JISC

Purpose Ensuring the DNER meets the needs of staff and students in Further Education

Aim and Objectives

The JISC's Distributed National Electronic Resource will be developed to better meet the needs of staff and students in Further Education. This aim will be achieved by meeting the following objectives:

• Understand the Further Education sector through continuing collaboration with existing agencies, expansion of relevant representation on committees, and proactive consultation
• Develop collections to include new resources more directly relevant to the Further Education curriculum
• Tailor existing JISC collections and services to be more relevant to the needs of the Further Education sector
• Stimulate the sustainable embedding of collections in the Further Education community, and evaluate their effectiveness in improving learning and teaching outcomes.

FE is now a full funding partner in the JISC. As a stakeholder FE can expect real benefits from the considerable success that JISC has enjoyed in the development and provision of high quality services and leading edge technological advance. The provision of content services for FE will enable needs to be met in complement and collaboration with HE, and in seeking to meet the needs of FE JISC will ensure that FE representatives play a full and active part in policy formation, monitoring and development. It is likely that addressing the needs of FE will accelerate change and broaden and deepen the scope of services that JISC has to offer to all users.

The development of a full range of DNER services for FE can only be a long-term project. This plan is therefore a modest beginning to a serious agenda. Wherever possible though integration should proceed as quickly as possible in order to establish engagement and ownership. In the long term JISC will be a key player in planning, developing and managing post-16, "lifelong" learning. In the short term JISC will establish content and services that can quickly begin to provide support to all aspects of learning and teaching in FE.

This document outlines a number of developments required to deliver high quality collections and services for FE. The intention is to form an overall action plan for the next two to three years, through which a number of interlocking activities can be understood and managed, minimising duplication and the uneven results of an ad-hoc and largely reactive approach.

Two key points should be noted from the outset. Firstly, the JISC has a remit for the whole UK, and this plan attempts a UK wide perspective. Where appropriate, particular reference is made to agencies and organisations of individual territories. Where such references are not made the document should be read as inclusive of all territories in the UK. Secondly, unlike other sector bodies that serve the needs of teachers and practitioners only, the JISC will offer services for teachers, practitioners and learners.

It should also be emphasised that proposals and activities in this plan can and should be amended in the light of conclusions from JCALT's Needs Analysis of the UK Further Education Sector, 2000/01 and continuing consultation with the FE sector.

In producing this plan a careful balance has been struck between reflecting the results of consultation with representatives of the FE sector and laying out a vision for a future DNER environment that is tailored for the rapidly changing strategic needs of the FE sector. We have tried very hard in the plan to strike a balance between many, sometimes conflicting and nearly always complex factors and issues to create a plan that is realistic, relevant, meaningful, manageable and sustainable.

This reflects the very great challenge of culture change that is required in order for the DNER to make the dramatic impact on learning and teaching experiences that it has the potential to have. As many of the services in it were designed with HE in mind, not FE, why should we assume that staff and students in FE will use them? The fact is that we do not make this assumption, but accept that thoughtful tailoring, gradual but radical culture change both in FE and the DNER, and time will be essential ingredients of any success.

The challenges facing us in transforming the DNER into a useful information environment for FE are considerable. This challenge is captured in the JISC Draft Strategy 2001-05:

    5.3.3 The DNER has, to date, been built for the research community. Its applicability to learning and teaching has been improved over the past few years but usage by students is still relatively low. A sustained programme of awareness raising along with measures to improve ease of use for learning and teaching is required. This will require improved finding aids and elementary portals as well as the development of sophisticated personalised search engines.

    5.5.4 JISC will continue to seek and procure datasets of wide applicability to the spread of subjects in HE and FE. It is particularly important to build up a collection of datasets of relevance to FE. This will continue to mean pushing boundaries of electronic resource types that are currently in use in these communities, and will also mean the provision of learning and teaching materials within the DNER.

    5.5.9 The range of information available will be expanded. The majority of information on the DNER at present are primary and secondary sources (e.g. key bibliographic resources, electronic journals, datasets such as the Census data, Ordnance Survey Digital maps, and facsimiles of historic materials). The JISC will encourage the inclusion of learning materials at all levels of granularity .... Furthermore, some work will be undertaken to adapt some existing collections for incorporation in learning management environments.

