Looking Forward –

It is the start of a new year and with that comes a conditioned desire to look forward and attempt to make the coming year better (what ever better means) than the previous year. Most of us do this and I am no exception.

As the days away from work diminished and thoughts of work started to creep back into my consciousness I have found myself mulling the following thoughts regarding work.

1. I have a better understanding of my role and spending more time forming the work instead of implementing the tasks (to varying degrees of success I must admit).  There are a few bits of organizational dynamics to address to make us work more smoothly but those are tweaks that are only apparent because things are working well and generally moving in the same direction.
2. Now that we (user services) has our niche carved and day to day tasks becoming second nature, how do we connect with the community beyond requests for help? If we are better connected with the community it will help us be more intune with their perspective allowing us to make better decisions when implementing what needs to be done.  The question I face is how to accomplish this?  I am going to propose that each of us take a few buildings and commit to walking through them a couple times a month with the sole purpose being trying to connect with users and helping them know that we are people who want to help.  It will be interesting to learn how the group will respond and improve the idea.  (This is one thing I really appreciate about my colleagues – they field my half-baked ideas and make them into plausible practices they feel comfortable implementing.)
3. I will also be doing my own part to reach out to the community.  I would like to meet with a majority of directors on campus to start the conversations of working better together.
4. The last “resolution” is for me to gain a better understanding of how a college’s budget, particularly the portion of which I am responsible is most appropriately used over the course of the year.  Starting to attend the FFC meetings and the Finances portion of the IT Manager’s Series  has given me a good framework of how to use and talk about budgets by connecting to the mission of the institution.

We will see how these play out.  I will be blogging more on these topics and we will see how it goes.  Your input is welcome.

Received My 3×5 Index Card in the Mail Today.

Funny coincidence today, the day that I return to the office from day 2 of NERCOMP’s IT Manager Series, I received the note card I sent to myself at day 1 of the series.

The card was to force us to check in with myself about a goal set during the during one of the sessions on that first day.  My card asks -

How well have you shifted your communication strategies to meet the communication styles/needs of the people your work with?

The answer is – I’m not sure.  I have spent a lot of time on talking about communication, what is being done, what we want to convey, what we need to learn, how to be inclusive, etc..But have I shifted my strategies or just attacked communication from my perspective and style and not actually communicated in a manner that works for the various communication styles and information needs of those I work with.

I will need to think about this a bit.  – Any constructive criticism from the peanut gallery?

Reflections on Budgeting and Finance Session

We are about half way through the budget and finance section and my mind is about full so I am checking out for a minute or two to post a few reflections on my forming beliefs on how to manage the user services budget.

First – The story of where the money is and how it is spent is more important to me than the numbers when discussing budget. This gives me the context of how to make choices between project requests.  It also gives others the context for what is happening with the budget and why it was choosen to spend it in such a manner.

Secondly – Numbers do matter as I am the steward of this portion of the college’s budget I need to be prudent in the expenditure of the funds the college entrusts to me.  I need to make the decisions about the budget to impact learning, professional growth, professional accomplishments, and generally position the college for the future.  This means spending wisely and cautiously but not always choosing the cheapest option (there is a reason that it is so cheap).

Third – I need to continue to develop an awareness of expenditures to make sure the money is used consistently throughout the year to minimze the perception of a spending frenzy at the end of the fiscal year. For example the maintence and repair budget is one that is hard to predict from year to year whether or not the budget will be tapped at year’s end or if there will be a remainder.  I think having a list of important (but not critical) projects that could be completed with these funds is important because then I can tell the story of why the project was planned and necessary project should funds become available and not a frivolity purchased with “free year-end” money.

This is a clear area that I need to grow into as it it news to me but I have good examples at my institution which is fortunate.   Suggestions and tips are appreciated as I am still working out this part of my managerial philosophy.

