Speakers: Ruth Drysdale, senior co-design manager, Jisc Drew McConnell, IT service delivery manager, University of Glasgow

1. Scotland
Thursday 14 June

2. How are students’ expectations
and experiences of their digital
environment changing?
Ruth Drysdale, Jisc and
Drew McConnell, University of Glasgow

3. Workshop overview
» Introductions and overview
» Group activity
» Background and findings from student
digital experience tracker
» What students from the University of
Glasgow are saying about their digital
experience
» What can you take away and use in
your context?

4. » Reviewed students’ expectations and experiences
of the digital curriculum, environment and services:
› In HE (2013-2014)
› Among school leavers (2014)
› In FE (2014) and in the adult and skills sector (2015)
› Among online learners (2016)
http://digitalstudent.jiscinvolve.org
The ‘digital student’ project

5. What universities and colleges wanted
Consultations with Jisc stakeholders found:
» Interest in the ‘digital student’ studies
» Appetite to find out more locally, engage
students in their own digital experience
» No existing instruments, surveys or quality
processes captured the digital experience
» Organisations wanted something
proven, easy to administer, credible,
and actionable
Find out more:
http://ji.sc/student-tracker

6. Your students’ digital experience?
» How do you gather your students’
expectations and experiences of
technology within your institution or on
your course?
» Share your ideas with us:
› Visit menti.com
› enter code 94 91 40

7. ‘Not just another survey…’

8. Sector
analysis
Enhance service Collect
Improve
Jisc
consultancy
Tracker
launch
Sector
analysis
Organisational
analysis
Experts panel
Insight drives
organisational
improvement
Change
initiated
Review of
service
scope &
question
set
Enhance
service
Analyse
Data
collection
Digital experience insights launching in september
Digital Experience Insights
» Student tracker
» Staff tracker
» Research tracker in
development

9. Digital experience insights (Tracker) is:
» A tried and tested student survey, made up of:
› Closed questions that can be benchmarked
› Open questions for local analysis
› Add or customise further questions
» A student engagement process,
governed by our guidance
» A community of practice around the
tracker process and findings (including
student representatives)
» Compare student feedback with teaching
staff views and organisational factors

10. Extensively trialled and evaluated
» Initial questions based on ‘digital student’ research
and sector consultations (2016)
» Closed pilot with 24 selected institutions (2016)
» Open pilot with 85 self-selecting institutions and
29k respondents (2016-17)
» 2018 pilot with 90 institutions and 39k respondents
with international closing on 30th June
» Reports available from
› http://bit.ly/jisctracker17
› http://bit.ly/tracker17brief
» Student questions available from
› http://bit.ly/trackerguide

11. Provided by institution
How would you rate the quality of digital
provision (software, hardware, learning
environment)?
Digital
experience
insights
Digital environment
Supported by teaching staff
How would you rate the quality of digital
teaching and learning on your course?
The 2018 student and staff tracker
You and your
digital technology
Digital at your
institution
Digital at your
course
Attitude to digital
learning
Student
tracker
You and your
digital technology
Organisational
infrastructure
Your digital
teaching
Your professional
development
Teaching staff
tracker
Digital curriculum

12. Questions for organisations
» How are you investing?
» How are you engaging students?
» How good are your strategies for
digital learning, BYOD?
» …

13. Questions for teaching staff too…
» Teaching staff matter:
› Support (aspects of) the student
digital experience
› Have their own experience to report
» Mapped to the student questions
and to the organisational questions
› How well are you supported?
› How fit for teaching are…?
› What do you think about…?
» Piloting with 15 institutions with
surveys closing 30th June
» Staff tracker: http://bit.ly/trackerstaff18
You and your digital
technology
Organisational
infrastructure
Your digital teaching
Your professional
development
Digital teaching
experience

14. Focus on student engagement
» Local actionable data
» Students involved locally and nationally:
› Designing
› Communicating
› Interpreting
› Responding
» Institutions can benchmark themselves but
no published benchmarks
» Community of practice shares insights into
student engagement, responding to
findings, partnership working

15. Key findings from 2017…

16. Submitting assignments
electronically is more convenient
Attitudes to digital technologies - 2017
Technology makes me more
independent and makes it easier to
fit learning into life

17. Virtual learning environment/LMS - 2017
Rely on their institution’s VLE to do
their coursework
Regularly access their institution’s
VLE via a mobile device

18. How students use their devices - 2017
Discuss learning informally on
social media
Access learning on the move
Make note/ recordings, and look for
additional resources
Organise their study time

19. Tracker findings: learning and teaching - 2017
» In qualitative data, students
overwhelmingly ask that digital
technology does not replace face-to-
face teaching
» They do want more reliable and more
joined-up access to services…
» … and more interaction, f2f and with
digital systems

20. Tracker findings: learning and teaching - 2017
» The digital confidence and capability
of teaching staff is significant to
students’ overall digital experience
» Students want consistency in the use
of core technologies…
» … but for teaching staff to be diverse,
creative, discriminating and selective
in their use of technology

21. Drew McConnell
University of Glasgow

22. Group discussions – on your tables
» Consider your current context and
practice, and the examples that you
have heard about today…
› Identify at least one takeaway /
action on how you might better
engage your students’ in digital
developments
» Share your feedback
› http://bit.ly/scotlandtracker
» How could the digital experience
insights make a difference…?
» At your university/college:
› To students?
› To teaching staff?
› To organisational strategies and
investments?
› What are the risks
and barriers?

23. What one thing can you do to better gather your
students’ digital expectations and experiences of
technology and involve them in digital developments?

24. Follow our developments
» Report of 2017 Tracker findings:
› http://bit.ly/jisctracker17
» Summary of 2017 Tracker findings:
› http://bit.ly/tracker17brief
» Tracker blog:
› https://digitalstudent.jiscinvolve.org
» Follow #digitalstudent and @jisc
» Change agents’ network supporting
student staff partnerships
› http://can.jiscinvolve.org
» Change agents’ network mailing list
› jiscmail.ac.uk/CAN
» As of September 2018, this project
will transition to a full service. If you
would like to enquire about how to
purchase this optional service, or to
be kept up to date on progress,
please register your interest by filling
out our form:
› http://bit.ly/2sDloA9

25. Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under CC-BY-NC-ND.
Ruth Drysdale
Senior co-design manager
Ruth.drysdale@jisc.ac.uk
Thankyou