There are wider, perhaps more political concerns, too. It is no secret that many prominent people in FE had, and still have, reservations about what JISC may bring to FE. The experience of many people in FE of collaboration with HE has all too often been a rather negative one. Regardless of reality this is the widespread perception. HE services are not necessarily prized. This inevitably makes people wary and perhaps rather sceptical. We cannot simply tack on " ... and colleges" to a list of DNER stakeholders and expect people to think that this will represent value for money for them or will be a service appreciated by people in colleges.

Currently the FE sector is roughly 3 times the size of HE. It certainly has a far more diverse range of courses, qualifications and type of learners (it is often quoted that FE has some 20,000 different qualifications and courses on offer across the UK), from level one basic education right through degrees and post-graduate qualifications. In spring 2001 the Learning and Skills Council will replace the FEFC, and we will see the generation of the new L & S community. The new funding body will take over funding responsibilities for the Training and Enterprise Councils, some community education programmes in LEAs, funding of private training providers as well as all FE colleges in England. We should soon have more visible and tangible elements of the People's Network (public libraries) as well as the work of the Regional Development Agencies. All of this has been central to the Government's thinking on the LSC, and the LSC will play a pivotal role in joining this up. Then there is the Ufi of course, and the growing possibility that its 3000 odd hours of learning materials may increasingly be available to FE in general, especially as metadata standards are adopted and all colleges purchase a Virtual Learning Environment. It is a challenge for us to ensure that DNER collections and services will be equally valued, and that the JISC's considerable experience in interoperability standards can contribute to producing a sustained user experience across these diverse services and learning providers

Understanding the Further Education Information and Learning Technology (ILT) Landscape

The FE sector is undergoing rapid and extensive change and development in the application of ILT. Here is a brief outline of some of the major developments, for information and background.

The Learning and Skills Council (LSC)

In April 2001 the LSC will replace the FEFC in England. The LSC will take over funding responsibilities for FE in England as well as subsume Training and Enterprise Councils and many community education programmes. The LSC will have an estimated total annual budget of around £6 billion to fund the learning and training of 5 to 6 million people.

It is intended that widely recognised weaknesses in existing funding arrangements for online learning will be addressed. The DfEE has stated that the LSC must:

• recognise the individual learner's need for flexibility and their potentially irregular pattern of learning
• place less emphasis on formal qualifications – in other words to fund learning whether or not it leads to a formal qualification
• look at new ways to support online learners over distance
• recognise that learners increasingly use a mixture of traditional and online learning

Activity One JISC staff will continue to monitor developments regarding the LSC, and look at ways to offer appropriate advice and guidance based on the JISC's extensive experience of online service delivery and technological advance. The DNER can offer quality services under the new funding structures. It will be the responsibility of the Collections Manager for Learning Materials to engage in dialogue with the new LSC, in conjunction with JISC ASSIST.

The National Learning Network and its 'central repository'

The National Learning Network (NLN) is the umbrella term used to describe the entire package of measures that have arisen from David Blunkett's announcement in December 1998 of a £74 million three-year government investment in Information and Learning Technology (ILT) in Further Education in England. This sum will be supplemented by the £100 million that colleges are estimated to spend annually on ILT. The programme supports an all-embracing approach to ILT that will improve hardware and connectivity, develop staff skills, provide learning materials and guide effective learning, teaching and management. Detailed implementation plans developed by the FEFC's ILT Committee (FEILTC) cover finance and timescales for:

    1. A 2Mbps primary connection to JANET for all 400+ sector colleges in England, with ISP services provided free of charge by UKERNA for the duration of the project.

    2. A technical support centre in each of the nine FEFC regions (the Regional Support Centres [RSCs]) in England (note: there are RSCs for the whole UK – 13 in total. In England they form a part of the NLN)

    3. Financial support to update LANs and computer equipment.

    4. Financial support for technician training.

    5. Support for managers, including guidance on producing an ILT strategy, on the total cost of ILT ownership and on benchmarking LAN performance.