Interesting Sesion on IT Help Desk Results of the ECAR Survey

One of the most interesting things is that the growing movement of Help Desks to transition from a center of incident management to a coordinated provide of IT services. I think this is a good summary of what I want User Services at Allegheny to become. If User Services can become the contact point for training, information and project requests we will have grown in to the organization that I will be proud of but also one that seems to be inline with where other Help Desks (in Higher Ed and out).

The presenter discussed criteria to identify the maturity of the Help Desk. I would rate our maturity as being very young. I see that our services fluctuates between

• services are delivered dependant “heroics” of individuals (immature)
• services that are repeatable across the help desk staff (infancy)
• services that are standardized across the help desk staff with process and expectations supporting the services (Moderately Mature)

The presenter made the connection between the more mature the organization there is more satisfaction with the services provided and those services are generally more complex go beyond incident management.

• So what do I need to do with User Services to push mature our organization.
• Continue to develop a communal understanding of what our mission is and how our day to day practices either facilitates or retards growth toward that vision.
• Develop practices that allow the team to make decisions based on data – connect Alla and Phil so Phil can teach her how to run some basic reports on close rates, work flow and response times.

Blogs Supporting Computing Projects: R18, techNOcool, LMS, Learning 2.0, No Name

I am pleased to report that blogging software is quite practical as a way to document projects and communicate progress to the community.

Currently, individuals and groups are blogging their projects in addition to the Help Desk and Office of Educational Technology using blogs as news pages.
If you are interested in what is happening in Computing I would encourage you to check out the following sites or even subscribe to the site feeds.

• R18 – Subscribe
• LMS – Subscribe
• Learning 2.0 – Subscribe
• techNOcool – Subscribe
• No Name – Subscribe
• OET News – Subscribe
• Help Desk News and Notes – Subscribe

Pretty exciting stuff if you ask me. But, I have been encouraging these things since I drank the Kool-aid up in Middlebury.

I will build on these practical examples of blogging in two workshops this summer. One for faculty, Get Your Blog On, and one for Administrators and Staff, Blog w/out Being a Blogger; Blogs as Organizational Communication Tools.

An honorable dilemma at The Fish Wrapper

A very interesting dilemma for sure is explained over at The Fish Wrapper. On a much smaller scale I felt a similar clash/disconnect between my preferred writing format blog/html and the universally accepted format of paper in completing my annual performance review this year.

I formed my ideas for what I would submit using my blog and quite naturally(or absent-mindedly) included links to many of the completed projects. As I moved from blog entry(ies) to a more print friendly media I came to a rather annoying realization that a flat piece of paper is not nearly as communicative as my entries. Not to mention the loss of context when the summary post was read without the supporting posts written throughout the year.

After reading this post I wonder if our students have similar reactions when moving between courses that are rich in Web 2.0 tools/practices and ones that require more traditional approach?
Would it make sense for the university archivists and historians to have a dedicated web server that could store such works publicly but not provide write access thus having a true archive of the work as it was conceived and orginially shared. As Martha says “I am not a librarian”, archivist, etc.. but that on the surface that makes sense to me.

I think I will bring this up at our RefIT group (a weekly meeting of Reference Librarians and Instructional Technologists) to see what ideas come from it. Hopefully our Learning Web 2.0 project will also benefit from this example as it is a concrete example of how Web 2.0 and user created content impacts both of our worlds.
This is a problem that more will face as the educational trend seems to be one that includes more user created content. Particularly in mediums that do not seem to be easily ’shelfable’ as is paper, video tape or dvd, photograph, or work of art.

Workshops Open For Registration

Finally, after many double checks and a few sick kids the faculty workshop Announcement Flyer is out in mailboxes. Not sure why but it always takes more time than seems necessary but it is what it is.

My post today is not to complain but to start a dialog about how we (those of us who read each other’s blogs) can help each other develop interesting opportunities for faculty to learn technologies that match teaching goals with technology of the day. This idea was spurred on by an exchange I had with John Martin over at EdVentures and reading Open Source 2010, Reflections on 2007.

