Richard Walker, University of York
Julie Voce, Imperial College London
ALT-C 2014:
2nd September 2014
About the UCISA TEL Survey
 National survey into TEL
undertaken by UCISA, with
backing from the UK Heads
of e-Learning Forum.
 Running biennially since
2001: www.ucisa.ac.uk/tel
 2010, 2012 and 2014
reports supported by case
studies, enabling
investigation of themes such
as QA & TEL governance.
The 2014 Survey
 96 responses from 158 HE institutions (Response rate 61%)
 Good spread of responses across the UK (by country, by
mission group and by type of institution, i.e. Pre-92, Post-92
and HE Colleges)
 Sent out to institutional Heads of e-Learning in January 2014
 Not getting same cohort each time; but results do show
consistency
1. Drivers for TEL development
The student learning experience is driving
TEL developments and student feedback is
the leading encourager.
Open education (MOOCs) is not making
headway and is the lowest ranked driver.
Drivers for TEL
 Top ranked drivers (2003 – 2014)
1.
2.
3.
Enhancing the quality of learning and teaching
Meeting student expectations
Improving access to learning for students off-campus
 Improving admin processes rises to 4th place; improving access to
DL has dropped down list. Bottom of the pile: provision of OERs &
open education courses (MOOCs).
 Encouraging TEL development
1. Feedback from students
2. Availability of TEL support staff
3. Availability and access to tools
 Central & school/departmental senior management support also
strongly ranked.
 Standards & availability of external project funding at bottom of list
2. Barriers to TEL development
Lack of academic staff knowledge has reemerged as a leading barrier to TEL
development.
Barriers to future development
 Lack of time (still the most significant barrier)
Longitudinal view of the top 7 of 16 rankings
Barriers – lack of…
2014
2012
2010
2008
2005
2003
Time
1
1
1
1
1
2
Academic staff knowledge
2
5
3
2
7
4
Money
3
2
2
3
2
1
Institutional culture
4
8
7
4
8
-
Departmental/school culture
5
3
-
-
-
-
Incentives
6
7
6
8
5
8=
Academic staff commitment
7=
6
5
-
-
-
Recognition for career dev.
7=
4
4
6
4
-
3. Challenges to TEL development
Despite the slight increase in the number of
learning technologists working in central and local
teams since 2012, institutions perceive a lack of
specialist support staff as the leading challenge to
future TEL development activities.
Challenges to TEL development
Challenges over the next two to three years
1. Lack of support staff / specialists skills / resources
2. Mobile technologies/learning: BYOD (support, creating content &
compatibility with systems)
3. Staff development
4. E-assessment (e-submission, e-marking, e-feedback)
5. Lecture capture / recording
4. Institutional VLEs
All institutions have a VLE platform and
Blackboard remains the leading enterprise
solution, with Moodle the most-used system.
A third of responding institutions now
outsource their VLE provision.
TEL tools – VLEs
 Institutional VLE
 88% of respondents use either Blackboard or Moodle as their main
institutional platform (unchanged from 2012).
 Blackboard Learn remains the leading enterprise solution (49%);
Moodle has increased in usage (up from 11% in 2008 to 31% in 2012
and now 39% - 2014).
 Overall VLE use
 Moodle is the most commonly used VLE platform (62%); followed by
Blackboard Learn (49%).
 Negligible use of other open source & commercial solutions: e.g.
Sharepoint (12%); FutureLearn (5%); Sakai (2%); Desire2Learn (2%)
 33% of institutions are using hosted services for their VLE provision.
5. Centrally-supported tools
Plagiarism detection and e-submission tools
are the most commonly supported services.
Podcasting tools appear to have been
replaced by lecture recording and media
streaming solutions.
