E-portfolios from concept to implementation…
OMDE 670 9040 – spring’08
E-portfolios from concept to implementation:
In search of an enhanced MDE experience
Stella C.S. Porto, D.Sc.
Graduate School of Management & Technology
University of Maryland University College
S.C.S. Porto
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E-portfolios from concept to implementation…
OMDE 670 9040 – spring’08
Acknowledgments
During these almost 7 years, in which I worked towards the MDE degree, many people were instrumental
directly and indirectly in sustaining my motivation and supporting the everyday juggling of family, work and
school. I‟d like to explicitly mention some of these people in a special way, as I finish this long endeavor.
First and far most is my sweet and beloved husband – Wayne. He was the stronghold of all the difficult and
stressful times. He was always the warm smile through all the happy moments and achievements. He was the
main support when I just needed extra time… He has been part of my life in most of its memorable moments,
and this one just adds to our loving story together.
Bernardo and Gustavo have seen their mother studying for most of their lives now. I hope I will serve as
inspiration to them in the future. They have learned to love this busy mother, and their hugs and smiles have
always been a place that I come to for confidence and unconditional love.Family and friends in Brazil were
always key in so many ways: for the love and caring they provided through my life and also their close contact
despite the distance after relocation.
Christine and Claudia, my “Anam Caras”... Despite the distance, our long conversations (via email or phone)
always remind me that there are these special some ones who can understand and even share my complexities
and idiosyncrasies.
Heloisa with her partnership in work and lazy lunches… We have built such a winning team so many times!
Every time we work together, trust and pleasure have always made projects feel like hobbies.
Lisa, Jane, Gila and Dianne, strong women in the MDE… They have been sources of inspiration, companionship
and loving care, for feminine jokes, revelations, losses, shared happiness and irritations. It‟s just plain good to
have all of them around.
Debra and Chris Mitchell, my dear neighbor from the Kentlands, filled many of our Friday and Saturday
evenings with laughter and wine. They were testimonies of struggles and achievements with words of motivation
and enthusiasm. They did make everyday life lighter… we sure miss them.
Friends at UMUC, who in many ways have supported my dedication to the life long learning, and have valued my
academic and professional work during this time. Some especial names are worth mentioning in this long list:
Scott Wibbert, Michael Frank, Jen Thompson, Regina Massaquoi, and Fran Rogalski.
Students and alumni in the MDE worked and shared their professional and personal experiences in so many
classes. They have always been an inspiration and provided me with a great sense of belonging.
S.C.S. Porto
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E-portfolios from concept to implementation…
OMDE 670 9040 – spring’08
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Institutional Context and the MDE e-Portfolio Case
The Master of Distance Education Program
Implementing the e-portfolio within the MDE
Analysis of the existing e-portfolios
Status summary
3. Understanding e-Portfolios and Implications for the MDE
Purpose and definitions
Types of e-portfolios
Technologies supporting e-portfolios
E-portfolio systems and standards
4. The proposal of an enhanced e-portfolio initiative
Proposal of a minimum set of standardized requirements for e-portfolios
Curriculum revision and anchoring of e-portfolio activities
Rubric for assessment of students’ e-portfolio within OMDE 670
Action Plan strategies
5. Conclusions and further thoughts
6. References
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1. Introduction
The main goal of this paper is to re-visit and critically analyze the current use of e-Portfolios within the Master of
Distance Education program, and further provide an enhanced framework for a more effective and efficient ePortfolio implementation within the program, based on main findings from the literature in the area of ePortfolio applied to the institutional academic programs, with particular interest in the graduate level programs.
The Master of Distance Education program was launched in January 2000. The program is a partnership
between the University of Maryland University College (UMUC) and the Center for Life-long Learning1 (C3L) at
Oldenburg University. The program has been offered for more than 8 years now in a fully online asynchronous
mode using WebTycho web-based virtual classroom interface developed and maintained by UMUC. The
population attending the MDE program is composed of working adults, from distinct backgrounds, including
corporate training, military, and academia. During these 8 years2, the capstone course has been the umbrella of
two major activities for students: a research project and a personal e-Portfolio. The current description of the
course states:
“A capstone study of distance education and training designed to demonstrate cumulative knowledge
and skills through two major projects: an electronic portfolio and a case study. The personal eportfolio documents credentials and accomplishments to date and also serves as an ongoing resource
and record of continuing professional development. The case study, which focuses on a distance
education/training program or organization, involves in-depth analysis of the setting and application
of concepts and strategies to enhance practice and performance in distance education and training.”
(http://www.umuc.edu/programs/grad/courses/omdecat.shtml#omde670)
Although this description has been revised throughout the years, the main goals of the course have been
consistent since its inception:


Each student will develop a personal e-portfolio, which will “demonstrate the student's qualifications gained
in the field” (Bernath & Rubin, 2003, p. 24) and provide evidence of his/her “competencies and skills in a
variety of disciplines /roles” (p.24).
Each student will develop on a Distance Education project, which should “reflect the student's sophistication
in and knowledge of the field” (p.24). The project “is intended as both a reflective and a constructive activity”
(http://www.umuc.edu/departments/omde/capstone/capstone.shtml).
There are multiple definitions of e-portfolios available in the literature and these will be discussed in Background
section of this paper. A simple definition is used within McDaniel's College website:
A portfolio is an organized, goal-driven collection of documentation that presents a student's growth
and achievement over time. (http://www2.mcdaniel.edu/its/digital_portfolios.htm)
More commonly than not, these definitions include the following e-portfolio traits, which also constitute the
basis of the e-portfolio concept embraced within the MDE (Stefani et al, 2003; Walti, 2006):
 e-portfolios are electronic versions of portfolios, and as such they are collections of artifacts in different
digital media;
 e-portfolios serve the purpose of assessment of competencies, skills and knowledge;
 e-portfolios showcase and evidence abilities and achievements in specific areas; and
 e-portfolios promote reflection of one's development and learning.
Independently from the type or format of the e-portfolio, the literature states that it should “encourage learners
to develop the skills to continue building their own personal portfolio as a life-long learning tool” (Siemens,
2004, p.1). This aspect will be further explored in this report.
Pedagogically, it is understood that e-portfolios have enormous educational potential. They promote the
integration of students' works in such a way that students' are encouraged to reflect on their achievements and
1
Former Center for Distance Education
2
Currently the program has around 130 graduates and 230 active students.
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competencies. It serves the purpose of not only looking back and showcasing abilities and skills, but also
planning future professional development steps. As Helen Barrett (2002) states, “An online portfolio system
needs to support a culture of evidence”, which the collection of artifacts created by students, reflections of the
learner on his/her development and learning and some kind of validation or external feedback from other
stakeholders, in this case peers or instructors.
Considering technological aspects, the development of e-portfolios has a lot to gain from advances in digital
technologies. The advent of the web has made e-portfolios portable and eliminated the need for replication or
transportation of documents and artifacts. The more recent changes under the web 2.0 umbrella has reduced the
development effort of such web-based e-portfolios significantly, allowing users to publish content on the web
without any special skills in web-publishing software or webpage design. Institutions also have the possibility to
provide students with in-house systems, which facilitate the collection, reflection, feedback and view of their
academic work.
E-portfolios are inherently personal and focus on an individualized management of one's collection of documents
and artifacts. However, when they are implemented in an academic setting in order with goals associated to
assessment, institutions will need to carefully consider implementation aspects. Issues such as permanence,
storage space, security, and stakeholders' involvement will be part of planning of an e-portfolio initiative for
students.
The paper will analyze the current state of e-portfolio development in the MDE and the requirements for
changes. It promises to connect the dots between recent trends and the outlook for the MDE program in terms of
its e-portfolio activity. It will use development criteria and methods proposed in the literature to determine the
possibilities and options for each of the main aspects that sustain e-portfolios. The goal is to find an exemplary
framework for the MDE student e-portfolio, and provide clear guidelines of how such framework should be used
in practice.
2. Institutional Context and the MDE e-Portfolio Case
The Master of Distance Education Program
The creation of the Master of Distance Education program was “the result of a pressing need within the academic
and training communities through the collaboration of two partners” (EFMD report, 2006, p.15), Eugene Rubin
from UMUC and Ulrich Bernath from Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg.
“These two distance educators recognized the significant necessity for professional training in
the field, but felt that some crucial issues/areas might be neglected. There were, and still are,
very few formal opportunities for faculty and professionals in higher educational institutions,
government and industry to develop comprehensive knowledge of and skills in distance
education. Several institutions that offer distance education also provide faculty development,
but these activities do not have formal recognition and often relate only to specific technologies
and skills. Most distance educators learned to develop and deliver courses through a „trial-anderror‟ method, while getting occasional advice from their more experienced colleagues or some
support from their IT departments. They do this with almost no background in distance
education theory, pedagogical models, or exposure to examples of good practice.
Two critical needs emerged from this analysis and are still valid:
 The need for an educational program in which new distance educators can develop a
broader perspective of the general foundations of distance education and learn
critical knowledge and skills in the field.
 The need for a global perspective among distance educators so that they can benefit
from the knowledge of how other institutions approach distance education and solve
problems, particularly in cross-border and cross-cultural contexts.” (p.15)
University of Maryland University College (UMUC) is “one of the eleven degree granting institutions constituting
the University System of Maryland, UMUC was founded in 1947 with the special mission of providing access to
higher education opportunities for adult learners.” (EFMD Report, p.16). UMUC is considered a leader in the
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delivery of online education in the United States. This leadership is based on its current large number of online
enrollment (i.e. surpassing 110,000 worldwide in FY 2005) and also the fact pioneering history in this arena.
“The Graduate School currently offers 19 master‟s degrees (all of which are available fully or at
least partially online), a doctoral degree program, and more than 35 graduate certificates. Fields
of study are concentrated in the areas of business and management, technology, and education.
In many respects, the discipline of distance education represents the synthesis of these three
fields and draws upon existing areas of institutional strength. As one of the benchmark academic
institutions in online education, UMUC is well positioned to offer a program with this particular
focus and to share its expertise and experiences with the larger academic community.” (p.16)
“The Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg, founded in 1974, is one of the youngest
German universities and evolved from the city‟s 200-year-old teacher training college. The
university has grown to include academic departments such as Social Sciences, Arts and
Humanities, Education, Economics, Languages, Mathematics, Natural Sciences, and Computer
Science. Approximately 10,500 students are currently enrolled in more than 30 programs of
study. Oldenburg‟s Center for Distance Education, founded in 1978, is a central unit of the
university and is a leading center in German distance education and particularly active in the
development of asynchronous learning networks with an emphasis on online tutorials and
seminars.” (p.16)
“In addition, the Arbeitsstelle Fernstudienforschung (ASF), or Center for Research in Distance
Education, a joint unit of the Center for Distance Education and the School of Education of Carl
von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg in Germany, supports inquiry in light of relevant
international research in distance education and facilitates the development of distance learning
programs and courses within the university as well as in a national and international context.
This research unit edits, publishes and distributes the ASF Series on distance education.” (p.16)
The operation of this successful international partnership has been based on a simple model, characterized by
cooperation and collaboration, while keeping distinct responsibilities in the management of the program. This
capitalizes on the strengths of each institution, while at the same time provisind the necessary freedom in terms
of decision-making within each partnering organization.
“The financial agreement between the University of Oldenburg and UMUC is based on revenue
sharing according to enrollments in the program per term and the activities each institution
undertakes on behalf of the program. Under this agreement, each institution is responsible for
staffing, reviewing and developing a specific set of courses. Student support and technology
infrastructure are under the control of UMUC, which is considered as the administrative
gateway for all students. UMUC partially takes on parts of faculty support when it comes to the
use of the classroom interface (WebTycho) and training. The Oldenburg partner has been
particularly responsible for research initiatives (the ASF series), which focus on the elaboration
of materials that are extensively used in the program‟s courses and are sold to the distance
education community.” (p.15)
The program has been offered for more than 8 years now in a fully online asynchronous mode using WebTycho
web-based virtual classroom (WebTycho, 2008) interface developed and maintained by UMUC. Until Fall 2007,
the curriculum was based on 36 credit-hours divided into 12 courses. Eight of them required courses and then a
list of around 10 elective courses, from which the student would choose any 4. OMDE 670 (numbered OMDE
690 until Fall 2007) has been since the inception of the program the so-called „capstone‟, which students are
required to take as the last step in the program.