    6. Functional and technical guidance on Managed Learning Environments (MLE), and purchase of MLE licences.

    7. Development of a FENTO-validated programme of staff ILT competencies, supported by a wide-reaching online ICT training resource.

    8. An ILT and Manager Champions residential programme to enable two delegates from each college to update their skills and understanding and cascade training back to colleagues.

    9. Audit and mapping of currently available materials to support ILT-based learning.

    10. Commissioning and purchase of new materials to support ILT-based learning.

    11. Finance to support in-house development of materials and the acquisition of multimedia authoring skills by college staff.

In support of point 10 above, the NLN will develop a central repository of materials mapped to the FE curriculum. The NLN team at Becta has carried out a rigorous EU procurement process to test potential suppliers for new materials and six suppliers have been selected and contracted to produce materials. All the suppliers have demonstrated expertise in developing educational materials using multimedia, knowledge of the FE curriculum, and a clear pedagogic approach to learning on-line. Successful bidders will develop materials in:
*  Amenity Horticulture, Level 2
*  Floristry, Level 2
*  Hospitality and Catering, Levels 1,2
*  Business Studies, Levels 1,2
*  Health Studies, Levels 1,2
*  Generic Science, Level 2
*  Key Skills: Communications, Levels 1,2,3
*  Wider Key Skills: Working with Others, Improving Own Learning, Performance and Problem Solving, Levels 1,2
*  Wider Key Skills: Working with and Integrated Training Systems Others, Improving Own Learning Performance and Problem Solving, Levels 1,2,3
*  General Basic Education, Level 1
*  Application of Number, Levels 1,2,3
*  Mathematics, Level 2
*  Communications, Levels 1,2,3
*  Art and Design, Levels 1,2
*  Hair and Beauty, Level 2

Over £5 million has been allocated over two years to develop a range of high quality, Web-based ILT materials, spanning the FE Curriculum, with particular focus on key skills. It is intended that users – tutors and practitioners, rather than learners – will be able to access the repository online via web interfaces and download materials to their local machines or networks. The materials will generally be free but some may be charged for.

At the time of writing there has been some discussion that the repository may be hosted by a JISC-funded service on behalf of the NLN. At the very least it has been agreed that the "central repository" and DNER collection hosting services must be interoperable. If the central repository is hosted by the JISC an important consideration will be required hardware and its corresponding technical support and maintenance.

The first examples of materials should appear in the central repository in March 2001, and will be expanded over the following two years. It is essential that the development of content services on the DNER take account of content in the NLN central repository.

Hosting the NLN central repository at a JISC-funded service will also provide a platform from which to serve learning materials deposited by Colleges for sharing with others and would ensure that, subject to appropriate licensing conditions, the materials were accessible to FE users throughout the UK. It would enable cost-effective concentration of technical expertise necessary for successful hosting and delivery of services, and would ensure that materials could be delivered in a way so as to be interoperable with the DNER, NLN, and other relevant lifelong learning networks.
Activity Two: A budget is established for hosting the NLN repository at a JISC data centre, and to commission (in consultation with Becta) a scoping document for its architecture, interoperability, and hardware requirements. This repository should ideally be able to serve learning materials procured by Becta, but also be extensible to serve learning materials developed by other agencies and institutions in the FE sector, including the JISC.

Budget: £200,000 in 2000/2001; £50,000 for 2001/2002; £50,000 for 2002/2003

The University for Industry and the Scottish University for Industry (Ufi & SUfi)

The Ufi and SUfi aim to offer an entirely new approach to adult lifelong learning. They will offer more flexible learning programmes, allowing people the choice to learn at times and places to suit them and their work, lifestyle or domestic commitments.

The DfEE has stated that it expects the Ufi to be a key strategic and business partner in the LSC in England, both at a regional and national level. Close ties have already been formed between the NLN and the Ufi, particularly between Becta and the Ufi around the issue of content interoperability and standards. Formal agreements exist to ensure that both agencies work to common standards when developing and procuring learning content.

There are organisational and other differences between the SUfi and the Ufi in England, and the JISC must take account of this. In particular, the SUfi does not deploy "hub" centres, as in England, but operates directly through its learning centres. Also, SUfi learning materials are adapted for the Scottish context.

