My presentation at Innovative Learning 2012. http://www.publicserviceevents.co.uk/221/innovative-learning

1. A Critical Appraisal of
Technology in the University
Dr Richard Hall [@hallymk1/rhall1@dmu.ac.uk]

2. DMU context

3. Maximising potential: a resilient strategy?
What is the place of technology in the idea of the
University?
How do technologies help us to realise or diminish our
values, and how do they impact the social relations
that emerge around these values?
Can strategy for embedding technology relate it to the
broader humane activities of the University?

4. Enhancing Learning through Technology
“The transformation of learning by staff and students
through the situated use of technology”.
The debate has amplified issues around the following [risks].
• Curriculum control/change-management: ad hoc vs
strategic control vs staff digital/technical literacy.
• Support and skills in-house: quality/distinctive or
interesting vs boring.
• Elasticity of demand and service-provision: developing
technologies that will enable emerging and future web
applications.

6. This!

7. http://bit.ly/MNPOpn

8. governance and enclosure in
the public organisation

11. • Twitter: EFF/American Civil Liberties Union; Birgitta Jonsdottir; U.S.
Department of Justice; Wikileaks.
• LinkedIn: cracking a service; aggregating data for future cracking;
confirming guesses about passwords; comparing hacked data against pre-
computed versions; broadening "guessable” data.
• Facebook, Google and Twitter: new obligation to identify “trolls” ; internet
companies will have to surrender the details of those posting libellous
messages.
• Leveson: Hunt’s private Gmail account; role of the information
commissioner; use of private (email) accounts to conduct official business is
subject to FoI.
Service resilience; confidentiality/privacy; copyright/copyleft/content
distribution; data security/back-ups; control/deletion

12. the legal standard for production of information by a third party,
including cloud computing services under US civil and criminal law
is whether the information is under the "possession, custody or
control" of a party that is subject to US jurisdiction.
It doesn’t matter where the information is physically stored, where
the company is headquartered or, importantly, where the person
whose information is sought is located.
The issue for users is whether the US has jurisdiction over the
cloud computing service they use, and whether the cloud
computing service has “possession, custody or control” of their
data, wherever it rests physically.
EFF (2012): http://bit.ly/yqsrps

13. • Risk-management at a range of scales: does it matter if
someone accesses your stuff? [Dropbox; subject to FoI]
• What about corporate governance, including access to
services that are marketised? [Google-Verizon and a two-
speed internet; costs of accessing data in marketised
HE?]
• Does it matter if the responsible academic gets hit by a
bus? [assessment; what should be managed in-house or
hosted via a contract?]
• Do we understand that data is being transferred into a
service and that we have responsibilities? [T&Cs; IP;
protected characteristics; indemnities for libel]
• How do we work-up the digital literacies of our
staff/students in this space?

14. innovative learning in a
disrupted world

15. 1. There is a strong correlation between
energy use and GDP.
2. Global energy demand is on the rise
yet oil supply is forecast to decline in
the next few years.
3. There is no precedent for oil
discoveries to make up for the
shortfall, nor is there a precedent for
efficiencies to relieve demand on this
scale.
4. Energy supply looks likely to
constrain growth.
5. Global emissions currently exceed
the IPCC 'marker' scenario range.
The Climate Change Act 2008 has
made the -80%/2050 target law, yet
this requires a national mobilisation
akin to war-time.
6. Probably impossible but could
radically change the direction of HE in
terms of skills required and spending
available.
7. We need to talk about this.

17. Futures: what might we do in public?
Principle 1: educational futures work should aim to
challenge assumptions rather than present definitive
predictions.
Principle 2: the future is not determined by its
technologies.
Principle 3: thinking about the future always involves
values and politics.
Principle 4: education has a range of responsibilities that
need to be reflected in any inquiry into or visions of its
future.
Facer and Sandford. 2010. The next 25 years? http://bit.ly/LtOWFl

19. The University and the Cloud: a health warning is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
.