“The MDE curriculum is intentionally structured to provide students with both breadth and
depth in the field of study. When UMUC and Oldenburg faculty first joined together to design
the program curriculum, they decided that an appropriate balance should be sought between the
pedagogical, technological, and economic aspects of distance education, and the broader
theoretical, historical, and social views of this field. In this respect, the program curriculum
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seeks to position the evolving role of distance education within a larger societal framework.
Whereas many related graduate-level programs may focus more narrowly on instructional
design and development, educational technology, or administrative and management issues, the
MDE takes a more multidisciplinary approach by seeking to integrate each of these subject
areas. Indeed, as the program has matured, it has moved closer to a focus on leadership, which
requires such a multidisciplinary approach” (EFMD Report, PE1 – p.1)
The MDE program also offers several graduate certificate programs, composed of subset of the courses that
compose the masters degree curriculum. “These certificate programs are ideal for students who want to gain
expertise in a particular content area related to distance education but may not want to commit to the entire
degree program. Students may also choose to earn certificates enroute to the degree program and can apply the
appropriate credits in their entirety” (EFMD Report, PE1 – p.1)
In the fall of 2007, the program was fully re-designed, and three different specialization areas were created,
namely: Distance Education Teaching and Training (DETT), Distance Education Technology (DETC) and
Distance Education Policy and Management. In this new curriculum, students are to take 5 core courses, 6
specialization courses and a final capstone (OMDE 670). The re-design was focused on re-using several of the
previous existing courses, re-designing and creating a few of them in order to promote an aligned focus on the
different specialization areas. The capstone has always been under the management of UMUC in formal terms,
but was in fact a result of collaboration of both partner institutions in its inception, design and delivery – with
faculty from both institutions involved in students‟ guidance throughout the elaboration of both project and eportfolio.
Implementing the e-portfolio within the MDE
Given the context described above, it is clear that the MDE is at a prime position in adopting the use of student eportfolios. In Stefani et al (2007), the „e-learning maturity level‟ of institutions is discussed as a main factor in
the success of e-portfolio initiatives.
“[There] is a challenge in both e-learning and „traditional‟ classroom teaching and learning
environments. Do our students understand the concept of collaborative learning? Are they
attuned to the ideas of information exchange and knowledge construction? Would they be able
to participate in online conferencing and Internet searching with fellow students?”
The answer to these questions are a sound „yes‟ in all counts, given the nature and subject matter of the program,
as demonstrated by the following excerpts from the EFMD3 Self-Assessment report (MDE, 2006), which
ultimately awarded the MDE with the EFMD-CEL Accreditation4.
“Several courses in the MDE require the students to work collaboratively in groups. This is a
pedagogical technique that is used throughout the Graduate School of Management and
Technology as the Graduate School is committed to preparing its graduates to work in the
collaborative environments of higher education, corporations and government. Often the
students are required to submit a group project and faculty (where appropriate) direct students
to work on specific projects in small groups (a special “study group” area of the online classroom
is set aside for this purpose).” (p.26)
“By far, however, the most significant collaborative environment is WebTycho (WebTycho the
proprietary Learning Management System used in all UMUC online courses) discussion
conference area and this is a highly interactive environment with interaction happening both
between the students themselves as well as between faculty and students. WebTycho allows
faculty to review the interaction data in terms of statistical data of students and faculty
3
4
European Foundation for Management Development - http://www.efmd.org/html/home.asp
Program accreditation for tEchnology Enhanced Learning -
http://www.efmd.org/html/Accreditations/cont_detail.asp?id=040929dygl&aid=041027wszf&tid
=1&ref=ind
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postings.” (p.26)
“The MDE is committed to trying to make the online e-learning environment as much like the
work environment as possible. Part of the rationale for this is that students continually demand
more and more “hands-on” and “how-to” skills and knowledge. They want the educational
environment to be more like a training environment. The more the MDE simulates the work
environment the better we will be preparing the students to function as graduates of the
program. Therefore, most of the assessments do not request that the students engage in
theoretical discussions, but instead engage in activities that could be directly relevant to what
they might be asked to do as e-learning and distance education managers in their respective
organizations.” (p.27)
“The asynchronous e-learning model brings a reflective thinking process and thoughtful
interchange to the learning environment. More recently, there has been an interest in including
other forms of media as well as modes of interaction, when the appropriate pedagogical use is
evident. This is the case, for example, of the inclusion of audio through "podcasts" and the use of
synchronous communication via telephone bridges, chat rooms or more complex tools such as
“Macromedia Breeze”, where several media are used during synchronous sessions, which can be
recorded. These are considered “add-ons” to the courses, because the MDE learning
environment is primarily a text-based asynchronous environment, given critical factors such as
cost, scalability, support and reliability.” (p.27)
“Other technologies used by students and faculty in MDE courses are also worth mentioning,
namely: electronic portfolios, created as individual websites; the use of PowerPoint for
presentations and Excel for graphics; and the use of student managed online classrooms shells
(where students play the role of instructors creating content and delivering instruction). It is
part of our strategic plan to emphasize the use of multimedia and advanced technology in our
courses, particularly where they logically and pedagogically fit.” (p.27)
Despite the maturity with e-learning at an institutional level, and an ingrained construvist approach in the
teaching and learning process, the MDE e-portfolio activity is still below the expected institutional support level,
mentioned as an important success factor in the literature. The institutional involvement, however, can be
controversial when it comes to student ownership and the use of the e-portfolio as a life-long learning tool.
“At the moment, the development of e-portfolios is caught in a dilemma: the imaginary scenario
or even mundane scenario of students having a portfolio throughout their college or university
caeer, needs the user to feel ownership of the portfolio in order to have any chance of success.
[…] However, for a portfolio to be useful it needs to integrate with many other systems and
institutions so that vital information can be transferred […] and the software can be
interoperable and „future-proof‟. Current practices […] pays lip-service to student ownership, but
remains largely teacher and institution led. The technology is still immature; the uses are still
fluctuating and even the definitions, the concept of what an e-portfolio is, are hugely varied.”
(Stefani at al, 2004, p.8)
The conundrum mentioned above is at the core of the elaboration of the new framework for the MDE e-portfolio
project, as it will be further discussed in this document.
Analysis of the existing e-portfolios
A compilation of observations from a total of 33 e-portfolios from MDE graduate is presented. Some initial
observations about the limitations of this analysis are appropriate at this time.
 This is a small subset (around 20%) of all the e-portfolios submitted by MDE graduates to this day, thus
observations here should not be generalized, and serve just the purpose of framing the needs for the
MDE e-portfolio initiative.
 The requirements for the e-portfolios have changed through time and thus, components such as the
“summative statement” are not present in early e-portfolios.
 In many cases, students in the MDE do not have professional experience that correlates to the study they
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
perform in the program. Thus, it becomes more difficult to associate the learning with professional
growth.
All the observations noted below are personal to the author of this report and do not reflect the thinking
of faculty or managers of the program.
The framework for this analysis is based on the requirements for this assignment, as follows (underlining not
part of the original text):
“The purpose of the Portfolio is to gather and organize and present evidence of your
qualifications for practice in the field, and to demonstrate your competencies knowledge and
skills in a variety of distance education contexts. It is the expectation of faculty that the Portfolio
will result in your entry into or advancement in the field of distance education.
The Portfolio contains both required and elective documents. The more formal required
elements are substantive assignments selected from each of the previous MDE courses you have
completed. The elective items you include might be documents that display other activities and
accomplishments while you have been enrolled in the MDE program, whether you are already an
active distance education professional or an aspiring one. In addition, the Portfolio will contain
your Resume or Curriculum Vita, and perhaps a photo or other appropriate graphics. The
Portfolio is a requirement for completion of the entire MDE program, and should exhibit your
best work.
Please note that the Portfolio is more than simply a compendium of past work. It should
effectively reveal a progression of increasing professionalism in the field. In this regard, the final
portion of the Portfolio is a reflective summative statement requiring careful thought and
expression. In this important concluding piece, you should attempt to convey how you have
developed personally and professionally while an MDE student, how the MDE curriculum has
affected your evolution as a scholar and practitioner in the field, and what are your further goals
and how you intend to pursue these objectives.” (E-portfolio guidelines, 2008)
Based on these guidelines, the following components of each e-portfolio were under scrutiny while observing
each of the e-portfolios:
Required components:
 Sample of work done during the program;
 Summative statement, which should convey personal and professional development, impact of the MDE
curriculum on learning, evolution as a scholar and practitioner and future goals.
 Resume
 Photo or graphics
Optional components
 Other artifacts done professional or academically related to distance education outside of the realm of
the MDE
 List of activities and accomplishments outside of the MDE.
Although reflections of one‟s own artifacts (sampling of work) are unfortunately not part of the e-portfolio
guidelines, this is at the core of the learning value of e-Portfolios as discussed in this paper. Thus, this aspect was
added to analysis of the existing e-portfolios.
A rubric will be used to organize these components in such a way that for each e-portfolio component (for each
student) is categorized in one of the following performance categories: Absent (A), Incomplete (I), and Present
(P). The quality of the components was not assessed in any further detail, given the lack of performance criteria
as part of the course syllabus, but the addition of a column for comments, allows for some highlighted
observations for each e-portfolio. For the components of „Sample of Work‟ (Sampling), „Summative Statement‟,
and „Reflections on one‟s own artifacts‟ (Reflections), further explanation for each of the categories is needed,
given the subjectivity of the component.
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


Sampling:
o Absent: no sampling of course work presented (except for the final project)
o Incomplete: some sampling of work presented, however, not significant.
o Present: sampling of work is significant.
Summative statement:
o Absent: no summative statement found.
o Incomplete: short summative statement that conveys poorly personal and professional
development, and/or learning gains from MDE courses, and/or future goals.
o Present: a comprehensive reflection of the MDE experience and personal and professional
growth in the area of distance education.
Reflections
o Absent: no reflections about course work found.
o Incomplete: Some reference to the courses in given, either within or outside the summative
statement, but they cannot be considered of reflections based on the artifacts that are showcased
in the e-portfolio.
o Present: Comprehensive reflection about courses, and reference to artifacts that are sampled in
the e-portfolio.
In what follows, a table with the described rubric is used to individually assess the 34 visited e-portfolios.
Eport.
ID
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
Sampling
Resume
P
A
P
P
P
P
P
A
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
A
P
P
P
I
A
P
P
P
Summative
Statement
I
A
A
P
P
I
I
I
P
P
A
A
I
A
A
P
A
P
A
P
P
P
P
P
25
P
26
27
28
29
P
P
P
P
S.C.S. Porto
Reflections
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
Photo or
Graphics
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
I
P
A
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
I
A
A
A
I
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
I
A
P
Comments
Final project showcased
A few external links unavailable
First one to have reflections on artifacts
produced during the program
Had some feedback from instructors
posted (commendation)
Interesting classification to roles and
competencies associated to each course
Has comments on student‟s own work
More of comments about courses (no
reference to faculty) – no personal
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30
A
P
P
P
A
31
32
33
P
P
P
A
P
I
P
P
P
P
P
P
I
A
A
experience
Many pages with alerts of “under
construction”
Some further observations:
 It was only three cases where students actually reflected on their own work showcased in the portfolio.
 Summative statements were sometimes absent from e-portfolios. In this case it is possible that students
were from cohorts when the „summative statement‟ was not yet a requirement.
