Persistent community pilot discussion area
Feel free to discuss ideas for this pilot in this space. These ideas can be formalised before moving them into the pilot template on the previous page - this discussion area is also the place to agree or disagree with peoples thoughts, but don't forget to add a reason as to why you agree or disagree!
Don't feel you have to stick to the titles below, let your imagination go wild...
Following discussions it is believed that it would be good to split this pilot into three separate pilots:
- Basic - Forum based - base the persistent community around forums as the learners are alreay used too.
- Medium - Social networking - using facebook as a medium for individuals to continue their 'learning' in an informal environment and connect with other people around the world that haven't necessarily been on our courses.
- Advanced - MUVE - e.g. Second Life as the opportunity to continue their learning
A. Basic information
I just had a quick look at the group and think there are three areas we have yet to think about:
- what are we going to call the group?
- what types are we going to use to describe the group? - currently we have used Student Groups and Academic Groups.
- are we going to add an image - the Edinburgh guidelines discuss badging external sites with the University branding .
(Comments added - Matt 07/11)
B. Detailed description
We intend to create a closed FaceBook group which will be advertised to the students on our short (10 week) online distance courses). Interested students will need to create a FaceBook account and then ask to join the group (which is by invitation only). Initially one of our (The Department for Continuing Education) administrators will 'let people into the group' but will not manage their accounts. We hope that if successful in the future this role will be taken on by a student to oversee group membership.
I think that the group should be overseen by a member of the Department, ideally from the Online courses office, and should continue to be in the future. By someone from the Department being involved and visible it shows that we are just as interested in building the community as everyone else. Otherwise, if we don't seem to be bothered about it, why should the students? The only reason for them staying in the space that we create rather than ones that they create themselves is precisely that - that we create it and that we can offer a centralised space with additional features and possibly content that they won't get elsewhere. We need to be able to offer them extra benefits and lend it some authority. (Comments added - Deborah Goodbody 07/11)
I agree with what Deb's saying, but this will need to be included in the discussions with Ox legal, because the questions I have been asking were based around us being very hands off. By adding someone from the Department as an administrator I would view them as a moderator - I'm not sure though anyone is going to know the answer to this and we might just have to announce it clearly somewhere in the group. (Comments added - Matt 07/11)
I have just discussed this with Claire (our courses administrator) she is happy to be a gate keeper but would be concerned about the level of work involved if she had to 'moderate' the group. Also, I think that a member of staff effectively moderating the group may put us in a tenuous legal situation. I will check this with Ox legal as Matt suggests. Claire mentioned that she could identify a possible student administrator before we launch the group to make sure that it wasn't just her as an admin as people arrive. The problem we have here is that most of the actions we could take to improve the groups chance of success cut across legal and practical issues (tying up staff etc). If the form of the gruop doen't work this time round then we may have to adjust it next term. I'd prefer to go for a stripped down group launch this term and then adjust rather than wait at this point (Comments added - DaveW 08/11)
The FaceBook group will initially contain a number of discussion forums representing each major discipline our courses cover. We will also create a general forum for cross discipline discussions/chat.
I think that there needs to be a plan for how these discussion forums will work - certainly to start with I think that the forums probably need to be seeded with suggestions to kick-start discussions. I think it's going to be difficult to maintain subject specific forums when you don't have a course to support the students ongoing learning. I'll be interested to see how much the discussion forums actually get used. (Comments added - Deborah Goodbody 07/11)
I suspect that actually the more shallow communication aspects of FaceBook will be the elements which get more use and we should think about using some of these as well, because not all community exists around discussion forums. Some people will just want to keep up with other students socially and won't be interested in continuing subject specific discussions. Others will want to know what new courses are in development. Others will want to discuss the news. We need to make sure that whatever we set up is flexible enough to be able to cater for what the students want. Also we should make sure that there is an email address which they can contact to offer feedback, suggest improvements etc. whilst the pilot is ongoing because that will also help to develop the community. Finally, enthusiastic users should be rewarded, whether that's through being spotlighted, or through their suggestions being taken on board because that will encourage their loyalty to the community and also encourage others to become involved as well. (Comments added - Deborah Goodbody 07/11)
Again visibility in the group versus hands off I think here - I do like the idea of 'rewarding' users! One aspect of this that hasn't been thought through is regarding the collection of feedback, from both the users that actually use facebook, but also the users that don't. I think this needs a lot of thought...(Comments added - Matt 07/11)
For practical reasons I think that these kind of ideas should go via the student admin. He/she could 'reward' individuals and switch on/off FaceBook features. I agree that many students may use the more social networky aspects of FaceBook. I hope they do. I think we should include the 'wall' as part of the default set-up for the group to encourage this kind of very informal communication. I've asked Ged to contact tutors on what inital posting would work for the forums so that they arn't blank when people arrive. (Comments added - DaveW 08/11)
The overall principle is to encourage a community of students which is moderated and managed by them. We need to be clear that we don't own the service, nor do we police it. However, we do want to visit from time to time to see what the students are interested in and also to contribute to discussions.
