Categories
Technology

EDUCAUSE 2015!

Welcome to Indy, EDUCAUSE attendees!

Monday was my travel day to the EDUCAUSE conference, because I’m attending a couple pre-conference seminars on Tuesday.  After dropping off my two younger sons at their elementary and middle schools, I endured the typical bad traffic on the 405 and made my way South to LAX.  Many thanks to American Airlines for a very smooth and uneventful flight to Indianapolis!

Last Friday, I downloaded the Uber app so that I could try it on my My firstUber billride from the airport to my hotel (I know, I’m late to this party).   Small gripe about creating my account via the web site:  the prominent sign up button on the home page was for drivers, which I accidentally clicked first.  I know Uber needs drivers and that’s probably their #1 priority, but it took me longer than it should have to find the “rider” sign-up option.  Once I got over that hurdle, it was as easy as setting up any other online service.  Anyway, after grabbing my bag in Indy, I walked out to the ground transportation and submitted my request via Uber’s app, and I swear, not more than three minutes later, my ride was there!  My first Uber driver’s name was Joseph, and he picked me up in a black Cadillac (hey, made me feel snazzy).  His car was spotless, and he was extremely courteous.  Exactly the OPPOSITE of the typical cab experience.  As you can see from my receipt, it was less than 22 bucks!  Needless to say, I’ll use Uber again.

The Indianapolis conference center is BIG.  I’m confident it’ll easily hold the expected 7,000 attendees this year.  Today, I’m attending two pre-conference seminars:

  • Building an Emerging Technology and Futures Capacity in Your Organization
  • Cloud 101:  Tools and Strategies for Evaluating Cloud Services

So what am I here for?  If you’re a vendor, I’m glad you’re reading this 🙂  I have a few things I’m looking for:

  1. Campus OneCard solution.  In 2016, CSUN will finally embark on a OneCard project, and I’m gonna be in the thick of it.  At this point, I’m looking for what’s out there.  At a high level, CSUN has a Peoplesoft SIS, uses the Modo Labs Kurogo mobile product.  I’m very interested to know how your product integrates with these and other systems.
  2. Portal alternatives that play well with Peoplesoft and allow for robust media publishing
  3. Scholarship search systems
  4. Software for visitors to sign-in to a university office with an iPad kiosk, that notifies office staffers of visitor arrival.

As usual, I will cover the sessions I attend at this conference via live blogging.  This way, perhaps others will benefit from my experience.  At the end of the week, I’ll summarize my conference experience in the MEGA POST, with links to all my conference posts.  It’s great to be here…I look forward to meeting new folks and catching up with old friends.

Categories
Student Affairs Technology

UNICON Learning Analytics Webinar

I attended this webinar today because I have a great interest in learning analytics, specifically with the integration of co-curricular data with respect to intervention strategies.  It was great, glad that I attended!  These folks will be at the EDUCAUSE conference in October, I’ll be attending some of their presentations 🙂

Presenters

  • Lou Harrison from ncsu.edu
  • Josh Baron from marist.edu
  • Kate Valenti from unicon.net

Historical Context:  OAAI Overview (Open Academic Analytics Initiative)

  • EDUCAUSE Next Generation Learning Challenges (aka NGLC)
  • Funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
  • $250K over 15 months
  • Goal:  leverage big data to create an open-source academic early alert system and research “scaling factors”

Basic Flow

  1. Feed in Student Aptitudes: (i.e. SATs, current GPA, etc.), demographic data (i.e. age, gender, etc.)
  2. Feed in LMS data:  Sakai Event Log and Gradebook data
  3. Fed into predictive scoring model
  4. Fed into Academic Alert system (AAR)
  5. Intervention deployed (to students & instructors)

Review of research design (I didn’t capture all this)

  • Deployed to 2,200 students across 4 institutions

Conclusions

  • Predicitve models are more “portable” than anticipated
  • It’s possible to create generic models that are then “tuned” to use at specific types of institutions
  • It’s possible to create a library of open predictive models that could be shared globally

