1. E-portfolio Community of Practice
Funded under the JISC Lifelong
Learning & Workforce
Development Programme
Led by University of Wolverhampton
Project Manager: Alison Felce
Project Officer: Sarah Chesney, Freelance Consultant
Duration: Sep 10 – March 11

2. Background
 Led by the University of Wolverhampton and the
ePPSME project
 The aims of the ePPSME project were to develop an
e-portfolio based pedagogy for work-based learners
in small to medium sized enterprises.
 The ePCoP funding was designed to share learning
gained from all projects (like ePPSME) in the
programme and encourage a wider audience to
participate in e-portfolio based pedagogy discussions.

3. Strategies to create the ePCoP
 Decided to use as open a platform as possible
 1. for minimum administration
 2. to encourage as wide an audience as possible
 3. so that at a future date visitors could use (and maybe
contribute to) the resources once funding had ended.
So we used Cloudworks

4. Strategies to create the ePCoP
 Invited specific JISC projects/expert practitioners to
share their learning via Cloudworks (six in total)
 Wide publicity through existing communities with
similar interests
 Invited specific experts with experience to lead
asynchronous activities for a time limited period

5. Some facts about Cloudworks
 Developed at the Open University with funding from
JISC.
 Resources & discussions can be viewed by anyone
 Anyone can have an account.
 Comments are checked (not ‘moderated’)
 Spam Catcher Molom
 Not a repository but can embed files from elsewhere

6. Tools to sustain the ePCoP
 Cloudworks url
http://cloudworks.ac.uk/cloudscape/view/2201
 But beyond this because Cloudworks doesn’t allow you to
upload files we used the project Wordpress site url
http://epcop.wordpress.com to host all our own generated
content
 Flickr for images url http://www.flickr.com
 Slideshare for Powerpoints url http://www.slideshare.net/
because these files can be embedded in Cloudworks.

7. Tools to sustain the ePCoP
 Cacoo to draw a visual concept of learning design
 url http://cacoo.com/
 Finally PB works – not used as intended.

8. Some more facts about Cloudworks
 Specifically our section of Cloudworks:
 Jan11-March 11 six activities led by practitioners associated with
e-portfolios & communities of practice
 Total of 1500 views (from different IP addresses)
 Most visitors came directly to the Cloudscape (browser
bookmarks, email links etc )
 Second Netvibes and third a Google search.
 48 followers from across the globe
 31 opted to be ‘attendees’

9. Engagement
 What is engagement?
 Use of other tools e.g. Elluminate produced some
additional engagers (who otherwise didn’t add to the
Cloudworks discussions)

10. Challenges
 We knew we were getting a large number of views
but not many were joining in the discussions.
 We had some inappropriate postings (nothing too
bad but not in the spirit of the community)
 This is a largely under-researched area and I wonder if
the openness of the community meant that
participants were cautious of revealing a lack of
knowledge so publically. (no evidence for this!)
 Timing of the community – is there ever a right time?

11. What next?
 Simply put if the ePCoP is to continue we need an
agreed set of aims. Australian VET ePCoP has these
aims:
 Provide assistance in embedding eportfolios
 Disseminate information about the process of building
eportfolios
 Mentor new users in the use of eportfolios

12. Plans for maintaining the ePCoP
 What next?
 The resources will continue to be hosted at
Cloudworks
 JISC infonet will host some of the resources
 http://jiscinfonet.ac.uk/JISCINFONET

13. Thank you for listening
 Sarah Chesney
 Email sarahchesney@me.com
 Freelance consultant