In England the Ufi will have a high street brand name of learndirect, and is expected to focus on three of the Government's priority areas in lifelong learning – basic skills, ICT and SMEs – together with four industrial sectors. At launch it is expected that around 60% of learndirect learning will be delivered online, with a target of between 75% and 90% by 2003.

It is imperative for the DNER to establish a good working relationship with the Ufi and SUfi in order to offer materials and content that will supplement and enhance Ufi and SUfi materials and vice versa, and ensure use of appropriate interoperability standards to support this collaboration.

Since the full SUfi and learndirect service is very new, and learndirect will be developing and delivering its own learning materials, it is unlikely that there will be interoperation with the DNER in the short or even medium term. It is very unlikely that there will be any tangible product of collaboration by August 2001. Nonetheless learndirect is an important and key player in lifelong learning and as such it is important that the longer term potential interoperability between SUfi, learndirect and the DNER is accommodated and planned for. We must avoid the situation where materials in learndirect and the DNER will not interoperate if and when the need arises. User experiences of Sufi, learndirect, and the DNER should be as consistent and seamless as possible.
Activity Three: A formal working relationship should be established between the Collections Manager, Learning Materials and counterparts in the Ufi and SUfi, with a view to DNER materials enhancing Ufi & SUfi materials in the longer term. There is enormous potential for collaboration and enhancement through emerging metadata standards and through new learning technologies that offer real interoperation based on those standards. The new Metadata Education Group could form the appropriate mechanism in which this relationship and potential interoperation is fostered. The JISC-funded Interoperability Focus at UKOLN is a member of this group.

ILT Champions, Manager Champions, and LRC Managers

As part of the NLN initiative colleges in England have been asked to appoint members of staff as ILT Champions. An ILT Champion will be expected to regularly update their skills and to disseminate training and help and advice about the use of ILT in teaching and learning within their institution. It is up to individual colleges to appoint their champions, but the NLN emphasises that they are expected to be non-technical practitioners. There is also a legacy of ILT Champion activities through older programmes such as the Quality in Teaching and Learning (QUILT) programme. The FE community is quite advanced in this area of staff development.

Colleges also have been asked to designate Manager Champions. These staff, along with LRC Managers are essential information intermediaries with whom to work closely.
Activity Three : Wherever possible the DNER team should form links with managers responsible for co-ordinating college ILT Champions, Manager Champions, and LRC Managers in England. In Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland the JISC will need to form links with those undertaking similar roles in colleges. This may be achieved in a number of ways in addition to formal contact with named individuals and visits to their colleges. This includes events and dissemination workshops (outlined later in this document), through informal contact, through RSCs, through agencies such as the Scottish Further Education Unit, and through the DNER services themselves.

Regional Support Centres (RSCs)

Thirteen Regional Support Centres have been established in the UK, including nine in the English regions of the FEFC (as part of the NLN), a centre in Wales, one in Northern Ireland and two in Scotland. RSCs provide a variety of network and infrastructure support services to colleges as part of the programme of connectivity to JANET. Emphasis is placed on collaboration at regional level between FE and HE institutions and other regional bodies such as the National Information and Learning Technology Association (NILTA).

RSCs also play an important role in, firstly, communication between the regions and the central committees of JISC, and secondly in helping to disseminate and raise awareness about JISC services.

This latter dissemination and awareness role formed part of the planned Phase Two development of the RSCs during 2001. In fact we have already learned from the RSCs that there is now an urgent need to outline the benefits of the JANET connection to FE colleges. During 2001 there will be opportunities to utilise the important role of the RSCs in the dissemination and feedback process. JISC ASSIST will obviously play a major part in helping the RSCs raise awareness and use of JISC services across the board, but the DNER should now consider how it in particular will "train the trainers" in the RSCs and in JISC Assist.

Mechanisms must also be developed by which RSC staff can notify the DNER team of problems/gaps in collections and services. A helpful development is that many RSCs are identifying a member of staff to lead on content/service issues. This person can serve as the key point of two-way contact between the DNER team and each RSC.