 In a few cases, summative statements mentioned content of courses, but no reflection of the impact of
such content in the professional growth. In such cases, observations about courses were nowhere to be
found throughout the entire e-portfolio. The analysis did consider that reflections could be spread across
the e-portfolio and not necessarily in one place.
 In many cases, summative statements were very generic and did not have any specific information about
the learning experience during the program. (This is the author‟s personal observation.)
 Faculty members‟ names were mentioned in some of the e-portfolios, associated to the courses taken by
the students. Rarely (less than 5 cases) there was actually any reflection associated to instructors as part
of the e-portfolio. A few cases did mention bad experiences in the program.
Status summary
The e-portfolio initiative as a whole has been a successful one within the MDE given initial expectations.
Anecdotaly, students are satisfied with the activity itself, although based on the 30 e-portfolios visited there is no
evidence that students have used it as a life-long learning tool after leaving the program. The general observation
of the e-portfolios in terms of its content is also useful in assessing how courses have impacted students
professional lives, and has enabled them to grow in their careers. The main limitation is still a result of the fact
that most students only start their e-portfolio activity when they reach the capstone course.5
In 2004, an e-portfolio tutorial (Walti, 2006) was created to help students get started in their e-portfolio
activities early on in the program and has been readily available through the web. The technological platform
then was a temporary storage space in an institutional server, which was cleared out after the students graduated
from the program. Students were strongly recommended to the use of Dreamweaver (web page editor) and the
elaboration of webpages, which would display major assignments collected throughout their program as other
submissions that students found to be worth showcasing as part of their achievements. All these artifacts were
then submitted via ftp (File Transfer Protocol) to the server. No special interfaces existed to access these
accounts, other the command line within a Unix server. These students, for the most part, had no technical
background or understanding of this level of the technology. The faculty involved in this process, for the most
part, did not have the skills to provide assistance. In many cases, students reached out for help through UMUC‟s
helpdesk. In many situations, such requests were answered, but generated complaints from the IT division to the
manager of the program. The help desk was designed to provide technical support to students, but not to teach
students technical skills.
In summary, the status of the e-portfolio activity within the MDE today displays the following inadequacies,
which will need to be addressed in the implementation of a new framework:


Permanence: Currently the environment supported by the institution does not provide permanence
to the students' e-portfolios. This issue will have to be re-visited and new guidelines given to
students.
Lack of the necessary skill set: Some students do not have the necessary technical and pedagogical
skill set to develop the portfolio, this includes technology fluency and practice of reflection of one's
learning. This will need to be addressed in order to succeed in this new initiative.
5
One might say that an exit analysis of previous work has its place as a summative reflection. However, many
student have voiced their concern of not having started the activities of collection, organization and reflection during the
program.
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






Late start: Although the e-portfolio tutorial is introduced to students in their first course, there are
not formal requirements of development of the e-portfolio throughout the program before the
capstone course. It will be necessary to build some sort of milestones throughout of the program in
order to guarantee that students will be working on their e-portfolios during most of the other
courses: collecting materials and reflecting on the learning process and academic achievements.
Lack of support: Currently, students receive practically no support in the development of the eportfolio. Instructors teaching the course need to dedicate more time to the development of the
capstone research project and are not prepared to provide technical feedback when students need it.
The technical aspects, give the lack of preparation of all stakeholders, ends up taking good part of the
effort of students, when in fact they shold be spending more time in the summative assessment of
their learning journey throughout the program.
Lack of institutional support: the institution does not provide any technical, pedagogical or
implementation support to students and faculty.
Lack of correlation with the curriculum: the e-portfolio is not formally connected to the rest of the
curriculum, although it requires students to post their artifacts from others courses they have taken.
There is a need to establish a more clear and direct link between this activity and the rest of the
program.
Lack of involvement of other stakeholders: since the e-portfolio is worked on at the end of the
program, students rarely include in the e-portfolios the feedback from peers and other faculty
members. The addition of this feedback would be of major importance in terms of the validation of
the achievements showcased in the e-portfolio.
Grading: The course has been assessed in a Pass or Fail form since its inception. Although this might
be important given the nature of the program (the two major deliverables have little standardized
assessment criteria), this possibly creates frustration for students who might wish to receive a grade
that assesses their performance and not only the completion of the assignments; as well as a demotivator for greater effort in elaborating a more rich piece of work. The need to change the grading
scheme is discussed here for the sake of completion. However, the author will not make
recommendations, given that this will require further discussion within the MDE faculty group.
Lack of structure and criteria of assessment of eportfolios: the guidelines that are shared with
students is clearly incomplete and is not being used appropriately in the assessment (possibly
because of the lack of performance-base grading scheme). In any case, the analysis has shown, that
these guidelines need to be reviewed. This revision needs to be in sync with the implementation of
the new process of e-portfolio creation, which require students to take charge of their e-portfolios
earlier in the program. Thus, the guidelines will need to be shared with students throughout their
program.
3. Understanding e-Portfolios and Implications for the MDE
In this section, we take a closer look at some foundational pillars within the e-portfolio field discussed in the
literature, including definitions, pedagogy, technology and implementation issues. Understanding these pillars
will allow us to make decisions concerning the e-portfolio initiative within the MDE, including types of
portfolios, best technology, process of implementation, and management.
Purpose and definitions
E-portfolios have multiple purposes – “as a showcase, development tool, assessment approach, or resource for
reflection” (Stefani et al., 2007, p.1). These purposes may be combined, depending on the context and the scope
of the implementation.
Lorenzo and Ittelson (2005) define e-portfolios as
“… a digitized collection of artifacts, including demonstrations resources, and accomplishments
that represent an individual, group, community, organization, or institution. This collection can
be comprised of text-based, graphic, or multimedia elements archived on a Web site or on other
electronic media such as CD-ROM or DVD.” (p.1)
Acker (2005) states simply that an e-portfolio is “a digital representation of self on characteristics of interest to a
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community” (p.1). Treuer and Jenson (2003) define electronic portfolios “as an organized collection of digital
and/or analog artifacts and reflective statements that demonstrate growth over time” (p.34). They shed light on
the potential of e-portfolios going beyond the paper-based portfolio counterparts.
Siemens (2004) highlights that “e-portfolios can best be viewed as a reactionary response to fundamental shifts
in learning, teaching, technology, and learner needs in a climate where learning is no longer perceived as
confined to formal education” (p.1). The term „webfolios‟ has also been used in order to be clear about the webbased implementation of such portfolios. In those cases, the term e-portfolio was used to refer to portfolios
residing on CD-ROMs or other physical media. With the spread adoption of web-based tools and storage, this
distinction has been lost, and the more common term in use is „e-portfolio‟ “as an umbrella concept that includes
webfolios” (p.1).
The growth in interest in e-portfolios is “fuelled by three broad factors: the dynamics of functioning in a
knowledge economy, the changing nature of learning, and the changing needs of the learner” (Siemens, 2004,
p.1). In the knowledge economy, knowledge is of primary value and represents “opportunities for employment
and access to education” (p.2). The e-portfolio allows the learner to display and evidence such knowledge
through multiple media. The change in learning approaches is also a current trend. Learner-centered approaches
are the focus of those promoting higher quality of the learning experience. Learning is not restricted to formal
education, but is seen as process that endures throughout life. E-portfolios are tools that support the concept of
lifelong learning and learner-centered approaches of learning. Since learners have become more technically
proficient with time, information technology has played a social role affecting learning and the workplace. Thus,
the use of e-portfolios is supported by the widespread use of internet-based tools in everyday life.
Considering the myriad of definitions found in the literature, electronic portfolios – “whether produced by a
student, a faculty member, or an institution – is for collection, reflection, and assessment” (Greenberg, 2004,
p.34). As mentioned by Helen Barret (1999): "A portfolio without standards, goals and/or reflection is just a
fancy résumé, not an electronic portfolio" (p.56). Ravet (2007) adds an important twist to some of the given
definitions by questioning if e-portfolios should be considered a „product‟ or a „process‟. He has, thus, used the
definition from NLII 2003 as a base and re-written it to say: an e-portfolio is “a collection of authentic and
diverse evidence, drawn from larger archive, representing capital6 developed by a reflective learning individual
or organization designed to exploit/valorize their assets in a particular context.”(p.3). Thus, the conclusion of his
questioning is that “an ePortfolio is not a product and a process, but is a product created as the result of a
process, this process being managed by digital means” (p.3).
Gibson and Barrett (2002) shed light on an earlier conception of e-portfolio by Mary Diez, which evokes almost
poetic metaphors, namely the portfolio as mirror, map and sonnet:
“The mirror concerns the portfolio‟s reflective nature that allows us to see our own growth over
time. The map includes concerns of the portfolio‟s ability to aid us in planning, setting goals, and
navigating the artifacts we create and collect. And the sonnet points to the portfolio‟s role as
framework for creative expression, encouraging diversity within the template or structure for
thinking about work and presenting it to others” (Gibson & Barrett, 2002, p.1)
This perspective is inherently present in the e-portfolio approach used within the MDE. Collection, Reflection,
Assessment and Showcasing are in fact the main goals of the MDE e-portfolio. While revisiting this initiative,
these goals are kept intact. Implementation procedures and processes are re-worked in order to achieve such
goals.
Three mains stakeholders are involved in the e-portfolio development process, namely: learners, instructors and
institutions. “The end-users of e-portfolios are: prospective employers, instructors (for assessment), parents, and
award granting agencies” (Siemens, 2004, p.1). The benefits of e-portfolios are distinct to each of the
stakeholders. As learners “seek to create and reflect on life experiences” (p.2), e-portfolios serve students as
“personal knowledge management” (p.2), recorded “history of development and growth” (p.2), and a
planning/goal setting tool” (p.2). Faculty are able to “share content with other faculty” (p.2), employ “more
authentic assessment” (p. 2) practices in their teaching and promote life-long learning among students.
6
Ravet (2007) defines „capital‟ in this context to be “competencies, knowledge, social networks, etc.” (p.3)
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Institutions are able to provide “value to learners by allowing personal control” (p.2) of the learning process and
have the potential of playing “a more permanent role in the lives of learners” (p.2).
The process of e-Portfolio creation can be seen as composed as four major tasks, as discussed in the e-Portfolio
portal (2004): Collection of artifacts for the e-portfolio; Selection of the artifacts that will demonstrate the aimed
competencies; Reflection on the artifacts that were selected as well as on the learning/self-development process;
and finally Connection to others, who will see, assess, and possibly provide feedback to the posted materials. In
the case of the MDE, the first three tasks are of major focus, since they are the ones, which should be ongoing
throughout the program. In some cases, and for some components of the e-portfolio, the students might have the
opportunity to practice their “Connection”. Within the MDE, the final moment of “Connection” is in fact during
the capstone course. However, given that we foresee such e-portfolio as a lifelong learning tool, students are
encouraged to continue this process after they have graduated.
Types of e-portfolios
The literature is rich in taxonomies to classify e-portfolios. The different types are labeled according to distinct
set of criteria.
E-portfolios can be used by individuals, by groups or by institutions. Thus, this criterion is based on who
manages the e-portfolio and the e-portfolio's main use. Lorenzo and Ittelson (2005) classify e-portfolios is three
main categories, namely: student e-portfolios, teaching e-portfolios and institutional e-portfolios.
