU resources and the learning and teaching website combined are central to both the Program Revitalisation Project and the Technology-Enhanced Learning Project, because the website provides a central learning and teaching ‘hub’, or a ‘one-stop-shop’ with the aim of disseminating available resources widely and providing ready access to those resources. This directly supports two objectives of the Program Revitalisation Project: to provide resources and professional development support for program development planning; and facilitate students’ learning journeys through the provision of flexible, high quality courses and programs by working with Faculty academic learning communities to implement quality L&T practice, as well as providing students with quality additional support and resources in flexible modes. The Learning Centre website, as a sub-section of the L&T website provides flexible access to resources for all USQ students, regardless of their study modes, which fits the overall USQ vision of flexible L&T.

Goals

1. To develop resources to support learning and teaching and professional development of academics and/or staff in leadership/management roles.

2. To create an inclusive learning space where co-creation of resources becomes an informing principle and USQ staff in general have a sense of ownership, rather than L & T resources being developed solely from a central location (LTSU).

3. To increase visibility of learning and teaching, and to normalise continuous quality improvement by providing resources for improvement, and celebrating successes and exemplary practices.

Strategic alignment

USQ Learning and Teaching Plan

Program Revitalisation Project -

Course and Program Mapping

Academic Professional Development

Vertical Integration Project

Tech-Enhanced Learning Project - Tech Enhanced Learning & Flexible Delivery

All LTSU Plans

Details of Faculty support for an 18 month period

Work collaboratively with Associate Deans (L&T) and LTECs –LTSU Faculty Reps to identify strategic priority areas and ways of productive collaboration in alignment with Faculty L&T Plans. Work collaboratively with CAIK, DAIS, Student Services staff, International Office and the Dean of Students to develop an integrated L&T environment to support and improve student learning outcomes in alignment with Faculty L&T Plans.

Tasks, timelines & budgets

Tasks	Timeline
Merge the previous L & T website with the previous LTSU website; develop a new L & T website structure	Initial milestone: Dec 07; ongoing development
Approach Faculty staff about a Teaching Exemplars section; identify priority areas (Assessment, Technology Enhanced L & T, L & T Design); develop resources	Initial milestone: Feb 08; ongoing development
Identify other priority areas (Work-Integrated L & T, Learning Spaces, Evaluation, Embedding Indigenous Perspectives); build resources taking advantage of Visiting Scholars; align these resources with LTSU Professional Development Plan.	Various milestones (Blogging archive, Visiting Scholars archive, Information Flyers) 07; ongoing development
Integration with L&T week for fast dissemination of Professional Development Resources	Feb 08
Development of the Virtual Learning Centre	Feb 08; ongoing development
Development of integrated online booking system for flexible student learning support	Mar/Apr 08
More in-depth development of website sections (Embedding Indigenous Perspectives, Assessment, Internationalisation, Evaluation)	2008; ongoing development
Initial evaluation of L&T website structure; identifying effective evaluation tools	Mar/ Apr 08, ongoing
Evaluate and redesign working process for updating the L&T website and developing content	Mar/ Apr 08
Develop a workshop for staff with the working title: ‘Communication for the Web’	Aug/ Sep 08
Monthly reports	End of month

Total resources/ budget required

Additional temporary staff for specific priority areas. For example, the employment on a contract basis of Rebecca Hazelden for a three month period.

Professional development requirements

Staff will need to undertake Professional Development if and when required, and as it relates to changes in the CMS system, and potential changes to the system supporting web development, for example Moodle and ICE training. This applies to staff with authoring and editing access to the L&T website (4 LTSU staff members). All LTSU staff: attendance at workshop with the working title: ‘Communication for the Web’; this can then be repurposed ‘on demand’ for Faculty staff.

Scholarship opportunities

All staff contributing to the L&T website will be encouraged to participate in LTSU PD activities, to research and publish, and to present to Faculty/USQ community, in relation to their L&T activities. The L&T website provides both a conduit for dissemination of good practice, and a publicly accessible space for LTSU staff to identify scholarship opportunities for Faculty staff and initiate mentoring relationships with Faculty staff with the aim of achieving publication outcomes, developing grant applications and L&T awards.

Communication plan

1. Monthly website updates will be communicated via Faculty LTECs, as well as via global and Faculty-specific emails whenever new content has gone ‘live’ or whenever new PD-related activities are developed for the website.

2. Monthly PRP reporting process

Evaluation strategies

We are currently in the process of developing a specific evaluation strategy for the L & T website. This will include quantitative data gathering (‘click data’), and qualitative data gathering via a survey and a series of Faculty specific focus groups (October/ November 2008).

This evaluation strategy will be finalised in April 2008.

Quality measures will include:

usability
accessibility
level of engagement with web-based resources
impact of such engagement on L & T activities
level of participation in PD activities

B3 - LTSU resources and web