To firmly place the RSCs in a position to train-the-trainers, we would like to organise a 3-day residential workshop for 1 member of staff from each RSC, one member of staff from each DNER service, the DNER team, JISC FE ops members, and national FE leaders in the field of ILT integration with the curriculum and the culture change in FE associated with ICT innovation (e.g. Markos Tiris and Kevin Donovan of the LSDA (Learning and Skills Development Agency), Bob Powell, Eta di Cicco and Sal Cooke of FERL/BECTa).
Activity Four: The UK-wide RSCs are one of the key channels of traffic between the DNER and colleges. Dedicated effort needs to be put into training RSC staff about the DNER collections and information environment, and in developing two-way communication lines to inform further development of the DNER A full train-the-trainer programme needs to be developed for the DNER, perhaps as a collaboration between JCALT and JCEI.

Budget: £50,000 for 2000/2001; £50,000 for 2001/2002

Developing the DNER for Further Education

There are three key phases of DNER development activity required to make collections and services useful and usable for those in FE:

• Raise awareness of existing collections and services that are of known and clear value to FE in core, priority subject areas and negotiation to license relevant new resources from the commercial sector
• Developing an easy "presentational layer" into JISC content for new users from FE
• Development of learning materials to make less accessible collections and services more relevant to the FE sector

Raising awareness of existing collections and services, and negotiating for new commercial resources

Raising Awareness of Existing Collections and Services

The JISC already provides a number of DNER services that are suitable for use in FE, but there is also clearly a need for new content services and new ways into existing services. Development of these new services will be discussed in section 4.2.

Services immediately of most relevance to FE are:

The Resource Discovery Network

The RDN is a co-operative network of subject gateways providing access to descriptions of Internet resources selected for their quality and accuracy by subject specialists throughout the UK community. Subject "hubs" are in different stages of development, but it is already clear that the well-established hubs are ready to make an impact on the Further Education Community. A few relevant RDN services are described below to give a sense of this.

Edinburgh Engineering Virtual Library (EEVL) - Engineering is a very large subject area in FE. Because of this and the quality assurance and wide range of resources offered in EEVL it could be a highly relevant and well regarded single, standard gateway into Engineering resources for FE. It is unified and easy to use, fully searchable and already contains many relevant materials. Also, input from FE practitioners is increasing so its relevance and use by FE will grow.

Online Medical Networked Information (OMNI) - Health and Social Care is a very large subject area for FE. Quality assured online information and other resources accessible through a single web interface with good search facilities will be highly valued in FE, particularly if the range and levels of resources can be further extended and tailored, through FE practitioners and specialists.

The Social Science Information Gateway (SOSIG) - One of the services at SOSIG is Biz/ed, and this is already quite well known and used in the FE sector. The Virtual Learning Centre of the Scottish Further Education Unit, for example, already contains mapped learning packs for Business Studies that utilise Biz/ed materials and resources. Biz/ed is popular and well regarded, and in fact serves as a very useful model for delivery of mapped and up-to-date online learning to and for FE.

Virtual Training Suite (VTS) - The VTS could be of great value to ILT Champions, Manager Champions, and LRC Managers in terms of both updating and building their own skills and as a tool for training others within their colleges in the use web based resources for learning and teaching. The VTS already contains materials appropriate for both GNVQ and National Diploma students, but with relatively minor modifications could be quickly made relevant to others.

The British University Film and Video Council (BUFVC)

Because of the cross-curricular nature of BUFVC resources and services there will be much of high relevance to FE – services such as the Information Service, Managing Agent and Advisory Service, Off-Air Recording and the Distribution service. The key issues will be concerns on the part of colleges regarding the technical capacity to fully utilise BUFVC resources, and costs. The BUFVC have made several attempts to address these concerns already, and are very aware FE needs. As awareness of BUFVC services grows so it is likely that FE use of the above services will correspondingly grow.

Although each of the above services is currently offering FE-relevant resources, the FE curriculum is changing rapidly and it would be too easy for the materials to become dated. These services require priority funding to stay up to date, and most importantly, to disseminate their successful models of service provision to other DNER services. They will also require budgets to produce professional, easily understood promotional materials. These should be designed to be easy to read and disseminate in recipient colleges.