Student e-portfolios are the evolution of print-based portfolios commonly used during the 80s, especially in the
art-related programs. These portfolios gained acceptance and spread use during the 90s. The focus has been on
showcasing students‟ work as well as reflecting on the learning process. With the diffusion of electronic media,
the natural enhancement for the print-version was to move into electronic storage, which thus allowed for better
dissemination and maintenance. The success of student e-portfolios arises from their potential of
 “helping students become critical thinkers” (p.3)
 “aiding in the development of their writing and multimedia communication skills” (p.3)
 “help students learn information and technology literacy skills and how to use digital media” (p.3)
 “create a digitized showcase of their work and skills that can be presented to prospective employees”
(p.3); and
 connect “students to their alma mater after graduation” (p.3)
Teaching e-portfolios are those developed by faculty members and are used frequently to “introduce themselves
and showcase their accomplishments to students, as well as to share ideas inside a class or other community”
(p.4). On the other hand, institutional e-portfolios “incorporate student and teaching e-portfolios as well as eportfolios from a wide range of programs and departments” (p.5). It is mainly used for institution accountability,
and serve as a “vehicle for institution-wide reflection, learning, and improvement” (p.5). The focus in this paper
is on student e-portfolios used throughout a specific graduate level program.
Greenberg (2004) lists three main types, based “on when the work was organized relative to when the work is
created” (p.31):
 For showcase e-portfolios, the “organization occurs after the work has been created” (p.31)
 In structured e-portfolios, there is a predefined organization for the work that will be created later on;
 Learning e-portfolios have their organization evolving as the work is created.
Stefani et al (2007) provide different classifications. One such classification, refers to the scope of application of
e-portfolios:
 Course e-portfolio refers e-portfolios “assembled by students for one course” (p.11) and are usually used
for assessment;
 Program e-portfolio are those “that students develop to document the work they have completed, the
skills hey have learned, and the outcomes they have met in academic department or program” (p.11); and
 Institutional e-portfolio – differently than the equally named category by Lorenzo and Ittelson (2005),
refers to e-portfolios that function as a “personal development tool, in which employees records
achievements, future plans and extra curricular activities.” (Stefani et al., 2007, p.11)
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According to Stefani et al (2007), another distinction can be made based on the European Initiatives
Coordination Committee concerning the purpose of the e-portfolio in different learning contexts:




Assessment e-portfolios “would generally be used in situations where students are not tested or
examined in conventional ways, but rather are expected to provide evidence of their competence in
particular subject areas” (p.41)
Showcase e-portfolios is here seen as the closest to the conventional view of portfolios used by artists,
and students will display their best pieces of work, and might also contain revisions and feedback.
Development e-portfolios where work in progress is shown in order to promote discussion between
students and tutors;
Reflective e-portfolio is merely a personal portfolio, where students are able to reflect on their
achievements and self-assess their growth over time.
In the e-Portfolio portal (2004), one more type is cited as combination of the others discussed above, the socalled „Hybrids‟. “Rarely will you find an e-portfolio that is strictly used for assessment, development, or
showcase purposes.” (Eportfolio portal, nd, p.1).
Within the MDE, according to the stated goals, we can assert that students will be developing program,
reflective, showcase e-portfolios. Although there is an underlying premise of assessment, assessment is not the
main focus of this initiative. It is our vision, that students will be developing a program tool, which will serve a
longer-term purpose of portraying the students as a competent distance educator. Whether students will keep
this tool after they leave the program is not under the program control, but it is certainly a clear intent to provide
this potential use to MDE graduates.
It should be considered that the MDE e-portfolio could certainly be used as formative and summative
assessment. Stefani et al (2007) shed light on the pedagogical potential of e-portfolios in this matter, through the
more recent trends and approaches to assessment, mainly through constructivism, authentic assessment and
peer assessment. Constructivism deals with knowledge that students are able to create based on their learning
experiences. “In the constructivist theory the emphasis is placed on the learner or the student rather than on the
teacher or the instructor” (p.11). Authentic assessment is closely related to constructivist principles because it
deals with assessment through activities that resemble „real-world‟ situations, scenarios, problem solving, that
request students‟ active involvement and critical thinking. E-portfolios promote the depiction of such learning
processes, which are student-centric and related to students‟ personal development as more autonomous
learners (Moore & Kearsley, 2004). It is also commonly accepted that most web-based courses are designed
based on principles that promote student autonomy. In this sense, the MDE is in a privileged position to adopt
such a tool, given its historic adoption of constructivism throughout its curriculum.
However, in order to use e-portfolios in formal assessment – associated to grades and students‟ records, it would
be necessary to “create matrices with grading rubrics that measure the degree to which students have met
specific learning outcomes or competencies” (Lorenzo & Ittelson, 2005b, p.2). As discussed by Acker (2005),
faculty workload is one of the obstacles and critical issues when implementing e-portfolios within a program or
institution. In the case of the MDE, the option of not using the e-portfolio as an assessment tool throughout the
program is based on this reasoning, as well as the limitations of the institutional support discussed in the
following section.
Technologies supporting e-Portfolio
The evolution of e-portfolios has happened strongly in the area of e-portfolio editing tools (Ravet, 2007).
However, “The most obvious gap today is the inability of e-portfolio systems to extract automatically meaningful
information collected in an e-portfolio repository.” (p.1) As discussed in this and the next sections, the diversity
of systems and technologies at both infrastructure and functionality levels characterizes the field of e-portfolio
development today. With the growth of web applications that support users in content creation, the landscape of
technologies is changing quickly. Moreover, not-for-profit organizations, educational institutions and corporate
companies have stepped into this market with different goals, but also shared interest. In many cases, such
projects have crossed the borders of the initial categories: off-the-shelf tools have been incorporated into fullyfledged systems; generic software applications have been backed-up by consortiums creating customizable
features; and diverse groups have joined forces towards definition of standards and common functionalities.
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Nonetheless, in what follows we attempt to describe the software supporting e-portfolios as part of large
categories according to the nature of its developers and its consequent reach to stakeholders, with close
resemblance to the taxonomy adopted by Stefani et al (2007).
Commercial software for e-portfolios is currently provided by a myriad of companies with and without hosting
capabilities. In many cases, such systems are focused to deliver services exclusively to organizations, and
individuals cannot create and maintain personal e-portfolios within such systems if they are not associated to an
institution that has purchased the particular system. The dependency on outside parties and their financial
health and commercial interest is the major drawback of such approach. However, the reduction of complexity in
dealing with technical support and updates could be the reason to adopt such solutions. eFolioMN (Campus
Technology, 2006) is an example of a system that has adopted a commercial solution, in this case from the
company Avenet.
More recently, commercial endeavors supported by consortiums and groups of institutions have increasingly
stood out as feasible e-portfolio system solutions for individuals and organizations. Epsilen is one good example
of such product.
“Epsilen is a comprehensive software package that provides wide-ranging tools and services that
students and professionals need for their day-to-day learning, teaching, networking, and
collaboration. The Epsilen suite includes ePortfolios, Learning Matrix, a Global Learning System
(GLS), Group Collaboration, Object Sharing and Repository, Blogs, WIKI, Messaging, Resume,
Social and Professional Networking, and much more.
Epsilen‟s members‟ collections (files, courses, etc.) and data are securely stored in a remote
central database accessible from school, home, work, or anywhere via the Internet. An Epsilen
member has total control for sharing his personal portfolio and collections with schoolmates,
teachers, or potential employers, as well as social and professional groups. Additionally, each
Epsilen member has a personal Web site (ePortfolio) with lifelong Web address (URL).”
(Epsilen, nd, p.1).
The history of Epsilen is summarized as one of more than “six years of research and development activities at he
CyberLab Purdue School of Engineering and Technology at IUPUI” (p.2) It was initially proposed as the „Jafari
model‟ – discussed in more detail in the following section of this document.
Proprietary systems are those often designed by individual institutions, or groups of institutions. For the most
part, such initiatives originate due to the existence of legacy systems, such as a proprietary Learning
Management System like WebTycho at UMUC. The fact that such LMS‟s are being maintained at high costs by
such institutions is offset by the gains perceived from institutional control, independence from commercial
development cycles and possible competitive advantage. The clear disadvantage is the need to provide the entire
chain of development and support for such systems, which can translate into prohibitive costs or dated
technology. This is the case of the Penn State e-portfolio system – “a collaborative effort of Penn State's
Information Technology Services, the Division of Student Affairs, and the EMS e-Education Institute”
(PennState, nd, p.1).
The open-source “approach is steadily gaining adherents” (Stefani et al., 2007, p.119). The underlying conceptual
platforms vary, some focusing on providing frameworks and tools that can be adopted by different institutions,
and others simply defining the standards for such environments to be built with a focus on interoperability and
transportability. One such group is the Open Source Portfolio Initiative (OSPI). “Open Source Portfolio (OSP) is
a robust, non-proprietary, open-source electronic portfolio application, developed by a community of individuals
and organizations from around the world” (OSPortfolio, nd, p.1), associated to the Sakai7 project, which is a
robust Collaboration and Learning Environment. OSP is a suite of Sakai tools, whose main components are the
Matrix and the Portfolio, the first representing the institutional perspective, while the latter representing the
students‟ perspective. Elgg is another initiative that can be categorized under this same umbrella.
“Elgg is an open-source social networking platform. It offers blogging, networking, community,
collecting of news using feeds aggregation and file sharing features. Everything can be shared
7
“Sakai is a free and open source product that is built and maintained by the Sakai community.” (Sakai, nd p.1)
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among users with access controls and everything can be cataloged by tags as well.” (Elgg Home
page, 2008, p.1)
Although the definition refers to social networking, by nature such applications include most features desirable
for maintaining a personal e-portfolio through its profile features and the functionalities of attaching and
hyperlinking to anything stored on the web. “Elgg works with the two most popular Virtual Learning
Environments, Blackboard and WebCT” (Elgg Home page, 2008, p.2), which lends it to the activities of
collecting students work in a transparent way.
One important European initiative in this field, is the Europortfolio consortium, led by EIfEL (European
Institute for E-learning),
“[…] an independent, not-for-profit European professional association whose mission is to
support organizations, communities and individuals in building a knowledge economy and
learning society through innovative and reflective practice, continuing professional development
and the use of knowledge, information and learning technologies.” (EIfEL, nd, p.1)
The Europortfolio is an “orchestrated effort involving both educational and corporate institutions to define,
design, and develop digital portfolio systems that meet the needs of all stakeholders.” (Europortfolio, nd, p.1)
The mission of the Europortfolio includes diffusion of the use of e-portfolios as a foundation “of a learning
economy and society” (p.1); definition of standards that ensure interoperability among e-portfolio systems;
promotion of the development of standards of competence “in the fields of education, training, human resource
and development” (p.2); support and coordination of European initiatives in the field of e-portfolios.
Helen Barrett is a common name in the literature on e-portfolios, as you will notice throughout this document.
Many of her contributions relate to the availability and use of technologies for the development of e-portfolios by
individuals, with special focus on teachers. Gibson and Barrett (2002), given the status of technologies available
at the time, compare two major categories of technological approaches in the development of e-portfolios,
namely Generic Tools (GT) and Customized Systems (CS). The separation between these two groups have
become blurred with the rapid change in web-based tools, but the general conclusion is still valid:
“Either approach can stand alone, but they may be weaker for doing so. A CS approach by itself
soon loses touch with the individuality of inquiry and expression of learners. A GT approach by
itself limits its contribution to a program‟s validity as well as accountability.” (p.10)
Early on in the study of e-portfolio technologies, it is clear that the choice of tools and/or systems depends
directly “upon the purpose and audience for the information within and connected to learner‟s portfolios” (p.10).
Although the benefits of bringing together both GT and CS approaches are numerous, contextual constraints
need to be taken under consideration. As discussed previously, the MDE initiative is at the moment just that: a
program initiative within an institution, which does not provide adequate support for the adoption of a more
complex and comprehensive e-portfolio system solution. Thus, the understanding of the overarching possibilities
is essential to plan for a long-term future, while near-term decisions will need to be based on low hanging fruits
through the use of generic tools.
Until recently, generic tools (proprietary, commercial or open-source) relied on development of web pages,
which required technical skills, more or less complex depending on the learner‟s creativity. These included,
“word processing, HTML editors, multimedia authoring tools, portable documents format (PDF), and other
commonly used productivity tool software” (p.1) This landscape has had a significant breakthrough with the
advent of web 2.0 technologies.