For the reasons mentioned above, I disagree with this premise. (Comments added - Deborah Goodbody 07/11)
I agree that your suggestions would probably improve the groups chances but I'm not happy about the legal or practical implications. If the group fails because of these restrictions then we can go back to JISC with a proper case and ask for their support. (Comment added - DaveW 08/11)
We have consulted JISClegal ( http://www.jisclegal.ac.uk) who recommended this guideline document ( http://www.vp.is.ed.ac.uk/Web_2.0_Initiative/Guidelines)from the University of Edinburgh. We have made our plans using these guidelines.
In addition, I don't think that tutors should be invited to join the community unless they are very keen to do so. When we create a course we have to be very specific about what students can expect from their tutors and we structure it so that students get much more peer-to-peer feedback than tutor feedback. By inviting tutors into the community it seems to be going back a step from that and I would be concerned that the community would become less about a student community developing and more about students getting more of that one-to-one feedback from the tutor, or trying to get the tutor's attention. And that's before we even think about the fact that tutors get paid for tutoring courses, so I'm not sure how this would fit in. I don't know how they would feel about it. Definitely something to ask Claire! (Comments added - Deborah Goodbody 07/11)
Ok this is probably going to come as a shock to some of you, but I was thinking while on my ride home about the legal v's moderation of the group - why a shock I hear you ask, firstly because I was thinking, but second of all because it was after work! I don't think Ox legal or JISC legal are going to be able to give us a definitive answer on this as there is no precident - hence it being new research. I think there are two avenues open to us:
- Moderated - Claire (or someone) becomes the Administrator for the pilot group and she (or one of us) has to spend time actually keeping an eye on what is being said/going on within the group.
- Advantages: us being publically visible and showing the learners that we are interested in what is going on within the group.
- Disadvantages: us being publically visible, looking a lot like an extension of the 'formal' learning environment and a little big brother'esk.
I believe we will have to be provide moderation if we are publically seen as an Administrator because I don't think we can only do half a job. If someone has an issue with something within the group - maybe Claire knows they are a trouble maker and so doesn't allow them to enter the group and they complain, I don't think a statement saying 'we aren't moderating this group' will suffice - I maybe wrong!
- Open - the alternative is to have an open group and rather than us being a moderator/administrator we have a presence in the group, providing input to the forums (not necessarily leading discussions) and encouraging, listening to and potentially implmenting feedback.
I think in this situation we can include a statement claiming that we are not moderating the group, but are interested in how it progresses.
I will look to tidy this up a bit in the morning, but wanted to get it typed in before the beer I'm about to drink flushed any sign of work out of my brain ;o) (Comments added - Matt 7/11 19:33)
This may not be the case if we can start the group with a student as one of the admins before people arrive. Claire can defer moderation issues via this person and simply act as the initial gatekeeper to control membership. This is a compromise and might not work but it's worth remembering that all of the students know how to contact Claire even if she doesn't appear as a group admin. We really don't know how much she will be asked by the students in any scenario. The same apples for MikeT. (Comments added - DaveW 08/11)
The 'legal issues' all seem to be based around the fact that the starting point was a document which said that the University shouldn't be responsible for the space. Why not have a legal disclaimer document which we draft which states our situation, then we can say whatever we want it to and as long as Legal Services are happy with it there isn't a problem. We could have a statement which says that we will not be reading every message, but that if a message is brought to our attention which is offensive or discriminatory it will be removed, or something. (comments added - Deborah Goodbody 08/11)
I think we do need to "moderate" the group in the first instance as i think it is unfair and potentially divisive to give it to a student or a groups of students selected by us and looses us the perception of buy in by the university. It is worth noting we have the budget to do this for Isthmus - even if Claire is the nominal contact someone from TALL can actually do it. If we do go the moderated route for the pilot this gives us a chance to see what it actually involves (I suspect it may be very little) and then decide if it is something we want to do in the future. If it is not, because we will also have a community by then, (or not but then this will be a moot point!) we can make choosing the administrator(s)something that the group does rather than us? (comments added - Marion 12/11)
A few thoughts - apologies that some are belated. Firstly, I feel very strongly that tutors should not be allowed in/ given access. It would set up unrealistic expectations on them and shift the focus in a way we don't want - if student's can get access to tutors via Facebook why should they bother to pay for another course? Secondly, with regards to moderation issues and degrees thereof, let's not base this primarily on time and money. Having some funds for my time is irrelevant insofar as if this pilot works it will be running after the final report has been submitted to JISC and their money spent and the a time requirement will still be there. Let's decide by listing the possibilities in an agreed order of preference and then considering each with reference to the legal guidelines. (comments added - Claire 16/11)
C. Rationale and expectations