Activity Five: Funding for 1-year FE posts should be offered to ensure the BUFVC and RDN stay up-to-date in provision of FE-specific resources, and most importantly -- that they disseminate their successful models of service provision to other DNER services. If the BUFVC and RDN are unable to accommodate another member of staff, they should be encouraged to second experts from relevant FE Colleges to devise appropriate dissemination activities and other advice. RDN hubs should be encouraged to investigate mechanisms for flagging their resources according to which level of the FE curriculum they are most appropriate (e.g. GNVQ, A-levels).

Budget: £50,000 in 2000/2001; £50,000 for 2001/2002.

New DNER Collections for FE

JISC has an established and successful history of negotiating national agreements for datasets and online information resources on behalf of the HE sector. This service should also be offered to FE for information and materials that are relevant to the FE sector in order to complement ILT materials for the curriculum developed within the sector.

The DNER Collections Strategy outlines the following key collecting areas:

* books
* discovery tools (including bibliographic databases, finding aids, and gateways)
* geospatial resources
* images
* journals
* learning materials
* moving pictures and sound
* primary research data

We anticipate that some of these areas will be more relevant to the Further Education sector than others. The emphasis should be placed on learning materials, followed by books, discovery tools, journals, images, moving pictures, and sound. Core FE subjects include Key / Core Skills, Basic Skills, Business Studies, Engineering, Health & Social Care.

Books Access to online textbooks and reference books could be an exciting teaching tool in the FE sector as access to computers by staff and students increases. It is not known what requirement there is for access to online books in FE, but provision should be trialed as soon as possible. Given the lack of inter-library loan facilities in FE online books could be an ideal solution in certain circumstances.

Discovery Tools As a general rule the FE sector has less need for bibliographic data services and abstract services than does the HE sector. These services however will be of use to colleges that provide HE courses and possibly to some VI form colleges. Abstract and index databases with links to online journal services in appropriate subject areas will be of use provided they offer access to full-text, as FE colleges do not have significant budgets for inter-library loans. We would anticipate that access to electronic resources might stimulate a requirement for document delivery and interlibrary loan services in the FE sector, and a watching brief should be kept on this area.

Other types of discovery tools besides A&I databases will also be relevant to the FE sector. These include catalogues of curriculum and instructional resources (e.g. learning materials, websites). The DNER already has a number of relevant discovery tools (e.g. the Resource Discovery Network) that can be tailored for use in FE, but others (e.g. for learning materials) may need to be developed.
Geospatial Resources -

The use of geospatial data is already essential for teaching in some parts of the FE curriculum (e.g. engineering, planning) and we should consider ways of building on this. There are some existing JISC collections (e.g. Ordnance Survey mapping data) that can be tailored to fill this need. The JISC is currently seeking 5 or 6 FE Colleges to participate in a trial of the Digimap Service to determine how it might be used in FE.

Images Digital images have the potential to be widely used across FE. The metadata (i.e. textual description of the images and their associated learning content or supporting materials) will be a crucial determinant as to whether images are actively used. Some subjects may already be accustomed to using physical image collections, in particular art and design and related courses, but other subjects have the potential to use images. More work needs to be done to gauge demand, understand use across FE courses and look at strategies for developing use.

Journals Access to periodical literature will be of importance for A-level and HE students based in FE institutions as these are key resources to utilise for learning independent research skills. However it should be noted that most HE students in FE gain access to such materials through arrangements with the partner HE institution. Offering such services to FE institutions could stimulate wider direct use of such resources and stimulate the general level of awareness of these services.

Learning Materials The greatest need in FE is for electronic learning materials and information resources that can be used directly by both the teacher and learner in mainstream FE pedagogic activity. It is important to emphasise this. This need is being addressed in part by services outlined above, particularly the NLN central repository, and services such as the National Grid for Learning and Further Education Resources for Learning. However these services have boundaries, and it is where these services reach their boundaries that the DNER can and should offer content.

Moving Pictures and Sound The existence of videos used to support teaching across aspects of the FE curriculum strongly suggests that there will be an appetite for access to similar material electronically. The JISC will prioritise negotiations for collections of appropriate material (e.g. Skill Bank) that can be digitised and streamed over the web for use in teaching and learning.