Findings on Intervention Effectiveness

  • Final course grades had a statistically significant positive impact on final corse grades

Apereo Learning Analytics Initiative Update

  • Like the Apache foundation
  • Serves higher education
  • Other projects:  Learning Analytics Processor (LAP), OpenDashboard, Larrisa, Student Success Plan (SSP)
  • Modular System:  Collection > Storage > Analysis > Communication > Action
  • Just got started with JISC National Learning Analytics Project (UK org)

Moving Toward Enterprise Learning Analytics at NC State

How we’re getting there
  • Lunch and learn sessions on LA space
  • Bring people up to speed on what questions to ask
  • Start thinking about who can generate answers

Details

  • Many products vendors try to sell us are NOT predictive!
  • We built a plan to build us a model, and then we validated it

Predictive Power

  • Gradebook
  • Cumulative GPA
  • Academic Standing
  • Then:  course logins, content access, online flag…

Model Results

  • Overall Accuracy:  75-77%
  • Recall rates 88-90%
  • False positives were a little high at 25-26%

Proof to Production

  • Initial steps:  small sample sizes
  • Predictions at 1/4, 1/2, 3/4 points in course
  • Multi-step, manual process

Goal 1:  More Enterprise-y

  • Large sample sizes (all student enrollments)
  • Frequent early runs (maybe daily)
  • Automatic, no more than 1 click

Currently in Progress

  • Rebuild infrastructure for scale
  • Daily snapshots of fall semester data
  • After fall semester ends, look for sweet spot

Future Goals

  • Refine model more
  • Segment model by pops
  • Balance models and accuracy
  • Refine & improve models over time
  • Explore ways to track efficacy over time
  • Once we intervene, can never go back to virgin state
Categories
Technology

Teaching with Tools of Engagement: Polls, Gamification, Badges, Leaderboards, Ohmage & Participatory Sensing

Presenters:

  • Rose Rocchio, Director of IT, UCLA
  • Rob Gould, Professor, UCLA

Web resources:

The classroom landscape is changing!  Technology can be leveraged in many different ways…about 80% of students have smart phones.  Engagement tools are really permeating the marketplace due to the ubiquity of mobile devices.  Today we’re going to look at ways some technological tools are impacting classroom engagement and provide a couple demonstrations of projects that are being done by UCLA and UC Berkeley.

When Analytics Meet Gamification:  The Pedagogy

Gamification provides reciprocal validation.  There is a content “gallery” that is used to share a collection of images for a course.  There is a points configuration tool for instructors that provides a way to assign points for adding to this gallery, i.e. (give a comment=5 points, get a comment=3 points, give a +1=1 point, etc.).  These points are aggregated into a leaderboard.  Professors provide weekly “missions” for students to complete, i.e. a lesson plan.

Results:

  • No correlation between total Engagement Index and final exam
  • No correlation between mission points and final exam
  • Strong correlation between mission completion and final exam

Rob Gould:  Our Collaboration with LAUSD

  • Using mobile app for engagement in the LAUSD
  • Part of NSF umbrella project called “Mobilize”
  • Partnership between several UCLA departments (statistics, CS, Center X, Graduate School of Education and INformation Science and LAUSD
  • Create and implement data science curricula in high school to enhance STEM learning

Curricula

  • Exploring CS (3 week unit)
  • Algebra 1 (3 2-week units)
  • Biology (3 week unit)
  • Introduction to data science:  year-long course

The Introduction to Data Science created an alternative pathway through high school mathematics.

  • Traditional:  Algebra 1 > Geometry > Algebra 2 > PreCalculus
  • Alternative:  Algebra1 > CS/Geometry > IDS > Statistics

Introduction to Data Science

  • Professional Data
  • “Big data” > I prefer “Everyday data”

This creates a bridge of “participatory sensing” leading to statistical and computational thinking.  This idea is gradually gaining traction, because student can now collect data everywhere they go with their mobile devices.

