Cybercolleagues,
May I draw your attention to the following call for papers.
Charles Wankel
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">St. John's University</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">New York</st1:state></st1:place>
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Special Issue of the British Journal of Educational Technology
CALL FOR PAPERS
Best Practice or Situated Action?
The Organisation of Technology Enhanced Learning
Overview:
Higher education institutions (HEIs) continue to face fundamental and
unprecedented competitive pressures due to lower government funding
(DfES, 2003) and a government agenda focused on a "widening
participation agenda" (Lynch and Baines, 2004). Despite the
literature (particularly from the <st1:country-region w:st="on">USA</st1:country-region> and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Australia</st1:place></st1:country-region>) being fed into
"vision statements" during the late 1990s and driving policy at
high levels, many HEIs are still grappling with both the formulation
and implementation of technology enhanced learning (TEL) strategies.
In fact, strategies and plans are rarely translated directly into
action. Instead, they act as resources for "situated action"
(Suchman, 1987) which takes place on the ground, in real workplace
situations, mediated by "communities of practice" (Wenger, 1998).
There may be tension between the motivations which lie behind
managers' introducing a technological innovation, and those staff
who have to work with it, or in some cases, may even feel threatened
by it. In some cases, technological changes can occur without these
really having been "planned" at all; change can occur through
"artifactual" processes, emerging from organisational dynamics
without conscious decision-making on the part of any single
organisational actor or group of actors (see March and Olsen 1979:
83).
HEIs must also respond to other strong external factors which drive
and fragment e-learning strategies. Work by Smith and Oliver (2000)
indicated that international issues drive national initiatives, which
in turn affect institutional policy. Significant drivers might
include:
o An increasing demand for and awareness of new technologies among
the student body
o Technological developments (e.g. Interactive Whiteboards, Web 2.0
technologies, etc.)
o Private Sector Competition (e.g. <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">National</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">American</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place>
which offers online courses)
o Government and media demands for increased accountability and
"productivity".
Indeed HEIs are far from being the only significant actors in this
field. ICT vendors, organised in different ways and under different
pressures, also have a role to play.
TEL strategies and plans must therefore be created and implemented in
a turbulent environment. TEL accentuates the problem of how to
organise and manage responses to a rapidly changing environment
within very large, segmented organisations (which HEIs are) and
within society as a whole.
Irlbeck (2002), writing about innovation in distance education from a
<st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region> perspective, described how "there is little education for the
management of this field, which brings a peculiar need for the
understanding of academic culture and mores, together with a need for
excellent modern management skills that encourage creativity and
marketing knowledge and skills". Nor is this just a matter for
institutional leaders. Learning is a necessary response to change in
any environment, but for any organisation to be effective this
learning needs to take place at all levels of the organisation. It
needs to be self-sustaining (Senge 1994), and self-critical (Argyris
1999).
Yet despite a great deal of work on the technological and pedagogical
aspects of TEL there still seems to be a general lack of
understanding of the complexity of implementing TEL solutions in
actual, functioning organisations. What are the relative merits of
top-down and bottom-up approaches? How do these influence each other?
Much of the TEL literature seems to fall into one of two camps:
either the "best practice" toolkit, oriented towards management
(which takes little account of the complexity and diversity of
organisational configurations both across and within HEIs); or the
"single course" case study, written by individual academics about
their own anecdotal experience (these papers often lacking a strong
methodological foundation and which, therefore, are hard to
generalise). Yet it is in the middle ground between these two poles
that the real work of TEL implementation lies.
Furthermore, for successful implementation of TEL, decision-makers
must anticipate how decisions will affect the institution in the
future. Decision making on TEL needs to be proactive, not just
reactive:
"When Wayne Gretzky (the greatest goal scorer in the history of the
<st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region> National Hockey League) was asked what the secret of his success
was, he is said to have replied "I skate to where the puck is going
to be; everybody else skates to where it is."
