Spotlight

The Trialling of Collaborative Online Tools for Business and Community Engagement Project (BCEct Project)

The overall project aims to enhance the use and awareness of web technologies in collaborative practice undertaken by BCE practitioners across Further and Higher Education. The project is funded by the JISC BCE Programme, and runs from 1st July 2008 to 31st July 2010.

1. Evaluation (Max. Funding Available £8,000)

JISC infoNet  would like to commission an evaluation of the BCEct project following guidelines (evaluation handbook 2007) provided by JISC .  The project team expect the evaluation project to:

• Analyse and, where appropriate, suggest amendments to current project documentation e.g. the stakeholder analysis, project plan.
• Design and provide an appropriate methodology in agreement with the project team for carrying out an evaluation of the project.
• Gather appropriate evidence from across the project and provide an analysis of the evaluation data gathered.
• Provide an evaluation report, including an executive summary and PowerPoint presentation.

An overall evaluation framework exists for the BCE Programme and any successful bidder will be expected to work effectively with both the programme evaluator(s) and project team.  The project team estimate this work to take approximately 15 days (111hrs).

Where applicable the project team will be willing to support reasonable travel and accommodation costs (outwith maximum funding given above), however we envisage most of the work to take place remotely.

2. Supporting Trial Projects (Max. Funding Available £6,000)

The BCEct project includes eight trial projects  from across Further and Higher Education in the UK.  JISC infoNet would like to commission an organisation to support each trial project in the evaluation of their individual work.  The project team envisage this support in the form of one day workshops.  Workshops will:

• Provide each trial project with guidance on effective evaluation practices.
• Support each trial project in a practical start on their evaluation.
• Provide an initial synthesis of lessons learned so far across our range of partners.

The project team estimate this work to take approximately 10 days (74hrs).  The project team will support travel, accommodation and facilities where applicable (outwith maximum funding given above).

Deadline and Submission

The deadline for expressions of interest is 12th February 2010.  It is envisaged that bidders will be notified of the outcome of the marking process by 19th February 2010 and that work will commence on or around 1st March 2010.  JISC infoNet will accept one overall proposal for the above areas of work if an applicant wishes to combine them.  Proposals should be submitted to jiscinfonet@northumbria.ac.uk using the subject line ‘BCEct EOI‘.

JISC infoNet may require clarification on your bid and therefore require contact during the week commencing 15th February 2009.  A template for submitting your proposal is available for download here:  Expression of Interest Template.

Structure of Proposals

Proposals will be evaluated using the following criteria:

• Relevant experience in the area of project evaluation.
• Credibility/Track record, it would be favourable to include recommendations where possible.
• Project Management.
• Feasibility of approach.
• Value for money.

Delegates gathered on the 10th December for a dissemination event, to highlight outputs from the ‘Embedding BCE’ project. Delegates heard presentations from all of the project partner institutions, as well as representatives from the JISC BCE Programme.

To coincide with the event, JISC infoNet launched their Embedding BCE infoKit.

The infoKit presents all of the findings from the project, as well as some of the methodologies and tools that allowed institutions to carry out a review of their Business and Community Engagement activities.

The five partner instituions were:

• University of Glamorgan
• Keele University
• Newcastle University
• Shrewsbury College of Arts & Technology
• University of Strathclyde

Presentations from the event are available on SlideShare, accompanied by a Diigo list that provides links to associated BCE resources.

The infoKit is also being presented at a number of other events across the UK, including last weeks JISC Winter Fayre, and the New Engineering Foundation Conference in January.

Look out for more BCE related additions in the New Year, including some new workshops.

There appears to be a lot of discussion around the term ‘customer’ in relation to Further and Higher Education at the moment.  Articles (e.g. THE - Times Higher Education) along with outcomes from events (e.g. JISC Conference) highlight this further.  I (Andy Stewart) decided that I’d run a session at the Support Northumbria conference to find out the thoughts of fellow colleagues.

As you’d probably expect a range of perspectives were given, often associated with an individuals current role and past experience.  Much of the discussion focussed around students with the room split on whether we should view them as a customer, after all they are paying for particular services.  If we don’t view them as a customer how can we possibly deliver on expected outcomes and deliver effective services?  Another delegate responded highlighting that the relationship should be viewed much more as a partnership, the student plays an integral role in their time at any institution.  The more time they invest in this partnership the better the outcome overall, for the institution as well as the individual.  One delegate recalled their time at an institution and highlighted that as a student it’s not all about getting a grade, rather an involvement in a unique and beneficial cultural experience - a statement I must agree with.

After thinking through the discussion I feel I must apologise to delegates in that I may have asked the wrong question.  Although the discussion was lively and useful, hopefully challenging people to review their current thinking, I believe a much more pertinent question would be to ask who are our customers?  The most recent grant letter received by HEFCE states:

“…and where I hope the Council will continue to focus during 2009-10, include engaging with business; widening access to higher education; supporting quality in HE; enhancing employability; sustaining world class research; and responding to climate change.”

Pretty simple wouldn’t you agree?  All jokes aside, what this seems to come down to is “future employers” and “society generally” being the core customers of institutions, a distinction I must attribute to a brilliant blog post by Lloyd Armstrong, Jr.  Perhaps we could argue the removal of ‘future’ and concentrate solely on ‘employers’ and ’society’, reason being students could be ‘work-based learners’.  All of this ties in nicely with the Business and Community Engagement (BCE) initiative currently underway within JISC, a cross cutting theme which needs to be addressed by the core components of any institution - Research and Learning & Teaching.

I particularly relate to the suggestion by Lloyd that education is “…in the knowledge chain management business”.  So what does this mean for the ’student’?  One delegate touched on the idea that their financial transaction was not so much in return for goods/services but an investment in their own future.  Again, something Lloyd touches upon in his post:

“…they are ‘independent partners’ who have invested in an education that will enable them to become valued contributors to their institution’s knowledge chain.”

I must thank all those that contributed to the discussion and encourage further debate using the comments facility below!