The term „Web 2.0‟ was coined by O‟Reilly when referring to practices and technologies emerging on the web
after the fall 2001 dot.com shake up (O‟Reilly, 2005). Although some would say the term is still debated and
there seems little rigor in its usage, the last few years has demonstrated that there is an essential new way of
capitalizing on the use of web-technologies. The diffusion of the term has relied on a community-based „intuitive
recognition‟, since the term serves as a label for a trend and a set of new paradigms of web usage, which is
increasingly recognized by its users. Users, who at growing numbers, have found in such services a resonance
with their personal expectations.
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The principle of “the web as a platform” sheds light on the fact that the value-added moved from webapplications (such as browsers, which became mere commodities) to „services‟ over the web platform. As stated
by Roush (2005), the Internet has moved from “collection of static pages into a vehicle for software services”.
The database is where the power of the tools resides, but the tools allow the data to be managed and produce
usable information: “the value of the software is proportional to the scale and dynamism of the data it helps to
manage” (O‟Reilly, 2005, p.3)
The inherent nature of the web based on hyperlinking generates a continuous organic growth of the “collective
activity of all web users” (O‟Reilly, 2005, p.4). Most of the organizations, including many start-up companies
(e.g. eBay and Amazon) have capitalized on this principle, reaching out to all sorts of groups, including those
smaller niches, reaching out to the entire web, not just the majorities at the center (i.e. „The Long Tail‟). The
collective intelligence has been embraced also through innovative approaches, such as Wikipedia, del.ici.ous,
Flickr, Technorati, etc. Although, there might be a resistance based on the fact that these initiatives are rooted
primarily in new business models, they are definitely becoming part of everyday practice of all those with access
to computers and mobile devices.
Barrett (2006, 2007) explores “the potential for allowing students to incorporate a variety of Web 2.0 services in
their portfolios” (Barrett, 2006, p.1). Such tools have changed the way we interact with the web, and thus it is
natural to see a change in the use and perspectives on e-portfolios as well. According to Barrett, „ePortfolio 2.0‟
(as opposed to ePortfolio 1.0)8 is networked, emergent, learner-driven, focuses on individuality, is composed of
small pieces loosely joined, uses blogs and/wikis as its architectural base, tends to follow open standards and is
stored in a distributed fashion across the network. As stated by Jong and Koper (2007), blogs recently have
become a popular way of collecting personal information and learning experiences related to formal education”
(p.1) With the functionalities of comments and thus interaction, “blogs offer learners a great degree of autonomy
to structure information while also embed reflection in a peer community” (p.1) It is interesting to notice that
although unaware of the conceptual notions of e-portfolios, “A healthy culture of sharing and documenting
learning is already occurring in the field of „bloggers‟”(Siemens, 2004, p.5).
The critique in the use of such tools could flourish from those with a strict focus on full-blown systems and
universally accepted standards. However, “To assume that a standardized portfolio is required for
interoperability ignores the successful growth of simple social technologies like blogs, wikis, Rich Site Summary
(RSS) and social networking tools” (p.5)
Considering the MDE current scenario, Siemens‟ (2004) suggestion plays out as a wise advice: “In situations,
where full-scale implementation of e-portfolios is not possible, instructors can begin to foster a culture of digital
documentation by encouraging learners to practice blogging, developing simple websites, or storing their content
online” (p.6). Moreover, we also need to consider the aspect of „beta‟ development of all web 2.0 technologies,
and aspire for more capabilities than those we have had the chance to experience thus far. Ravet (2007)
translates well such vision when he states:
“… what about more sophisticated processes such as reflection and connection? Such processes
could greatly benefit from technologies issued from semantic networks such as semantic
annotation, topic maps and mind mapping. One has to recognize that current ePortfolio editing
systems have not really moved much beyond the very first paperless portfolios in their ability to
support reflective activities effectively.” (p.2)
E-portfolio systems and standards
In (Siemens, 2004), the requirements of an ideal e-portfolio system are thoroughly discussed. Basically, it should
allow flexible input, organization, retrieval, and display. The content displayed through e-portfolios is varied,
including personal information, educational history, reflective comments, feedback from instructors and peers,
awards and certificates, presentations, papers, pieces of written work, professional history, etc.
The approach considered within the University of Minnesota system (Treuer and Jenson, 2003), is one where
students, faculty and staff members at the institution should have “lifelong ownership and control of his or her
8
Barret employs here to the same framework used by O‟Reilly in explaining web 2.0 through the comparison with
web 1.0.
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individual electronic portfolio, [... to] selectively share information in that portfolio with anyone, anywhere, at
any time.” (p.34) However, what happens when the student leaves the institution to move onto further studies in
other institutions, or simply to their professional life? Would the institution of origin be able to maintain such eportfolio, and who should have control over it? Treuer and Jenson provide a long and detailed set of standards
that should serve all organizations wanting to define and implement an e-portfolio system. Such set of standards
would allow for full interoperability. Minnesota‟s initiative has involved immensely since Treuer and Jenson‟s
publication. The currently known – Efolio Minnesota (Campus Technology, 2006) is a result of the effort of
Minnesota State College and Universities system (MnSCU). It was created to serve faculty, students, alumni, and
staff. The idea of supporting alumni is critical in this initiative, because it provides the continuity of e-portfolios
beyond the lifetime of the student within the institution. Efolio Minnesota has grown “beyond the higher ed
community, expanding to provide services for all students (K-20) and residents statewide” (p.2). The system is
based on a solution provided by Avenet, and was selected after a request for proposals (RFP) process. The goals
of the project included: “supporting Minnesota students and residents at no cost to the individual user”;
“deployment of web-based multimedia tools to support the needs of the individual learner”; and “adoption of
eFolioMN by other colleges and universities – even those that compete with MnSCU” (p.2) Although the
achievements of eFolioMN are extraordinary in terms of expansion of the system and becoming a available to be
adopted by any other institution, the issues of standards and its adoption „worldwide‟ remains as an open
question, far from being resolved.
Cohn and Hibbitts (2004) go beyond the concept of a lifelong learning tool and present the concept of the
„lifetime personal web space‟ (LPWS) – a “bee-hive configured web space that possesses sufficient organizational
plasticity to accommodate the user‟s developmental capacities and needs across a lifetime” (p.8). Such space
would start at birth and accompany individuals in all their learning throughout life. “The LPWS construct will
enable users to preserve more knowledge over time and to forge richer connection between their academic and
work endeavors” (p.9). Although such concept might sound somewhat futuristic, it brings to light the nature of
the digital identify. An idea cultivated by many others in the literature.
“In this electronic age, wouldn‟t it make more sense for a student‟s multiple records of academic
performance to reside not in a separate registrar‟s offices, but in a professional academic
reservoir? Such a universal academic electronic-identify (e-identity) clearinghouse might look
much like a credit bureau, though clearly it would have to be easier to use by individuals and
institutions needing information from it.” (Ittelson, 2001, p. 44)
In the literature (Aalderink & Veugelers, 2006; Gathercoal, 2002; Greenberg, 2004; Jafari, 2004; Jafari et al,
2006; Johnson & DiBiase, 2004; Love, 2004; and Suter, 2003) there is clear and sharp push for the evolution of
e-portfolios through the doors of „standardization‟: the holy grail of achieving an electronic portfolio that can be
managed as a lifelong work in progress is found through “standardization, interoperability, a universally agreedupon set of definitions, and adoption of policies that will help guide both behavior and expectations when it
comes to copyright law and easy access to digital information” (Suter, 2003, p.1).
Other ongoing projects also translate the same ambition as eFolioMN – to define standards and become a default
system to be adopted by a growing number of institutions. Under this umbrella we can cite ePortfolio.org
platform, which is a “student-centered platform […] augmented by Project Builder and an Assessment module”
(ePortfolio.org, n.d., p.1). This platform is being used by more than 20 institutions, and is under the leadership
and development efforts of the Connecticut Distance Learning Consortium. Representatives of all these
institutions sit on the advisory board and help shape the final product. Portfolios can be created and maintained
by students, while sharing and receiving feedback from faculty, advisors and other institutional staff members.
Assessment reports can be generated based on specified rubrics. “ePortfolio is a centrally hosted application”
(p.1), which reduces the costs and complexity for campuses involved in this initiative. The platform is also
integrated to both Blackboard and WebCT Vista, “allowing for single Sign-On” (p.1) Thus, transferring work from
the respective LMS to the e-portfolio is made easy. Since the platform serves many institutions, “new users select
the institution in which they are enrolled as part of their profile. The ePortfolio is then branded with the
institution‟s logo and name.” (p.1)
In the area of consortiums, a different initiative – ePortConsortium9 has grown to prominence, where the focus
9
The Electronic Portfolio Consortium
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resides on collaborating “to define, design, and develop electronic portfolio software environment and
management systems” (ePortconsortium, n.d., p.1). Participants of this endeavor include higher education
institutions and IT organizations. The focus is “to define and adopt interoperability and transportability
measures and standards when building prototypes to test potential scenarios and conceptual environments”
(p.1). The goal is that e-portfolios developed by educational institutions and commercial enterprises will all be
compatible. The main mediator towards the research efforts in the design of such a system is Dr. Ali Jafari,
whose discussion is thoroughly addressed in the end of this section, given its currency and timeliness.
Meanwhile, many other institutions have promoted their systems, limited to their constituent body, such as Penn
State (Johnson & DiBiase, 2004) and University of Denver (Gilbert, 2005).
“The University of Denver Portfolio Community (DUPC) is a fully developed web-based
application that supports the academic community with searchable database of electronic
portfolios for students, faculty, staff and alumni, community discussion, academic program
assessment based on student work, and an assessment rubric library.” (p.1)
Although in several cases, alumni are considered as part of the stakeholders, issues of interoperability and
lifelong use of e-portfolios are not directly addressed.
The broader perspective of lifelong e-portfolio connects to the concept of virtual identity, which should managed
by each individual and used in customized way, depending on context and the individual's goal at a certain
moment in time. Longer-term views of e-portfolio bring an enormous set of challenge to its implementation,
namely institutional support, technological change, interoperability and ownership. eFolioMN‟s approach lies on
the premise that it is possible to define a set of standards to be discussed and agreed upon by all organizations
adopting e-portfolios. Based on other technological advances, much more diffused and great reach than eportfolios, such attempt seems destined to failure. Siemens (2004) notes:
“Standardization of e-portfolios is a potential challenge. Heavily regulated efforts may stifle
creativity and innovation. […] The field of learning objects, as an example, seems to be hindered
in development due to the proliferation of complex standards. The flaw in learning objects
standardization appears to be the attempt to create the system on the assumptions that
interoperability is what end users need. […] E-portfolios will be successful if the urge to
excessively standardize is resisted. Simple technologies like RSS and SOAP10 reveal that content
can be shared when interoperability is built into the sharing structure, not the
content itself.” (p.4)
This debate between highly structured and regulated institutional approaches and other more open trends is an
important one within the MDE e-portfolio project. It impacts the decisions related to requesting and pushing for
institutional involvement and support. Siemens (2004) highlights well the basis for making e-portfolios a
„personal life –learning tool‟:
“One of the most critical aspects of successful e-portfolio use is the creation of neutral e-portfolio
providers. The institution should not be in control of the portfolio. As a personal life-learning
tool, there is no place for organizational control” (p.4)
Such beliefs lead to projects involving open-source (discussed elsewhere in this paper) or e-portfolio providers
approved by the institution, which allow the user to remain in control of their own e-portfolios.
Serge Ravet from the Eifel project provides a deeper understanding of this debate (Ravet, 2007).