Both of these reminded me of how important a community is to the exchange of ideas and supporting instructional technology in this day. As most colleges only have one or a handful of instructional technologists sometimes it is difficult to find time or media to interact with those like us. Thus, I am posting the Flyer to share what Allegheny is doing for faculty development this summer. Also, I open the door for those of you interested in asking questions, sharing critiques, or offering words of encouragement to do so on this blog and other blogs I maintain. Hopefully, such exchanges will help to develop more complete faculty develop opportunities both at Allegheny and your home institution.

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Developing a Faculty Consultation Model

There are lots of instructional design models that are employed by various instructional designer, instructional technologist, and instructors. It is a pretty universal thing to teach in graduate school. But has anyone put together a model , or at least best practices for consulting with faculty by instructional support professionals? (I will need to do a little research. Perhaps PODNetwork is a good starting point.) If there is such a model I wonder how closely what I do fits with the model.

My work with faculty requires two things trust and expertise.

Trust is first as teaching is a very personal endeavor.

Expertise is second because trust will be broken quite quickly if:

• I prove to be less than competent in my knowledge of instruction(al technology).
• I don’t demonstrate an appreciation of the faculty member’s expertise especially as without the expertise in the discipline what content is there to be learned?

So that is my philosophy but what are the steps of a consultation?

Pre-consultation

• Be available – being physically available to faculty is the first step. If the faculty member does not see the instructional technologist, (s)he is not likely to ask for assistance.
• Take a personal interest in faculty subject and teaching – it is an instructional technologist’s job to help faculty accomplish their course goals. To be successful it is imperative to understand where opportunities for assisting lie.
• Develop skills and understanding of emerging technology – staying current with instructional technology expands expertise which can easily translate in to more opportunities to assist faculty.

Consultation

• Personalize – We are talking about education so there is no cook book to follow. It is important to know that each problem is unique and efforts should be take to avoid fitting a round peg in a square hole.
• Share possibilities - Both parties need to share. The faculty must share such things as teaching, problem, goals, and style. The instructional technologist must share his understanding of the faculty’s situation, possible solutions, and commitment required.
• Action plan – Identify concrete steps of innovation – Important to note that while the project might not be considered cutting edge or noteworthy by others, it is a change and new practice for the faculty member. The project should be treated with the appropriate amount of care and encouragement. – and responsible party. It is important to divide the work evenly based on expertise.

Implementation

• Develop options – This phase is where the faculty make/revise instruction to include the technology and where the instructional technologist develops the tools and processes for use.
• Incorporation – The faculty uses the technology for teaching. Questions, troubles, and new insights flow from the first uses.
• Develop Confidence and Support faculty – This step is key to continued use. The tasks of this phase vary depending on what the faculty member finds during initial uses. How well problems are addressed and solved and the rate at which the faculty member feels ‘I can do this’ will be key in determining whether or not the innovation will be incorporated into subsequent courses. (Of course there is the caveat that the innovation has to further teaching and learning of the content).
• Evaluate – It is important not to close the books on a project without at the very least a quick check-in with the faculty. It is obviously preferable to have a focused conversation with faculty about the project and the parts that needs improvement.

Now this is not science but these steps have produced many interesting projects.

I would be interested to read about how those of you reading this approach your consultations. I am going to tag this and future posts about faculty consultation models fcmodels and invite you to do the same so that we can tie our posts on this topic together.

POWERFUL Statement about Instructional Technology! at EduTechie.com

Ever get caught in a debate about the value of technology in education?  This post reminds me of arguments/examples on both sides of divide.

POWERFUL Statement about Instructional Technology! at EduTechie.com

The post itself is worth a read but jeff’s reply to a commenter is worth a repeat.

I think the key is using technology to augment those human relationships, not replace them. I think the scenarioâ??s you describe here are great examples of that. IM and the phone let you stay connected while people are at work. Blogging keeps you connected when you canâ??t be together.

This fits with what I wrote about the technologies I use.