It is a challenging time to be educating the next generation of learners. As fees increase, so do the expectations of learners who need top-quality courses with a broad appeal that equip them effectively for future employment. Keeping the curriculum responsive to these changing demands is essential to any institution’s marketing and learning and teaching strategies.
Planning and designing the curriculum involves every aspect of the business from market research and course development to quality assurance and enhancement, resource allocation, timetabling, recruitment and assessment.
During the past two year I have been working on the Transforming Curriculum Delivery through Technology Programme which funded 15 projects based in universities and colleges with the aim of enhancing curriculum design and delivery through innovative uses of technology.
This work has focused on some of the key challenges that universities and colleges all face such as: improving motivation, achievement and retention; managing large cohorts; supporting remote and distance learners; engaging learners with feedback; ensuring ongoing responsiveness to stakeholder needs and delivering resource efficiencies which enhance rather than reduce the quality of the learning experience. By exploring new, creative and flexible models of delivering curriculum we have learned more about how and where technology can add value and even transform the way in which the curriculum is delivered in different contexts.
We’ve found, for example, that students’ learning can benefit from efficient, integrated systems. At Lewisham college, for example, students on the new 14-19 diploma course are no longer dealing with printouts but getting instant access to their timetables, attendance and punctuality records through the college’s new learning portal. The result is more motivated students who are more in control of their own progress, as student Sherrane Scott highlighted, “I use [the portal] for many things. The main use for me is to check my work in the courses section of the site. I use it because it is useful and convenient. It is also set out in a clear and understandable way.“
If you are interested in finding out more about this project, and the other work in the programme and want to understand more about the potential of technology-enhanced curricula on , our new guide Transforming curriculum delivery through technology: Stories of challenge, benefit and change is now available. This guide provides an overview of the outcomes from the programme and offers some insights into the ways in which institutions and individual curriculum areas can make use of technology to respond more robustly to the demands of a changing world. Copies can be downloaded or ordered from www.jisc.ac.uk/curriculumdeliveryguide (allow 2 weeks for delivery). For further information about the work of the projects and access to all our programme-related resources, please see the Design Studio. A recording of a presentation I gave recently providing an overview of the programme and its achievements, is also available.
Accompanying the guide, our latest radio show in the ‘JISC On Air’ series looks at how technology can deliver curriculum changeand includes interviews with representatives from projects involved in the programme whodiscuss the impact achieved in two very different contexts and disciplines.
