As it is difficult to get Managers, mentors, tutors, to adopt WBLWAY in the face of the numerous ILT/IT software initiatives that the college is lauching (from FrameUp to Covalent to Pro- Achieve to etc etc) I have now promoted WBLWAY to students. After preliminary classroom visits, I have written to all of our FD DATA (Dance and Theatre Arts ) students to personally invite them to trial WBLWAY and respond to a user survey. This should make them feel special and aware of the fact that we are working to provide ever improving services. As I have worked with the tutors, employers, mentors, and sponsors of DATA events (ie Coors) this may improve engagement , as I will be able to undertake some of the spadework on behalf of each role (ie input access permissions to set up screens - as I have sent instructions and permission forms to students).
Actions as a result of our Pursuit of the Training Standard and possible involvement with initiatives to improve such things as course validation may improve our employer responsiveness - particularly that harnessing ILT/ICT initiatives.
Thursday, 3 July 2008
Friday, 6 June 2008
Operations Management Team Response
The paper of 6th June 2008 (posted on WBLWAY Google Groups) was presented today to our Operations Management Group (Deputy/Assistant Principals, Heads of Faculties).
I had the opportunity to brief the group at length about WBLWAY and the activity that Burton college has been involved with so far.
The concensus was that, "The college preferred to promote SURF locally to meet our own objectives". This referred to the building of the new HE centre and the policy of encouraging stay at home student to access HE provision locally. There was an element of competition with other SURF colleges.
One comment mentioned the name of the information point. This was in relation to it not indicating FD HE based WBL . Also the use of Frameup within college was discussed, as this can, and most possibly will soon, be used to allow both employer and student access to course progress etc. Of course, this does not include the communication aspects of WBLWAY.
The OMT are happy to allow the WBLWAY link to remain on the college website and mentioned the possible value of such a service to our larger employers training officers. As a review of our online services is imminent, due to our pursuit of The Training Quality Standard, and giving consideration to our self-promotion concerns they would prefer the pilot to continue with smaller employers.
My response will be to continue the work with students and staff involved in the FD's Early Years,and Performing Arts.
I had the opportunity to brief the group at length about WBLWAY and the activity that Burton college has been involved with so far.
The concensus was that, "The college preferred to promote SURF locally to meet our own objectives". This referred to the building of the new HE centre and the policy of encouraging stay at home student to access HE provision locally. There was an element of competition with other SURF colleges.
One comment mentioned the name of the information point. This was in relation to it not indicating FD HE based WBL . Also the use of Frameup within college was discussed, as this can, and most possibly will soon, be used to allow both employer and student access to course progress etc. Of course, this does not include the communication aspects of WBLWAY.
The OMT are happy to allow the WBLWAY link to remain on the college website and mentioned the possible value of such a service to our larger employers training officers. As a review of our online services is imminent, due to our pursuit of The Training Quality Standard, and giving consideration to our self-promotion concerns they would prefer the pilot to continue with smaller employers.
My response will be to continue the work with students and staff involved in the FD's Early Years,and Performing Arts.
Wednesday, 21 May 2008
Embedding WBLWAY
The process of embedding WBLWAY into college processes is continuing. It features in the ILT Development Plan but not in the consciousness of the key players in employer engagement and HE in FE.
Remedies that I am working on:
Development of a portal from our college web site that places WBLWAY visibly alongside all of the ILT services that I am developing (from Library- to Moodle- to Well at College etc).
Encouraging the take up by students (particularly where my contact employers have an, " I see them everyday anyway", attitude).
Adding a WBLWAY agenda item, to follow up our pursuit of the Training Quality Standard, at the OMT meeting on June 6th 2008. 1. to point out that WBLWAY satisfies some of the requirements for the standard. 2. to restate that our employer engagement team, HE curriculum developers, marketing team, should be helping me with this project.
Remedies that I am working on:
Development of a portal from our college web site that places WBLWAY visibly alongside all of the ILT services that I am developing (from Library- to Moodle- to Well at College etc).
Encouraging the take up by students (particularly where my contact employers have an, " I see them everyday anyway", attitude).
Adding a WBLWAY agenda item, to follow up our pursuit of the Training Quality Standard, at the OMT meeting on June 6th 2008. 1. to point out that WBLWAY satisfies some of the requirements for the standard. 2. to restate that our employer engagement team, HE curriculum developers, marketing team, should be helping me with this project.
Tuesday, 13 May 2008
Stepping up use of WBLWAY
Ruth Gill, Burton Nursery, has now reviewed the changes made to improve the Information Point. All of the FD students that Ruth manages will now be encouraged to use WBLWAY to access course details and communicate using the formums. Once this has happened, the plan is to revisit all of the employers engaged so far and illustrate Ruth's progress.
Tuesday, 6 May 2008
Moving on
As a follow up to Mark Stiles and Fleur Corfield's address to our ILT Strategic Planning Group, I am presenting a WBLWAY update to our Operational Management Team (OMT) on Friday 6th June 2008.
In the meantime the information point is to appear on the new Student ILT page that we are planning to use as a portal to online student services. This will give it a formal profile and help me to "trial it" further.
