The academic technologies team at the University of Warwick supports the use of technology for teaching, learning, and research. The team works with academic departments of various sizes, both with and without dedicated support. Their scope includes e-learning/technology enhanced teaching, research activities like digital humanities and research data management, and supporting innovation. Current initiatives include a Moodle rollout across faculties and exploring research data management requirements. The team collaborates across IT and other services to ensure academics have the best tools for their needs.

1. the academic technologies team
supporting the use of technology for
teaching, learning and research at the
University of Warwick
Presentation to IT Ops Group Thurs 29th
Aug 2013

2. building on existing success
Some of you already know members of the team: Chris Coe,
Steve Brydges and Rob O’Toole
New recruits Dec 2012 - March 2013: Russell Boyatt, Jim Judges,
Richard Clay, Amber Thomas, David Beck, Steve Ranford
•more than e-learning support now
•central moodle service is rolling out
•establishing new digital humanities function
We work with academic departments of all shapes and sizes,
some with dedicated academic technologists/e-learning support,
some without.
We work with other teams in ITS and other support services

4. scope
TEACHING
CLASSROOM
TECH
ASSESSMENT
ONLINE
CONTENT
STUDENT AS
PRODUCER
VLEs
COURSEWORK
MANAGEMENT
eLearning / technology
enhanced learning
fairly familiar territory
BUT
huge differences in use,
uptake and support needs

5. scope
RESEARCH
E-JOURNALS
RESEARCH
DATA MGT
RESEARCH
WEBSITES
STUDENT AS
RESEARCHER
OPEN ACCESS
DIGITAL
HUMANITIES
technology in research
not technology about research or
research about technology, but the use
of technology in research. Includes e-
science, e-research, digital research,
digital humanities … fuzzy boundaries
and pretty new for universities to
address this in a coherent way

6. scope
“academic technologies”
the use of technology to support learning, teaching and research
RESEARCH
E-JOURNALS
RESEARCH
DATA MGT
RESEARCH
WEBSITES
STUDENT AS
RESEARCHER
OPEN ACCESS
DIGITAL
HUMANITIES
TEACHING
CLASSROOM
TECH
ASSESSMENT
ONLINE
CONTENT
STUDENT AS
PRODUCER
VLEs
COURSEWORK
MANAGEMENT

7. scope
context of academic
technologies:
outreach
engagement
“impact”
RESEARCH
E-JOURNALS
RESEARCH
DATA MGT
RESEARCH
WEBSITES
STUDENT AS
RESEARCHER
OPEN ACCESS
DIGITAL
HUMANITIES
TEACHING
CLASSROOM
TECH
ASSESSMENT
ONLINE
CONTENT
STUDENT AS
PRODUCER
VLEs
COURSEWORK
MANAGEMENT

8. scope
the scope changes as
the context changes
innovation support
responsive provision
RESEARCH
E-JOURNALS
RESEARCH
DATA MGT
RESEARCH
WEBSITES
STUDENT AS
RESEARCHER
OPEN ACCESS
DIGITAL
HUMANITIES
TEACHING
CLASSROOM
TECH
ASSESSMENT
ONLINE
CONTENT
STUDENT AS
PRODUCER
VLEs
COURSEWORK
MANAGEMENT
ONLINE
COURSES
????????
DIGITISATION
???????????

9. current!
V

10. Where are we up to with moodle?
We have mainly worked with whole departments, now we will also work with
smaller groups.
We will be requesting nominated moodle co-ordinators alongside tabula
permission administrators.
Service: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/services/its/servicessupport/elearn/moodle
4
VLEs
Faculties
Live Courses 13/14
•Chemistry
•Life Sciences
•WMS
•WMG
•CAL
•CLL
•Maths (rollout)
Pilots and investigations
•Institute of Education
•Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies
•Centre for Cultural Policy Studies
•IMR Physics
•Engineering - Peter Kimber
•Psychology - Kim Wade
•MOAC
•Law
•Corporate relations
Services
Committed
•Library
•LDC (partial)
•Information security
•Corporate Relations
•Outreach
•Security

11. current!
V

12. what is … digital humanities?
existing tools put to new uses
digitisation, annotation,
presentation …
text as data, data as images, maps,
timelines …
social media, participatory,
crowdsourcing …
controversial, fuzzy, buzzy
Our priorities: web content, matchmaking creative technologists, upskilling
academics, data management, collaboration tools, applications requirements
Projects: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/research/digitalhumanities/projects/
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2
1) http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/vis/?id=4fb24d5d 2) from Mark Knights Making History Course, Warwick
3) http://commonsinabox.org/ 4) https://www.facebook.com/TranscribeBentham
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3

13. on the horizon … RDM
drivers:
[+] opportunity: “reproduceability”,
data citation, data publication
[-] compliance: the university’s own
data policy, funder requirements
RESEARCH
DATA MGT
http://www.admin.ox.ac.uk/rdm/
Implications for IT:
early days, explorations underway for a library-hosted catalogue of datasets, a
store of research data management plans, frameworks for storage and archive
and advice on good practice
1) http://www.admin.ox.ac.uk/rdm/ 2) http://cardio.dcc.ac.uk/ 3) http://sudamih.oucs.ox.ac.uk/
4) http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/ceis/re/isrc/themes/rmarea/datum/health/ 5) http://figshare.com/
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2
5
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15. people networks: we collaborate
collaboration can
be messy

16. what all this means for IT colleagues
We want to ensure that academics pick the best tools for the
job, using ITS provision wherever that’s the best fit, so:
•we will refer people on to services with well-informed
requirements
•we will welcome referrals from colleagues where we can help
refine requirements for research and teaching purposes
•we will request enhancements to existing services, based on
our evidence and expertise
•we will work with services to pilot and evaluate new provision
•we will work with colleagues to improve the evidence base
about current practice and emerging needs

17. the academic technologies team
supporting the use of technology for
teaching, learning and research at the
University of Warwick
Presentation to IT Ops Group Thurs 29th
Aug 2013
questions? suggestions?
contact us at academictech@warwick.ac.uk
or ask me direct at amber.thomas@warwick.ac.uk