(<st1:place w:st="on">Graves</st1:place>, 2001)
THEMES FOR PAPERS:
This Special Issue is intended to focus on organisational issues that
may enable the successful, proactive integration of TEL at all levels
of HE institutions. In this edition of the British Journal of
Educational Technology, the guest editors are seeking good quality
papers that engage with one or more of the following:
o the interaction between strategising and situated action,
vis-à-vis TEL
o the "office politics" of TEL
o processes of organisational learning around TEL within one or more
HEIs
o conducting comparative studies of TEL solutions across different
departments or HEIs
o the dissemination of TEL solutions into different contexts
o interactions between HEIs and other organisations involved in TEL
(e.g. the ICT industry)
We seek papers based on sound research informed by organisation
theory. Authors should provide practical knowledge and/or
theoretical models of TEL implementation that will help
decision-making processes at any level of an HE organisation whether
institutional leaders, academics, or support staff.
REFEREEING PROCESS/GUIDELINES FOR AUTHORS:
BJET is a fully refereed journal and all papers will be rigorously
refereed according to standard BJET procedures. Please note that
publication of articles for this special issue may depend on the
authors' readiness to respond swiftly to the referees' comments.
Full articles should not normally exceed 4000 words including
references to any sources that readers might wish to trace. However,
there is no merit in lengthy reference lists per se. Wherever
possible, reasons for citing a reference should be clear from the
context.
Shorter colloquium contributions (400-900 words) will also be of
interest. These will adopt a style akin to a conversation in print.
Possible areas include: summary of work in progress raising queries
or problems; short thought piece, perhaps questioning received
wisdom; reaction to a previous BJET contribution.
Before submission, please check very carefully for both accuracy and
presentation. In addition, please follow 'author guidelines' on-line
at: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/submit.asp?ref=0007-1013 .
IMPORTANT DATES:
Notification for intent to submit ASAP
Deadline for submissions Friday 14th September
Notification of review process Wednesday 31st October
Final version to be received Friday 30th November
Publication March 2008
Submission to BJET Special Issue Guest Editors:
Maggie McPherson m.a.mcpherson@leeds.ac.uk
Drew Whitworth andrew.whitworth@manchester.ac.uk
REFERENCES
Argyris, C. (1999) On Organizational Learning. <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Oxford</st1:place></st1:city>: Blackwell.
DfES (2003) The Future of Higher Education, Department for Education
and Skills
<st1:place w:st="on">Graves</st1:place>, W. (2001) "Framework for an e-Learning Strategy" Educause
Preview Report. Available online at:
http://www.educause.edu/SEARCH/606 [Last accessed 10/09/06]
Irlbeck, S. (2002) "Leadership and Distance Education in Higher
Education: A <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region> perspective". International Review of Research in
Open and Distance Learning 3(2).
Lynch and Baines, (2004) "Strategy Development in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">UK</st1:place></st1:country-region> Higher
Education: Towards resource-based competitive advantages". Journal
of Higher Education Policy and Management 26(2) 171 - 187.
March, J. G. and Olsen, J. P. (1979): Ambiguity and Choice in
Organizations. 2nd edition. Universitetsforlaget, <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bergen</st1:place></st1:city>.
Senge, P. and associates (1999) The Dance of Change: Challenges of
Sustaining Momentum in Learning Organizations. <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">London</st1:place></st1:city>: Nicholas
Brearley.
Smith, J. and Oliver, M. (2000) "Academic Development: A framework
for embedding learning technology". The International Journal for
Academic Development Taylor & Francis Ltd. Online at:
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/routledge/1360144X.html [Last
accessed 10/09/06].
Suchman, L. (1987): Plans and Situated Actions: The problem of
human-machine communication, <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Cambridge</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place> Press.
Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and
Identity. <st1:city w:st="on">Cambridge</st1:city>, <st1:country-region w:st="on">U.K.</st1:country-region> and <st1:city w:st="on">New York</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">N.Y.</st1:state>: <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Cambridge</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place>
Press.