“The common misconception about the relation between ePortfolios (eP) and ePortfolio
Management Systems (ePMS) is that the function of an ePMS is to host ePortfolios. The main
function of an ePMS is not to host ePortfolios but to manage a process during which an
ePortfolio can be consumed or produced” (p.2)
10
Simple Object Access Protocol
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From this differentiation, Ravet arrives to a more formal definition of an e-portfolio Management System:
“A system used to manage (produce, consume and exploit elements, of individual ePortfolios for
a specific purpose – scaffolding learning, assessment, employment, competency management,
organizational learning, knowledge management, etc.” (p.4)
Looking at some of the systems discussed thus far, it is clear that most systems have been built to “fit the needs
of an organization” (Ravet, 2007, p.4). At this point, the individual learner is not at the center of the decisions
about tools to create and manage artifacts or archived materials. Thus, the learner is not in control of his/her
own digital identity. Individual ePortfolio management systems would be the answer to this issue. Ravet calls
such tool the ePortfolio organizer, which “belongs to individuals and provides them with the ability to create and
control their digital identity” (p.5) and suggests that Eifel was built to fill this void in the arena of e-portfolio
systems. “While an ePortfolio provides a snapshot of the learning state, an ePortfolio organizer should be able to
provide a deeper view and understanding of the learning process” (p.5). However, it is exactly in the area of tools
that support such „deeper understanding‟ that one finds a gap in the technologies used within e-portfolio
organizers:
“[…] there is no tool providing the kind of instant feedback a mirror would. In order to play a
role of a mirror, it is important to develop technologies that provide dynamic analysis of eportfolios through data mining and spatial representation.” (p.5)
Against most of the trends in e-portfolio systems discussed, Ravet concludes that it is not realistic to plan to have
one single provider for the hosting of an e-portfolio – “it goes against the nature of the World Wide Web” (p.5).
On the hand, it seems feasible and desirable to provide one single point of control, from which multiple services
of managing one‟s identity through the e-portfolio are available. Ravet‟s discussion is extremely timely, given the
spread of our identity imprint through blogs, social networks, wikis, etc. Ravet‟s point is that these are all
components of the e-portfolio organizer “as they hold some of the assets of an individual” (p.6). This is true for
“all services contributing to the construction and expression of one‟s digital identity” (p.6) Using IT standards
developed by several groups, one current important trend in the field of e-portfolio systems is to move “from
organization-centered IS [information system], where individuals were offered a space, to people-centered IS,
where organization‟s IS behaves as an aggregator of individual or departmental IS.” (p.9) Thus, e-portfolio
systems for organizations and individuals will take on distinct lives. There are currently many providers of
Organization e-Portfolio systems, such as Nuventive – with its iWebfolio solution that encompasses
“documentation, management and display of competencies and professional accomplishments from the
individual through the institution” (Nuventive, nd, p.1). As part of the e-portfolio organizer (e-portfolio
individual management system) set of requirements, one needs to consider elements such as “single sign on to
control of who has access to what and when” (p.9), as well as “data mining, aggregation and spatial
representation” (p.9) of individual‟s personal assets distributed across multiple systems.
In Jafari et al. (2006) the discussion of new e-learning environments encompasses similar goals. “The nextgeneration e-learning environment includes Google, IM, SMS, Web 2.0 social knowledge and software,
intelligent systems with memory and personalization of the learner‟s needs, mobile learning, wireless learning”
(p.62). The so-called „Jafari model‟ integrates five design requirements, namely: lifelong, outsourced, global,
comprehensive and smart. The lifelong aspect allows each learner to automatically have a permanent URL
forming “a lifelong repository, lifelong contact information, and a cyber-identity” (p.66). An outsourced model is
represented by “a strategic outside hosting solution that offers full-scale services to students” (p.66) independent
from the location where the learner is studying and/or working. The „global‟ reach is characterized by a system
that offers “networking and collaboration among the global communities” (p.66) beyond specific campuses or
workplace. Being „comprehensive‟ entails providing an extensive toolbox containing “all the necessary tools for
day-to-day learning and teaching tasks” (p.67). This toolbox includes tools specifically for managing one‟s eportfolio, as well as social and professional networking and various communication and collaboration tools.
Finally, being smart means to include “personal intelligent agent software” (p.70), which can support the learner
performing many of the activities and functionalities available in this system.
Despite the fact that current contextual factors are definite obstacles for pursuing solutions of this caliber for the
MDE e-portfolio, it is nonetheless essential to have a vision for an ideal implementation. Ravet and Jafari offer
such a vision, while providing proposals where the organizational support and the individual ownership and
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control are kept in balance.
4. The Proposal of an enhanced ePortfolio Initiative
Initiating an e-portfolio project can be extremely challenging (Stefani et al, 2007). The case of the MDE is not
different, but represents fertile ground for such endeavor. First, because the program has an ongoing use of
student e-portfolios, and thus the concept and the value of such tool is commonly understood. Secondly, elearning is the basis for this and all other programs within the institution. Thus, e-learning practices for teaching
and learning, assessment, and learner support are in place, are accepted and considered a reliable and authentic
education modality by all stakeholders.
In the specific case of the MDE, e-learning is also at the core of the subject matter under consideration. Thus,
MDE students not only should be able to develop their own e-portfolios, but they need to be knowledgeable of
this topic given its importance in the overall e-learning arena.
As discussed before, the e-portfolio requirement has been accomplished for the most part as an exiting task.
Although students are alerted about its requirement in the first course of the program (OMDE 601) and are then
introduced to the e-Portfolio Tutorial (Walti, 2004), most students only work actively in reflection and
organization practices for this task when they reach the final course in the program (OMDE 670). In summary,
students face the following difficulties given this practice:
 Lack of technical skills to create e-portfolios;
 Lack of understanding of the meaning and goals of the program e-portfolio;
 Loss of artifacts given the non-existence of institutional support in keeping students' works for longer
periods of time;
 Lack of experience in the reflection process of completed work;
 Lack of opportunity for revision of work based on feedback received from instructors;
 Lack of opportunities for peer and outside feedback on previous work;
 Lack of time throughout the program to select and organize meaningful artifacts; and
 Lack of performance criteria in the assessment of e-portfolios
The implementation of e-portfolios can be challenging and there a myriad of issues that need to be considered.
Lorenzo and Ittelson (2005) provide a comprehensive list of such issues, in the form of questions to be answered
by those in charge of promoting and overseeing the project. Answering such questions serves as the needed selfassessment in terms of readiness, as well as a way to identify major critical aspects during implementation. In
what follows, we discuss each of the proposed questions, based on the MDE context and findings in the literature
discussed previously.
1.
Students‟ motivation. How to we ensure that students understand the purpose of implementing eportfolios within the program?
Currently students work on this task at the end of the program, during the capstone class. Motivation
is thus associated to completing the degree, given that the e-portfolio is a requirement for degree
completion. This will continue to be in the same way, with the addition of a few assignments
throughout the course that will be tied to the e-portfolio. The determination of such assignments should
be a result of an analysis of the current MDE outcomes assessment plan, a review of all assignments
and discussion with faculty members.
2. Will the content of the e-portfolio serve as an official record?
The term official can take different meanings depending on the scope. It will be considered as an
official assignment used for assessment within the program. For now, given the fact that e-portfolios
are not adopted at an institutional level, or supported by the institution for that matter, the e-portfolio
cannot be considered as a repository of official records. Another aspect is that there is no technical
support that allows students to extract the data existent in the UMUC PeopleSoft databases. If in the
future, the institution decides to adopt the use of e-portfolios for all students, this will certainly be part
of the requirements of such system.
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3. E-Portfolio activities will be optional or mandatory?
E-portfolio activities will be mandatory as part of the capstone course. There will be a few assignments
connected to the e-portfolio in some of the courses in the program, and these will also be mandatory.
Students will be called to collect, organize and reflect after every term, through the use of e-portfolio
workshops. These will not be mandatory, but should fulfill the need to keeping students motivated,
initiating and maintaining their e-portfolios throughout their journey within the program.
4. What are the life expectancies of these e-portfolios?
The life expectancy will depend mostly on the technology that will be used. Currently, if students wish
to use institutional web space, they have access to specific servers (Nova or Polaris), and will need to
develop web pages using tools such as Dreamweaver (Adobe) for the editing, and ftp tools for the
transfer of the pages onto the servers. The lifetime of such artifacts is usually around one year after the
student completes the capstone. In this case, the e-portfolio will need to be transferred to another site in
order to avoid being permanently deleted. Students will have permanent websites if they decide to pay
for their own domain, or have Internet providers, which offer web space under their domain. Another
possibility is to consider the use of free or paid space through Web 2.0 tools. As discussed before, these
tools have given common users the possibility of being creators of content on the web, and using them
for the creation of e-portfolios is not uncommon.
5.
How is ownership defined for students‟ e-portfolios?
It is understood in same lines as Siemens (2004)’ arguments: students should maintain full ownership
of their e-portfolios, even if this means less default settings and automatic institutional support.
Students should be the ones creating, collecting, organizing and reflecting on their work portrayed
within the e-portfolio. Although there is a program requirement for such e-portfolio as an assignment,
there is a declared intent that it will be a tool to accompany students throughout their
personal/professional life, taking on the flavor chosen by the owner. If this intention will be fulfilled
will depend on the graduate’s motivation and the usefulness of such tool for further learning and
professional development.
6. Are other people allowed to make changes to the e-portfolios?
In many examples seen earlier, e-portfolio systems provided the possibility of having other people edit
or make changes in the students’ e-portfolio. Again, this will depend strictly on the e-portfolio
tool/system selected by the student. (Considering the context where the institution is not yet ready to
provide an institutional e-portfolio system). In many of the Web 2.0 tools, the user is allowed to give
access to other users. In fact, the e-portfolio could be a combination of such tools, some with access and
change rights given to others, and other components with strict access (e.g. Google docs with blogs or
wikis). An important aspect related to this issue, is the responsibility of actually collecting artifacts,
selecting and organizing them. Given the current institutional limitation (i.e. the lack of an e-portfolio
system, which automatically collects students’ works of all sorts), students will be the primary actors in
performing these basic e-portfolio functions. One activity, which needs serious consideration, is that of
“collecting”. Currently, students’ artifacts submitted through their course interface – WebTycho – is
assured to be kept intact for a maximum of a semester after the course is over. There are several layers
of storage, starting with a “live” class, going through “archived” class and finally classes that are in
“tape”. The latter can be recovered, but students are strongly discouraged of doing so, given the work
needed to recover those pieces of information. Thus, as part of the strategies discussed further in this
section, focus will be given in reiterating to students the fact that they need to take over responsibility
of collecting pieces of work, be it from any nature (e.g. conference postings, assignments, feedback
from instructors).
7.
How will the e-portfolio culture be promoted within the institution or the program?
The concept of e-portfolio is not foreign to UMUC. In fact, it has been used within the MBA for some
time. The word “portfolio” is indeed used within the WebTycho system to refer to the area where
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students can see all their contributions within a certain course: postings, assignments, group
collaboration, grades, feedback, etc. The concept is the same, but the scope is strict to the lifetime of an
ongoing class. The institution does safeguard full classes in deeper levels of storage, after they become
inaccessible to students and faculty. However, this concept is the one behind the MDE e-portfolio,
which depends on the selection, organization and reflection of students. Given the long tradition of
UMUC as a provider of distance education through the means of e-learning, the concept of an eportfolio is one simple to grasp by staff and management. The main obstacle relies on implementation
issues related to institutional support, scalability and the final resources that it will need. This will
represent the major barrier to divulge the e-portfolio concept throughout the organization. Not an
impossible task, but one that will require strategic planning and educational time. As discussed in the
strategies (further in this section), the idea will be one to start with the current MDE faculty, and
getting a buy-in from this first group. This will represent an asset when it comes to raise students’
awareness about the creation and maintenance of the e-portfolio throughout the program. Sharing the
project with the rest of the Graduate School will be certainly a second step. This will probably be done
through information sessions, and grassroots movements with other programs interested in adopting
such tool. With the collaboration and interest of other programs, it becomes easier to consider the
proposal of an institutional initiative.
