JISC

JISC and SURF: Shared challenges, joint efforts, essential gains

Online Educa is the world's largest international e-learning conference, attracting over 1,700 strategists and practitioners from more than 60 different countries.  The conference is accompanied by an exhibition and demonstration area, where delegates can learn about the latest products or services of leading international e-learning companies.

SURF and JISC are the national organisations for the Netherlands and the UK charged with championing the role of information and communications technology in education.  Our two organisations signed a Memorandum of Understanding last year, committing us to a closer working partnership and a programme of collaborative work.  We are adopting an innovative joint presence at this years' Online Educa conference by demonstrating our joint activity to date and showcasing some leading European developments, including:

• A joint Dutch-UK pre-conference workshop on open access development
• Policy session on how European policy on lifelong learning meets national strategies
• Speakers and contributors to several conference sessions
• A joint e-learning exhibition 'market' in the Wintergardens exhibition area, showcasing a range of JISC and SURF projects, tools and activities.  The joint e-learning exhibition 'market' will centre on the two organisations' activities in the areas of e-learning, open access, access management and e-framework developments.

A schedule of joint JISC and SURF activities is below:

Wednesday 29 November:
15.00–18.00 Open Access in research and education (pre conference workshop #18)
18.00–19.00 Drinks reception in the exhibition market (exhibition market booth #C99, Wintergartens)  

Thursday 30 November:
12.00-13.30 Grassroots, individual staff development (session UNI12)
14.30-15.30 e-Framework concept and e-Portfolio for student flexibility (session LIF15)
16.15-17.30 Trust Federations and Federated Identity Management (session UNI37)  

Friday 1 December:
09.30-11.00 Links between research community and e-learning sector (Plenary session)
11.45-13.15 EU policy meets national strategies (session LIF51)
13.00-14.00 TEN Competence EU project drinks reception (exhibition market booth #C99, Wintergartens)

To find out more about the partnership activities, please contact Louisa Dale (JISC Partnership Manager) or Bas Cordewener (Manager International Collaboration, SURF) email: cordewener@surf.nl tel: 00 31 (0)30 234 66 00