This document discusses the University of Kent's implementation of Mahara as an institutional personal development planning (PDP) tool. [1] It describes how Mahara was chosen after a successful pilot of PebblePad and outlines key features such as customizability and scalability. [2] Feedback from pilot users found Mahara intuitive and flexible for recording reflections and development. [3] Future plans include further integration with other systems and pre-registration access.

1. If you build it they will come:
Institutional implementation
of Mahara
Daniel Clark – @danielrclark
Steve Bailey – @stevobailey
University of Kent
S

2. History
S Three-year PDP pilot using PebblePad
S Valued features:
S Blogs
S Multi-page “Web Folios”
S User-selectable themes
S Form Creation
S Chose to move to Mahara 1.2 for institutional rollout

3. Why Mahara?
S Feature set comparable to PebblePad
S Scalability
S Customisability
S Open Source

4. Pilot
S Basic installation of 1.3 running on existing server architecture
S Users capped at 300
S Existing PebblePad users – academic-led
S Independent users
S Branding
S Training and Support
S Raising Awareness

5. Stakeholders
S Pilot Members
S Student Union
S Careers Advisory Service
S Student Ambassadors

6. Employability Points Scheme
S Existing scheme requiring a front-end
S Swipe-card points collection
S Check balance & redeem points in Mahara
S Points balance block for Views/Pages

9. Engaging Alumni Through
Personal Development
Planning
S JISC Relationship Management Programme: Alumni Engagement
S Explore the link between PDP and a mutually beneficial alumni
relationship by:
S Incentivising involvement
S Promoting the value
S Collaborating with stakeholders to cover the entire student lifecycle
S Use the findings of previous “Logins for Life” project to enable alumni
access
S Create an employability catalogue
S Create supporting tools

10. Gathering feedback
S Academics – Interview on PDP
S Independent users – Verbal “first impressions” feedback
S All pilot members – Exit questionnaire covering:
S Background
S PDP Experience
S Training and Guidance
S Features and functionality
S Future development
S Parallel projects – Focus-groups

11. Feedback received
S Intuitive interface and functionally easy to use
S Views, Blogs and Résumé were the most popular features
S The ability to collate multimedia content was seen as one of its
strongest facets
S Kent Branding was appreciated

12. Feedback received
“A good way to remember thoughts and record ideas”
“It is very flexible and easy to use”
“Made me be more aware of what I was doing. It made me
want to do more research, as when I reflected I got
new ideas”
“It helps you think about and reflect on work you are in the
process of doing or have completed”
“It helped me to easily reflect on my development”

13. Identified Issues
S Software Limitations
S Quality Assurance
S Language editing
S Submitting Collections
S Embedding non-secure content
S Institutional Limitations
S 50mb quota
S Access beyond graduation
S Keeping MyFolio within the collective consciousness

14. Rollout: Promotional
S Literature:
S Case studies
S Posters
S Flyers
S Promotional Video
S Events
S Fresher’s Fair
S Lectures
S Staff Learning & Teaching Forums

15. Rollout: Technical
S Mahara 1.4
S More themes (via student competition)
S Custom help files
S Updated training materials

16. Future Plans
S Upgrading to Moodle 2.1 (Integration)
S Release of themes via Creative Commons
S Full integration with the Employability Points Scheme
S Pre-registration access to aid recruitment of distance /
international students

17. Advice
S Choose pilot members that will use the tool
S Student-driven, so listen to their feedback
S Don’t provide too much support – only as much as you’ll be
able to provide as a wider service
S “A camel is a horse designed by committee” – very difficult to
avoid when people see the merits of a new system like Mahara.
S Senior management – there’s no point just explaining the
concept - build it (and they will come???)