8. Who will have the responsibility to train staff and students in terms of needed skills to develop and
maintain e-portfolios?
For this implementation, the staff continuously involved in the porject will be the program directors,
some of the faculty (mostly those involved in the capstone course, or whose courses contain
assignments that are part of the MDE outcomes assessment plan), possibly one TA and graduate
volunteers11. Students are expected to work autonomously in learning the necessary skills. But, as
discussed in the proposed framework – in this section, a few other initiatives will help to provide the
necessary learning for this task, including one week workshops exclusively on e-portfolios, on-going
discussions within the MDE student lounge and reminders sent from the program director to students
every semester.
9. If e-portfolios will be used as part of assessment, who is responsible for assessing it?
The MDE student e-portfolio will be assessed holistically by the instructor of the capstone course
(OMDE 670), under which the student is enrolled. Those assignments that will be required to be posted
to the e-portfolio as a result of the curriculum analysis, will be assessed and solo components, and
graded according to existing rubrics. The feedback might be then used to revise such submissions and
be a part of the student e-portfolio permanently.
10. How prescribed or creative/innovative should be students e-portfolios?
The e-portfolio “documents credentials and accomplishments to date and also serves as an ongoing
resource and record of continuing professional development.” (OMDE 670, 2008). Thus, it is our goal
to have the e-portfolio accompany students in their professional development after they graduate.
Thus, in terms of layout and form, MDE e-portfolios have no requirements, other than being webbased and easily accessible. Given the experience in other institutions, such as McDaniel’s College –
Department of Education (Kerby, 2008), where students had an exit e-portfolio as a program
requirement, it is understood that defining major requirements is beneficial in serving as guidance and
minimum standards for assessment. Thus, as discussed below, the MDE e-portfolio will also define a
set of requirements, which will then be used for assessment of completion of the work during the
capstone course. These requirements need to be tightly connected to an overall vision of the program,
as well as general expected outcomes of graduate education. Moreover, providing some clear way of
assessing the e-portfolio, shared among faculty and students, will also guide the elaboration of this
final assignment.
11
It is common for MDE graduates to look for ways to stay involved in the program, and this is one way that can be of
great value to the program and to the graduate student.
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Thus, based on the literature discussed previously and the answer to the self-assessment questions above, it is
clear that the following changes are needed in the re-implementation of the MDE e-portfolio as a program-wide
initiative:
 Definition of a minimum set of requirements and criteria in terms of structure to help students in the eportfolio development task, which includes selection, organization and reflection of their work;
 Anchoring the e-portfolio creation to the curriculum through all the courses in the program, in such a
way that students will not be confronted with the entire workload when they enter the capstone course;
 Provisioning of continuous feedback, support and motivation to keep the work on the e-portfolio as an
ongoing and evolving activity throughout the program (including works from outside of the program,
associated to professional development);
 The use of a simple rubric to guide the assessment of the e-portfolio as a final artifact during the
capstone course (OMDE 670) of the MDE program;
 Clarification of the existing institutional support and better use of the current available technologies that
do not depend on the institutional support and therefore enhance the perception and feelings of
ownership and
 Definition of Strategies for diffusion of the project and feedback from stakeholders.
The proposed framework for enhancing the e-portfolio initiative is therefore based on the following components,
which will be further discussed:
1.
Proposal of a minimum set of standardized requirements for e-portfolio structure based on information
from the literature and the outcomes assessment plan developed for the MDE;
2. Proposal of an MDE curriculum revision in order to anchor the use of e-portfolio throughout all or some
of the MDE courses;
3. Proposal of a rubric for assessment of students‟ e-portfolio during the capstone course.
4. Strategies towards an action plan that will support:
I. Student continuous involvement with the development of the e-portfolio throughout the program;
II. Student familiarity with technologies for e-portfolio development and maintenance;
III. Faculty involvement as providers of feedback for students e-portfolios;
IV. Students‟ reflection of past work;
V. Students‟ plan for their own learning process and professional goals.
VI. Diffusion of the e-portfolio value within the program and the institution.
Proposal of a minimum set of standardized requirements for e-portfolio structure – Framework component # 1
The standard requirements stated here need to be sufficient to provide students with the necessary guidelines,
while at the same time keep a certain level of freedom to allow for creativity and authenticity. The final result
should reflect the student‟s journey within the program, and reinforce the feelings of ownership in order to
promote the use of the e-portfolio as a life-long learning tool.
As a basis for possible standards for structure, we will consider two sets of information closely related to the
MDE program:
 Core Learning Areas – set by the Graduate School of Management and Technology as assessment
standards for all programs at the graduate level at UMUC; and
 Program objectives, described within the MDE outcomes assessment plan (MDE Outcomes Assessment
plan, 2007)
The core learning areas for the Graduate School of Management and Technology at UMUC are defined as follows
(Office of Outcomes Assessment, 2005):
1. Written Communication (COMM): Demonstrate competence in effective written communication.
2. Oral Communication (COMM) : Demonstrate competence in effective oral communication.
3. Technology Fluency (TECH): Demonstrate an understanding of information technology broadly enough
to apply technology productively to academic studies, work, and everyday life.
4. Information Literacy (INFO): Demonstrate the ability to use libraries and other information resources to
effectively locate, select, and evaluate needed information.
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5.
Globalization/Diversity (GLOB): Demonstrate knowledge of other cultures and the ability to respond
appropriately to a variety of cross-cultural situations.
6. Quantitative Literacy (QUAN): Demonstrate the application of mathematical and numerical reasoning
skills.
7. Critical Thinking (THIN): Demonstrate the use of analytical skills and reflective processing of
information
8. Specialized Knowledge: Demonstrate the ability to apply the disciplinary knowledge and skills
appropriate for the chosen field of study.
The first general CLAs listed are clearly addressed through the MDE Outcomes Assessment Plan (Appendix 1). In
such plan, each CLA is associated to a specific program outcome. As the tool to implement the outcomes
assessment collection of data, each CLA is associated to at least one specific course objective and finally a specific
method/tool (i.e. assignment from a specific course).
The outcomes associated to each of the CLAs are as follows:





COMM: Present summaries, essays, analyses, and recommendations in written and/or oral forms in an
effective and professional manner in the area of distance education and training
TECH: Select distance education technologies and media on the basis of the educational and operational
characteristics appropriate to organizational and student needs.
INFO: Utilize published literature for basic and applied research in the area of distance education and
training and apply techniques accepted in the field.
QUAN: Develop budgets for distance education development and delivery systems.
THIN: Evaluate the history and theory of the field of distance education based on review of the relevant
literature of the field.
The area of specialized knowledge is not directly included in the institutional outcomes assessment process, but
is obviously at the core of the competencies that students need to develop during the program. A possible
effective way to include those is to consider the overall program goals, defined as follows (excerpt from the MDE
Outcomes Assessment plan):
Upon completion of the Master of Distance Education Program, graduates will be able to:







Develop a mission and vision for the implementation of distance education within an
organization;
Function effectively as leader, manager, and team member within a distance education or
training organization;
Devise best practices in online distance education and training according to the organization's
context and needs;
Develop strategic goals and business plans for distance education within an organization;
Analyze an organizational distance education technology plan;
Manage the implementation of technology in distance delivery and design; and
Assess the necessary support services for a distance education program.
Students are never formally introduced to such a plan for the program. However, it is clear that familiarizing
with such goals is of great importance to the activity of planning your own learning and reflecting on the
achievement milestones. Students are introduced in each course to the objectives of that particular course, given
the information presented in the syllabus. The program outcomes, however, provide holistic information, which
ties to the goals of the e-portfolio (Easterling at al. 2003). Exposure and reflection about this information is thus
part of the proposed framework.
Curriculum revision and anchoring of e-Portfolio activities – Framework component # 2
The basis for including such a component in the framework is to help guide students through the program to
collect, organize and reflect on past artifacts. If we are to propose criteria for selecting such samples, anchoring
this activity within specific courses, will help students avoid postponing the activity. The challenges here are the
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involvement of faculty and assessing the volume of change required in the curriculum. In order to make this into
a more feasible task, the initial suggestion is to avoid changing current assignments. Instead, the anchoring could
be done by simply selecting specific assignments, and requiring students to post those within their e-portfolio
during the specific class they are taking. The assignment will be graded on its own merit (by the instructor of that
course), but the posting of the assignment within the e-portfolio (or any other accessible place over the web) will
be counted with a percentage of the grade. Given the timeframe of this project, the proposal will not include
definitive choices. It will entail an initial suggestion for criteria to be used in selecting the assignments, to be
further discussed with faculty and implemented accordingly.
Initial suggestion of criteria for target assignments/courses:
 Utilize core courses so we have common guidelines for all students, and not differentiated guidelines for
students in different specializations;
 Select one assignment at the most per course, such that the faculty members are not overwhelmed with
activities that involve the e-portfolio and are not forced to change significantly the grading schemes used
thus far;
 Select the assignments that best reflect the outcomes of the program and revise such outcomes if they‟re
not the correct matches for the existing core courses.
Rubric for assessment of students’ e-portfolio within OMDE 670 (Capstone) – Framework component # 3
Although the underlying belief is that the MDE e-portfolio should be owned by students, managed by students,
and reflect their personal learning journey, the e-portfolio is part of the required assignments within OMDE 670
– the capstone course. Thus, providing a rubric (based on the expectations discussed in this document) to be
shared with students and used by the OMDE 670 instructor for the purpose of assessment is definitely an urgent
need. It serves the purpose of being a guideline of performance to students, and supports the assessment process
for the faculty member.
The rubric displayed here, should be taken as an initial proposal. This proposal will be discussed and enhanced
based on the feedback from instructors involved in the capstone course, as well as MDE managers. The proposal
is based on the goals and the changes proposed in this document. It is evident that instructors will need to use
some discretion when applying such rubric, because many students entering OMDE 670 will not have been
exposed to the new e-portfolio initiative long enough in order to have their e-portfolios as an ongoing activity.
Moreover, OMDE 670 course remains a course to be assessed with Pass or Fail, instead of a letter grade. Thus,
the rubric should in fact provide the means for formative assessment, helping students enhance heir e-portfolios,
and consider it strongly as a lifelong learning tool.
The proposed analytical rubric (Barrett, 2003), will be based on the following major aspects:



Content
o Artifacts
o Reflections
Design
Technical
The levels of performance will be 3 (in order to keep it simple to use and understand), namely Poor, Good and
Excellent. „Poor‟ reflects below expectations, „Good‟ stands for achieving minimal expectations and „Excellent‟
refers to those e-portfolios that go beyond the basic requirements.
The table below describes this rubric initial proposal (Klein, 2003).
Criteria
Content:
Artifacts
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Poor
The student showcases no or a
minimal number of artifacts,
which do not sufficiently
demonstrate the expected
competencies (CLAs of GSMT &
programmatic goals).
Good
The student showcases
several artifacts and these
demonstrate most of the
expected competencies (CLAs
of GSMT & programmatic
goals).
Excellent
The student showcases a
variety of artifacts, which
demonstrate the expected
competencies (CLAs of GSMT
& programmatic goals).
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The collection of artifacts is
based on the required
components, but does not
include all the required
elements or any other produced
during the program.
The student does not include
artifacts that go beyond those
produced within the program,
and the CV is not included.
Content:
Reflections
Design
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The student does not include
artifacts that go beyond those
produced within the program,
although the CV is included.
The collection of artifacts is
based on the required
components, as well as others
that the student has selected
him/herself for specific
purposes.
The student includes artifacts
that go beyond those
produced within the
program, including the
professional CV.
