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Educational Technology Committee

Meeting 04/08

Thursday 15 May 2008, 2.30 pm
Chair: Prof Phillip Steele,CL_75.G21
Video conferenced to: CA_H7.82; VCP_Sisson Room; GP_2W.263, MY_2.3.

1.

Welcome

Attendance:

  • Clayton: Phillip Steele (chair), Len Webster, Lawrence Maskill, John Hurst, Simon Huggard (for Janette Burke), Melissa de Zwart, Aidan Lister, Alexandra Phelan, Maria Garcia de la Banda, Dash Jayasuriya, Kate Roth, George Kotsanas, Katherine Lock, Michael Henderson, Gayle Nicholas (support),
  • Malaysia: Rajendran Parthiban
  • Caulfield: Cameron Nicol, Des Casey
  • VCP: Paul White
  • GP: Alison Whitley

Apologies: Gordon Sanson, Bernard Holkner, Jeff Janet, Janette Burke, Darren McKee

Phillip Steele welcomed Rajendran Pathiban to his first meeting with the ETC. The retirement of Philip Dearman as Arts Faculty representative was noted.

2.

Confirmation of minutes and business arising

  2.1 Confirmation of minutes
   

The minutes of meeting 03/08 on 11 March were confirmed.

  2.2 Business arising

2.2.1 Video conference set up ETC 0308-7.2

In response to feedback on the video conference set up at the last meeting a different mode, the lecture mode, was trialled at this meeting. Members were asked to give feedback at the end of the meeting.

3.

Exploring content syndication to reduce information overhead

Mr Aidan Lister and Ms Alexander Phelan, Monash Students' Association
Mr Simon Huggard, Monash Library Two presentations demonstrated the benefits of mashups, portals and RSS feeds to bring information into one location from where it can be accessed. The benefits of this for both staff and students were noted.

ACTION:

  • Emily Feher to be requested to provide a report to the next ETC meeting regarding: content syndication functions in BlackBoard, Moodle and my Monash portal facilities and their ease of use
  • MUSO Steering Committee to be asked to further investigate the options for Monash

4.

eEducation Centre

Phillip Steele reported that the relationship between the new eEducation Centre and the ETC was yet to be determined, but that he considered the ETC would be a valuable forum for the new Centre. Gordon Sanson will take over the role of chairing the ETC.

Kate Roth thanked Phillip Steele for his work as interim Chair.

5.

Staff Development Unit (SDU) MUSO Training Program

Phillip Steele reported he was following up on this matter for the Education Committee.

The following points were raised in the discussion:

  • Well known to faculties that SDU is running MUSO training
  • There is concern that a charge may be made for the training
  • Separation of educational and operational training not possible
  • a full morning is not an appropriate time frame for academic staff
  • staff in faculties had been asked to help design the course
  • this is another case of central v. faculty training issues
ACTION: The matter will be referred to the MUSO Steering Committee

6.

Chairperson of the MUSO Steering Committee

Following David Murphy's retirement this position will be referred to the eEducation Centre for a replacement strategy. An appointment from CALT or the eEducation Centre is expected.

7.

Safe Assign plagiarism detection software

Phillip Steele, refering to MUSO Steering Committee minutes, raised a query re the status of plagiarism software at Monash.

Responses:

  • Legal issues with Turnitin and IP were still progressing through the courts
  • Turnitin is being used in the university in a plagiarism preventative program
  • consideration of the holding of student work needs to be given when evaluating new software
  • the university distinguishes between plagiarism and cheating
  • Faculty of IT is evaluating its own use of plagiarism software
  • Harsh Suri at CALT has done an evaluation of Turnitin. It was suggested this be used as input to the FIT project
  • Reports on plagiarism have been done by the Faculty of Law
  • The Library and LLs have plagiarism resources
  • students are concerned that plagiarism software is used for punitive rather than preventative programs
  • the use of a term other than plagiarism was suggested

    • ACTION: A recommendation be made that the Education Committee reconsider the plagiarism software issue, in consultation with the ETC.

8.

Reports to Education Committee

The ETC now reports to the Education Committee. The Education Committee requires reports in the above format. Previously the ETC reported to the LTQC which accepted full minutes. Reports will be placed on ETC agendas for noting.

9.

Reports from sub-committees and SIG

  5.1 Policy subcommittee
No report
  5.2 Lecture capture and broadcasting subcommittee
Paul White and Simon Huggard reported on meetings with Lectopia and Media Site. Media Site has higher resolution graphics and a different back end set up. Investigation into licence agreements, costs, roadmaps needs to be done. Consideration is being given to trials of each product. It is expected that the project will not be underway until late 2009.

There is still scope to review other products, including open source options. Information regarding other options should be circulated to the committee.

  5.3 Digital Media SIG
No report
  5.4 Conference subcommittee
Des reported that further information had been received and included on the web site at: http://calt.monash.edu.au/Quality/ETC/conferences.html
  5.5 MUSO Steering Committee

10.

SLIGers demonstration

Michael Henderson, Lecturer, Faculty of Education

Michael Henderson from the Centre for Educational Multimedia in the Faculty of Education presented on work being completed by masters students in Second Life. The presentation included a visit to Monash Island and was a demonstration of how technology can be used for educational skills development.

The students are using Moodle alongside Second Life.

11.

Next Meeting


The next meeting of the Educational Technology Committee will be on Thursday 12 June, 5 - 7 pm. This timing is to enable a video conference link to South Africa. Refreshments will be provided on the Clayton campus.