Some PS Campaigns

  • Measuring snacks:  measure what you’re eating (cost, when, who you were with, how did you feel when you were eating it, etc.)
  • Stress / chill moments:  measure how you feel at certain points of the day
  • Design their own

A dashboard view provides students with additional visibility about the data that they’re collecting.

 

Categories
Technology

Build Your Own Open Source App Store, Join the CASA!

Presenters:

  • Rose Rocchio, UCLA

Resources

CASA = App Discovery / Curation / Publishing

  • We started with iTunesU about 10 years ago.  That was pretty configurable initially, but eventually Apple decided to create its own categories that weren’t strictly compatible with the way we wanted to do things.  This got us started on CASA.
  • A key element is classification of content on the publisher’s terms
  • “Networks are better than the hub-and-spoke model”
  • Extensibility of attributes; continue to define useful attributes
  • Compliance registry coming soon at IMS Global
  • Continued tight integration with all IMS Global Standards

USE CASE:  Mobile/Web Portal Strategy and Personalization

Rose gave a quick demo of the mobile interface, showing how users can set up the mobile dashboard to organized the apps they want to see.  The point of this was to show that the apps that can be added come from a variety of curated resources across the UC system.

CASA  uses Caliper Analytics.  The team created sensors that sense how apps spread through the network, how apps are found and viewed, and when apps are added to storefronts and courses (this sounds pretty useful to me).  These sensors can help describe how popular apps are, i.e. how much they’re downloaded and used.  Rose then showed a dashboard that demonstrated how it works.

Student Benefits:  transparent, allows focus on class interaction & study; personal info is secure with trusted apps; improved course experience

CASA Roadmap

  • Working to get IMS Global CASA node registry in place
  • Define the compliance checklist process
  • Define a CASA attribute for CALIPER Metric Profiles
  • Define a plan for app referrals
  • Discuss Rating attributes and confidence levels
  • App Curation

 

 

Categories
Technology

Finding the Power, Finding the Point: Using Technology for Engagement & Retention

Presenter:  Mike Robertson, IsThisMikeOn?

One of Mike’s favorite quotes is:  “Life is a Banquet, and Most Poor Suckers are Starving to Death”

Technology is ubiquitous, it’s the first thing and last things most of us touch every single day.  We often treat tech like a light switch or a button that’s either on or off.  However, it’s a tool.  A tool is something we can use to make our lives better!  Tech can bring light, yes…but it can also bring enlightenment.

Edison invented the motion picture, but didn’t see the value of it.  Hollywood exists because people didn’t want to pay Edison royalties for using his technology.

Mark Twain:  “the difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between the lightning and the lightning bug.”

We’re in the business of transmitting enlightenment.  Presentation is supremely important:  PowerPoint is an unfortunate software title.  Most presentations don’t stick or engage because most of them have no power and no point!  Your presentations should be used to convey deep meaning and be beautiful.

Get with the program!

  • Delve into your presentation program and learn everything about it
  • Try setting animation and transition effects at their longest intervals to make slides memorable
  • Use good fonts, NOT ALL OF THEM.  Fonts should support the meaning you’re trying to convey.
  • All caps is good for just a few words; lower case is easier to interpret
  • Never use all caps with a script or calligraphy font
  • Bump up the contrast
  • Shared a type masking technique
  • Backgrounds:  do Google search for textures, i.e. rust, cork, moss, aluminum, concrete, wood, etc.  Example:  felt background with billiard balls as bullets.  This is memorable!
  • Use layers creatively
  • Use frames to highlight important things and focus attention (TCM billboard, yellow bricks for a Wizard of Oz presentation, M&Ms, add link to your web site, etc.)
  • Make your slides work for you

The Really Cool Stuff

  • Animation with .gif files:  changing backgrounds
  • Monty Python pointing finger
  • Stand in a white circle on a black background as a spotlight
  • Smack the screen and use letter dropping animation (timing is important!) to simulate physical interaction with your slides
  • Play with color saturation

QUOTE:  don’t show your audience a wall of text, show them a brick and teach them to build a wall

Make your slides echo your voice.

 

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