In the meantime the information point is to appear on the new Student ILT page that we are planning to use as a portal to online student services. This will give it a formal profile and help me to "trial it" further.
Tuesday, 8 April 2008
Choosing and engaging project participants.
I engaged employers who would not be deterred by project setbacks and who would be proactive. I particularly avoided larger prominent employers when planning the pilot phase. As our college had been through a restructuring, whereby employer engagement became a set aim, I targetted curriculum areas with close established links to the college.
When introducing employers to the project I found it useful to meet them alonside one or two learners. This meant that discussions about usefulness had more than one perspective. Often learners stressed that they wished employers to be aware of and involved with their study progress.
As part of our restructuring and new build HE centre plans, staff involved with work based learning at NVQ level and staff newly charged with HE employer engagement have began to work together. Whilst project team visits to senior management teams have led to awareness of the project at that level, the ground level operatives remain unaware or unconvinced of the WBLWAY support points use. This is partly due to the delay in providing information from Hive (repository) that would make the information point a useful marketting tool.
Plans for future engagement:
At present I am waiting for the information point to evolve to a point where I can revisit employers and placate their early fears (largely relating to information available).
The Standards and Development Unit at college now has a dedicated HE Curriculum Development Manager (employed on a temporary project basis). He will be made aware of the Information Point, as the Curriculum Area Leaders have been at formal leadership meetings which were promoted by CEL (Centre for Excellence in Leadership) and Kingston Universties "Managers into Leaders" programme. Involvement in the LSC's Technology Exemplar Network should also provide an opportunity to promote the WBLWAY Information Point.
An immediate opportunity to engage staff teams should be afforded by the training programme we have just initiated to embed FrameUp. FrameUp is now being used to begin to track work based leaners at all levels below HE. It clearly presents the framework that students follow and enables staff to monitor student progress, details and involvement with employers but is only an internal tracking tool ( accessed by college staff only).
Staff are already questioning its usefulness and wether something similar should be applied to HE (particularly FD's) and opened up to employers. Owing to this interest, I have made them aware of WBLWAY. Should WBLWAY ever allow even a simple overview of progress alongside its capacity to provide information that could market FD's, it could become an accepted tool. Our employer engagement team would now be keen to talk to the team about WBLWAY. Pauline Athersmith leads the team, with Evelyne Flynn responsible for employer engagement, and a team of placement officers. They would deal with progression to FD's, whilst Curriculum Area Leaders and Advanced Practitioners have a role developing FD's.
When introducing employers to the project I found it useful to meet them alonside one or two learners. This meant that discussions about usefulness had more than one perspective. Often learners stressed that they wished employers to be aware of and involved with their study progress.
As part of our restructuring and new build HE centre plans, staff involved with work based learning at NVQ level and staff newly charged with HE employer engagement have began to work together. Whilst project team visits to senior management teams have led to awareness of the project at that level, the ground level operatives remain unaware or unconvinced of the WBLWAY support points use. This is partly due to the delay in providing information from Hive (repository) that would make the information point a useful marketting tool.
Plans for future engagement:
At present I am waiting for the information point to evolve to a point where I can revisit employers and placate their early fears (largely relating to information available).
The Standards and Development Unit at college now has a dedicated HE Curriculum Development Manager (employed on a temporary project basis). He will be made aware of the Information Point, as the Curriculum Area Leaders have been at formal leadership meetings which were promoted by CEL (Centre for Excellence in Leadership) and Kingston Universties "Managers into Leaders" programme. Involvement in the LSC's Technology Exemplar Network should also provide an opportunity to promote the WBLWAY Information Point.
An immediate opportunity to engage staff teams should be afforded by the training programme we have just initiated to embed FrameUp. FrameUp is now being used to begin to track work based leaners at all levels below HE. It clearly presents the framework that students follow and enables staff to monitor student progress, details and involvement with employers but is only an internal tracking tool ( accessed by college staff only).
Staff are already questioning its usefulness and wether something similar should be applied to HE (particularly FD's) and opened up to employers. Owing to this interest, I have made them aware of WBLWAY. Should WBLWAY ever allow even a simple overview of progress alongside its capacity to provide information that could market FD's, it could become an accepted tool. Our employer engagement team would now be keen to talk to the team about WBLWAY. Pauline Athersmith leads the team, with Evelyne Flynn responsible for employer engagement, and a team of placement officers. They would deal with progression to FD's, whilst Curriculum Area Leaders and Advanced Practitioners have a role developing FD's.
Tuesday, 4 March 2008
Project Promotion
I am being encouraged to increase our involvement with ILT Development Projects. Recently I joined the QIA/CEL (Quality Improvement Agency/ Centre for Excellence in Leadership) eXplorer programme. A number of the participants introduced Change Management Plans that involved promoting Work Based Learning. I took the opportunity to introduce both of our WBL projects. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that some colleges (ie North Devon) were already aware of the project outputs.
Our planned involvement with the LSC's Technology Exemplar Network may generate even more interest.
Our planned involvement with the LSC's Technology Exemplar Network may generate even more interest.
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