TEL tools - centrally supported
Tool
VLE
Plagiarism
detection
E-submission
E-portfolio
Blog
E-assessment
PRS / clickers
Wiki
Media streaming
Lecture capture
2014
95%*
2012
100%
2010
2008
96%
95%
92%
92%
-
85%
78%
73%
71%
70%
66%
65%
63%
87%
76%
72%
79%
74%
51%
89%
72%
74%
80%
75%
-
68%
72%
64%
-
Proportion of courses using tools
Tool
Access to external web based
resources
E-submission
Plagiarism detection
Formative e-assessment
Summative e-assessment
Audio / Video lecture recording
Document sharing
Online student presentations
Asynchronous collaborative
working tools
100%
75% - 99%
50% - 74%
8%
35%
12%
6%
5%
5%
2%
2%
1%
1%
34%
31%
1%
5%
1%
2%
2%
22%
34%
16%
4%
5%
6%
6%
0%
7%
19%
6. Non-centrally supported tools
Social networking tools are the leading noncentrally supported software used by
students but are no longer a feature of
central provision.
TEL tools – not centrally supported
Tool
Social networking
Document sharing
Blog
Social bookmarking
Media streaming
Personal RS
Screen casting
Podcasting
VLE
e-Portfolio
Lecture capture
Wiki
2014
64%
62%
59%
31%
26%
26%
26%
21%
20%
19%
19%
17%
2012
73%
52%
60%
40%
22%
21%
23%
20%
36%
2010
81%
59%
48%
41%
23%
25%
51%
2008
46%
30%
31%
26%
11%
34%
7. Mobile learning developments
The optimisation of learning and teaching services
for mobile devices has increased in scale, with a
strong focus on communication and information
services for iOS and Android devices.
However, only a handful of institutions have
addressed pedagogic initiatives and staff
development activities in support of mobile
learning.
Services optimised for mobile devices
Service
2014
2012
Access to email
64%
35%
Access to course materials & learning
resources
62%
21%
Access to course announcements
60%
31%
Access to communication tools
48%
20%
Access to library services
43%
37%
Access to lecture recordings & videos
39%
13%
Access to grades
29%
12%
Access to personal calendars
29%
21%
Access to timetabling information
28%
26%
Promotion of mobile devices
Promotion method
Loaning of devices to staff & students
Funding for mobile learning projects
Free provision of devices to staff / students
Institutional switch-on policy
Other method
Do not promote use of mobile devices
%
42%
35%
18%
17%
30%
24%
8. Role of TEL in module delivery
Supplementary uses of TEL tools remain the
leading module delivery mode and
unchanged in number since the last Survey.
Content-focused categories of TEL course
delivery have accounted for two-thirds of
module delivery since 2003.
Categories of TEL usage
A: Web-supplemented
(optional participation)
Bi: Web-dependent:
Interaction with content
Bii: Web-dependent:
Communication
Biii: Web-dependent:
Interaction with content
& communication
C.: Fully online
2014
2012
2010
2008
2005
2003
39%
39%
46%
48%
54%
57%
27%
29%
26%
24%
16%
13%
9%
10%
17%
13%
10%
10%
21%
18%
18%
13%
13%
13%
3%
3%-
3%
4%
6%
5%
9. Evaluation of TEL developments
Half of responding institutions have
evaluated the impact of TEL tools on the
student learning experience, but less than a
third have evaluated pedagogic practices.
Accessing the Report
 The 2014 Survey report is now available on the UCISA website at:
www.ucisa.ac.uk/tel
 Case studies of institutional TEL developments will be published in a
companion report, targeted for publication by the end of the year.
 Comparative analysis is planned with the Irish Learning Technology
Association.
 Feedback on the Report (question-set and findings) would be greatly
appreciated to inform future surveys.
 Please join the M25-LT & East Midlands LT SIG meeting this
afternoon (4pm in room 0.13) for further discussion on the Survey
results and how they may apply to your institutional context.
Acknowledgements and thanks
 To the Survey team:
Joe Nicholls (University of Cardiff); Elaine Swift
(Nottingham Trent University); Jebar Ahmed (University
of Huddersfield); Sarah Horrigan (University of Derby);
Phil Vincent (York St John University); Julie Voce
(Imperial College London) & Richard Walker (University
of York), with help from Martin Jenkins (Coventry
University) and Nick Smith (The Research Partnership).
 To the UCISA Executive & Operational Support Team.
 To UK Heads of e-Learning Forum (HeLF) members
 To UCISA Academic Support Group members