Activity 6: Innovation in your context
I am certain my innovations are valued within my context. I have a long experience of providing appropriate systems based on consultation and user feedback.
For example: our institution uses a custom Moodle module known as “Corepacks” This is our record of awarding body quality compliance within each taught unit.This was initially an exercise to move from paper based files stored on a shelf to online files. However, this system has grown into a complete process which is tied in to our staff intranet system in terms of reporting and role assignment. In Moodle the delivering staff member can access the pack materials from within the Moodle course.All lecturing staff now use this system to store SQA compliance information / moderation with complete audit trail of the status of the pack.I am not aware of any other institutions working exactly this way. Some maintain a separate private VLE rather than embed in the course.
I have received much positive feedback about this system and continue to improve it.
I have also recently provided, at very short notice, a file converter web page to allow lecturers to convert assessment submissions arriving as Apple HEIC images (from iOS devices) to jpegs as they were unable to view them to mark them.
The staff involved were delighted with the system as they had been working around the problem by uploading images to Facebook then downloading them again which is not suitable for all manner of reasons.
There is much innovative practice taking place in my organisation. There are not currently any policies relating to innovation. However, we have recently had a change of leadership and our new Principal is keen for us to utilise new techniques and technology and we are positively encouraged to be innovative by solving challenges with existing technology where possible or by creating our own software.
We are also encouraged to have blue sky thinking time to learn new coding techniques or simply brush up on our current skills.
I myself like to have a number of experimental projects on the go. I am positive this is the right approach to take as we often speed up processes, save resource hours and solve issues before they become problematic.
2 thoughts on “Activity 6: Innovation in your context”
This is really interesting Steve. My background is in the pedagogy and not the technology as such. It’s great that you developed a fix for the image problem staff were experiencing, that overcame the issues around creating an image that could be marked. When I first worked for the a distance organisation and used online marking systems, we used to have issues marking assignments if they were submitted in the wrong format, which created a lot of additional work. Technically there were ways to get around it but we were required to ask students to resubmit in the correct file format, which might result in delays marking etc. Therefore, I can really relate to the solution you developed.
Many thanks for taking the time to read my blog Tanya. I am asked regularly to help open files which have been submitted for assessment (mainly ODF files which confuse many a person).