The student either does not
provide a general summative
reflective statement about the
MDE experience, or the one
provided is poor and does not
convey any details about
his/her learning experience.
The student provides a
general summative reflective
statement about the MDE
experience, but this could be
broader and provide more
details about his/her learning
experience.
Reflections are not related to
artifacts; many reflections are
missing and/or need
substantial improvement and
revision; reflections overall are
of poor quality.
Reflections are related to
artifacts; some reflections are
missing/and or need of
improvement and revision;
reflections overall are of good
quality.
The design of the e-portfolio
does not reflect student‟s
choices and interests.
The design of the e-portfolio
reflects student‟ choices and
interests for the most part.
Reflections demonstrate
growth over time; reflections
are well written and reveal
depth and breadth of
experiences, keeping a
personal perspective;
reflections overall are of
excellent quality.
The design of the e-portfolio
reflects student‟ choices and
interests.
The e-portfolio lacks
organization and has very little
evidence of personalization.
The e-portfolio is organized
and has some evidence of
personalization.
The e-portfolio is well
organized and demonstrates
uniqueness and creativity.
The e-portfolio barely includes
visual aspects and does not
demonstrate use of graphics,
audio and text elements.
The e-portfolio has some
good visual aspects and
demonstrates good use of
graphics, audio, and text
elements.
The e-portfolio is highly
visual and demonstrates
excellent use of graphical,
audio, and text elements.
The e-portfolio is limited and
has a strict design that will not
allow for any expansion or
continuous use beyond this
course.
Technical
The collection of artifacts is
based on the required
components, but does not go
beyond the basic
requirements, with other
works produced during the
program.
The navigation of the site is
confusing and counter intuitive.
Many links do not work, and
access to external components
The e-portfolio has a design
that will possibly allow for
continuous use, but might be
a bit too strict for expansion
in the future.
The navigation is clear for the
most part, but not always
intuitive. Most of the links
work and accessing external
The student provides a
general summative reflective
statement about the MDE
experience.
The student provides
reflective statements related
to the course work and
connected to the artifacts that
are displayed in the eportfolio.
The e-portfolio has a design
that allows for continuous
use and thus has high
potential of becoming a
lifelong learning tool.
The navigation of the site is
very clear and intuitive. All
the links work and accessing
external components is error28
E-portfolios from concept to implementation…
OMDE 670 9040 – spring’08
generates many errors.
The web environment will not
allow any future use.
components is error-free for
almost all of them.
The Web environment might
allow future use, but
management will not be
uncomplicated.
free.
Web environment allows for
future use and easy
management.
As in all rubrics, this is a work in-progress. Faculty members will be able to propose changes and enhancements
as they use this rubric to provide feedback to students. It is suggested that such feedback be used in a formative
fashion: students will be able to work on their e-portfolios based on this feedback, and possibly bring it to higher
levels of performance in all criteria.
Action plan strategies – Framework component # 4
The action plan described below involves one core endeavor: the creation of a short voluntary workshop – here
named MDE e-portfolio workshop – available to ALL students, to be held through an online environment12
during the first two weeks of each term. This MDE e-portfolio workshop should serve as an active mechanism of
supporting the e-portfolio activities, reminding students of the importance of maintaining their e-portfolios
throughout their program, and clarifying questions related to technology and structure. Being in the early weeks
of each term, such workshops should work as triggers for students‟ awareness and readiness for activities to be
performed during that particular semester, as well as making sure that artifacts from the previous semester are
appropriately stored and reflections of previous course work is also completed and validated. These workshops
will also provide the needed channel of feedback about the e-portfolio initiative, which will help its revision and
enhancement according to students‟ needs. At this time, these workshops are planned to be offered by the
program director, with possible support from MDE graduate volunteers and one TA. Faculty will be informed
about such workshops, and those interested in participating will be welcome to do so.
I. Strategy for increased and ongoing student involvement
The increase of student involvement throughout the program in building their own e-portfolio will
result from greater communication of this topic within ongoing courses every semester. This
should be done by the program director through the faculty teaching these classes, through
standard messages happening early in each course and at the end of each term. The invitation to
the workshops, which ultimately will contribute to student involvement as well, will be done
through such messages (sent to each class), through the MDE blog (http://mdeblog.blogspot.com)
and the MDE student lounge (http://groups.google.com/group/MDE-lounge).
II. Strategy for increased familiarity with technologies
Given the lack of an existing institutional tool, the guidelines for technological tools will be revised
to include existing possibilities of open source systems and web 2.0 based tools. Students will be
given free range of choice. During the workshops the topic of technologies will certainly be at the
forefront. Students are not required to choose the technology right away, and will be able to work
on collection, organization and reflection without necessarily having chosen the technology that
they will use to implement the e-portfolio. The awareness and the continuous discussion about the
tools available is an important one, not only because of the e-portfolio activity, but also for
students‟ general information on topics related to e-learning in general.
III. Strategy for faculty involvement;
Faculty involvement and support of this initiative is of crucial importance. The strategies for
involving faculty start with information sessions that will happen during regular MDE faculty
meetings. Faculty involved in the capstone will have a prominent role in this process, as
ambassadors of such activity and as actors of the decisions related to the new initiative. These
12
The online environment for the MDE e-portfolio workshop could be the existing MDE Student Lounge, or a separate
environment. A separate environment has the advantage of not cluttering the lounger with this discussion, but will require
students to sign-up for the workshop. The MDE Student Lounge will certainly be used to advertise the event to students, as
well as through the ongoing classes each term.
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faculty will be the first to discuss the new proposal, before it is in brought to the entire faculty
group. The definition of the assignments that will be the anchors of the e-portfolio activities within
courses will be determined through discussions with faculty currently involved with a particular
course and MDE directors. Any faculty member wishing to be closely involved with the e-portfolio
development will be welcome to take part in the MDE e-portfolio workshops.
IV. Strategy for student’s reflection activity;
Through the analysis of the existing e-portfolios, it is clear that the activity of reflection on the
learning from each course throughout the program is limited and that there is no practice of
reflection on one‟s own past work. During the MDE e-portfolio workshops, one of the core
activities will be to consider the previous semester, assess major learning achievements, and select,
organize and reflect on past artifacts. For those students with an existing e-portfolio environment,
this will support the regular updating and maintenance of the e-portfolio. For those students, who
do not yet have an e-portfolio, this is a good opportunity to start planning on its creation, while at
the same time making sure that artifacts are carefully collected and that the reflections of such
pieces of work is done in timely manner.
V. Strategy for students’ planning for their own learning process and professional goals.
A final activity during the MDE e-portfolio workshop will be to have students reflect and possibly
journal on their current goals for the learning of that particular semester and professionally for the
near future. Longer-term goals are sometimes difficult to be clearly described without the practice
of reflection over previous achievements. Setting shorter-term goals and reflection of past courses
and one‟s own work, should help student set such longer-term goals.
VI. Strategy for diffusion of the e-portfolio value within the program and the institution.
The diffusion of the value of e-portfolio value within the program will happen through faculty
meetings and workshops with students. At the institutional level, the plan constitutes of
information sessions to be developed possibly after one year of the implementation of the activities
described above. At the same time, given the fact that several key UMUC staff people are members
of the MDE faculty group, the diffusion will certainly happen at a different level in an earlier stage.
It is important that such institutional conversation/negotiation be done when it is definitely clear
for the MDE what kind of support the program needs from the organization. The risk is that in
bringing in greater institutional involvement, standardization will become the main focus of the
process. This may blur the programmatic goal that such project has taken so far, which is one of a
student-centered life-long learning task.
1-year schedule for implementation of action plan
Below is an initial time frame for the action plan involving the activities discussed previously.







June-July‟2008: initial discussions with capstone faculty and cleaning of the current proposal, followed
by discussions within faculty meetings and with specific faculty members concerning the definition of
anchoring assignments.
July-August‟2008: planning of first workshop
August-early September‟2008: promotion of the workshop among students
Early September‟2008: offering of first workshop and assessment of value of such activity and
suggestions for change for next offering.
September-November‟2008: discussion and implementation of anchoring assignments (this might be
done in phased way, with a few assignments during the fall and then others in the next two terms,
depending on course offerings and on feasibility)
January‟2009: discussion of the results from the use of anchoring assignments
Late January‟2009: 2nd iteration of the workshop and assessment of participation and results.
5. Conclusions and further thoughts
In finalizing this paper, it is clear that beyond its original and objective intent of re-visiting the MDE current eportfolio implementation, and using the literature to shed light on a new enhanced MDE e-portfolio proposal, we
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achieve such goal accompanied by an important secondary result: a renewed understanding of the e-portfolio
development scenario and a the encounter with current questioning about e-portfolio implementation, which
were not under consideration when the MDE e-portfolio initiative was first launched.
One such questioning is well depicted in the tradeoff between flexibility and standardization discussed by
Siemens (2004). The trend towards standardized tools and services in one hand might be responsible for a larger
e-portfolio market. However, the price paid for such a massive adoption is less freedom and flexibility.
Another related and recent issue, that of using e-portfolios as an assessment tool for purposes of re-accreditation
has had a significant impact on the meaning of e-portfolios and its perspective for learning. Trend Baston (2007)
states – “The idea of the electronic portfolio in higher education in the US has transmuted from a focus on
learning to a focus on accountability.” (p.1) This results in a confusion of learning e-portfolios – “emphasizing
student ownership of their own work over their time in college” (p.2) – with assessment management systems.
Ayala (2006) confirms such trend when he questions if electronic portfolios are in fact student-centered. He
points out that the research is slim when it comes to students‟ perception and opinions on the use of e-portfolios.
So far, most of the research has focused on the views of administrators and faculty.
Ittelson, on the other hand, reflects on the importance of e-portfolios as an assessment instrument, and the
multitude of issues that need attention. How should e-portfolios be assessed? Do standardized and accepted
rubrics exist? The emphasis on accountability has placed e-portfolio at center stage.
However, the use of e-portfolios as an assessment tool might be hiding a positivist attitude, focused on the needs
of educational organizations. Ayala (2006) states that for the most part the current development in the eportfolio field has been an attempt to solve curricular problems.
In the proposal for an enhanced e-portfolio experience within the MDE, we aspire to maintain the „learning
nature‟ of students‟ e-portfolios. Another aspiration is that MDE e-portfolios will have an enduring life in
promoting students potential of reflecting on their accomplishments, planning the future learning and
controlling their showcase of artifacts as evidence of acquired professional competencies. Siemens (2004) alerts
us of the challenges of achieving lifelong learning e-portfolios, re-affirming the need for having the learner in
control of the process and the product. Institutions should help clarify the concepts , but it is the learner who will
drive the effective use of this tool. Once more, the learner‟s control over his/her own identity is at stake.
In the path to achieve such authenticity and the balance between organizational support, individual ownership,
lifelong learning span, we need to work on providing students with the necessary tools, while maintaining the
breathing space for reflection and creativity. We are faced with an inherent obstacle of dealing with adult
learners and their everyday balancing act to accomplish professional, personal and academic goals. Learners
might not see the value of e-portfolios in the beginning of the learning process and/or have difficulties on
contributing to the e-portfolios before it actually becomes a requirement.
The proposal discussed in this project takes these limitations under consideration, aspires for higher goals under
the contextual institutional boundaries. This plan, just like an individual e-portfolio is a work in progress, which
takes shape based on accomplishments, feedback from stakeholders and on the institutional scenario.
Nonetheless, the unique spirit of e-portfolios needs to be kept throughout this journey:
“A portfolio tells a story. It is the story of knowing about things… Knowing oneself… Knowing an
audience… Portfolios are students‟ own stories of what they know, why they believe they know it,
and why others should be of the same opinion. A portfolio is opinion backed by fact… Students
prove what they know with samples of their work” (Paulson & Paulson in Barrett & Garrett, p.1)
6. References
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