Primary Research Data There is much less call for research materials in the FE sector than in the HE sector, although these services will be of some use to colleges, particularly agricultural colleges, that provide HE courses and possibly to some VI form colleges.

Collection Building Activities Underway We are learning more on a daily basis about the range of commercial products available and already tailored for use in the Further Education sector. It is essential that over the course of the next two to three years we move to a scenario where rather being supplier-led in this way, we move firmly to a footing of being driven by user needs and agreed sectoral priorities.

A range of resources that are applicable to FE have been identified and will be reported separately to the JISC's Content Working Group. These include:

* KnowUK
* Oxford English Dictionary Online
* Literature Online (LION) for Colleges
* InfoTrac Journals
* National Extension Colleges collections
* Further Education National Consortium catalogue
* AMICO image collections
* SCRAN image collections
* JSTOR
* Digital Brain
* COLEG
* Digital University Press ProVision products
* samlearning.com
* Ebsco FE Resources
* BBC programmes and learning materials
* Social Service Abstracts
* Newspaper collections (e.g. those from Gale and Proquest)
* Online Computing Reviews from ACM packaged for learners (reviews.com)
* ISI Basic Indexes
* Skill Bank videos
* Physical Review Focus
* Ante
* KnowEurope
* British Standards Index Online
* Official Index to the Times
* Palmers Index to the Times

The above list is only the beginning, and has been compiled by analysis of appropriate surveys (e.g. FEDA's audit of ILT materials in the English FE sector as part of the NLN initiative), consultation with LRC managers and other FE representatives, and discussion with library consortia in the US that have community college members.

Further consultation needs to be done. The FEDA report could also seed the process of pursuing national agreements for multimedia and other learning materials for FE. In particular, we should draw upon the "wishlist" incorporated in the report, and should look at ways of supporting the development of materials by colleges themselves. This particular activity would integrate well with the procurement of materials by the NLN central repository, and we should include this work as part of our collaborations with Becta. Further consultation, especially with community colleges in the US, could prove very beneficial.

We should consider renegotiating some of the existing contracts to ensure that all members of the JISC constituency are able to participate. As resources come up for renewal, or are identified as being of high priority to the FE community, effort will be spent in enabling extension of existing licenses where possible.

Many people in FE appear unaware that free trials are available for most of these resources for at least a short period of time upon request to the publisher. This opportunity should be more widely disseminated. New collections added to the DNER should have widely-publicised free trial periods whenever possible. College managers will probably find that, just as in HE, college-wide trials are difficult and time-consuming to manage. There is a case for commissioning case studies of good practice in managing trials for dissemination.

Subjects groups should help define priorities to meet our overall objectives of ensuring an appropriate balance and range of products and services.

Activity Six National agreements continue to be pursued on behalf of FE for both online datasets and information services. We should also pursue new national agreements for combined multimedia and online resources, with particular reference to the audit of ILT materials conducted by LSDA and the experience of parallel colleges in other parts of the world. We should look at ways of working with developers to convert materials to fully online resources, wherever possible, as well as supporting "in-house" development of learning materials by FE colleges. Case studies in good practice in managing trials should be commissioned.

Budget: £2,000,000 in 2000/2001; £980,400 in 2001/2002; £1,230,000 in 2002/2003

The FE Subject Curriculum
It is vital to the success of DNER content services for FE that what is provided ties in with the FE curriculum and pedagogic practices throughout the UK. This will entail recognising and providing for the significant differences between the territories.

The best people to ask what collections and services are required are the end users themselves, however the sector is very large and very diverse. Protracted polling would waste time and may not yield any meaningful results. It would be far more effective and practicable to utilise the skills and knowledge of professionals from within the FE sector throughout the UK.

Wherever possible, existing DNER groups with subject representation (e.g. service Steering Committees) should be expanded to include FE representatives.

Specialist FE subject or curriculum groups may need to be established in key areas identified as unique to FE (i.e. Key and Basic Skills, Health and Social Care, Hair and Beauty, and any other subjects identified as unique to FE).

Each group might consist of a number of tutors from a particular subject area, or a combination of tutors and resource managers / librarians. The groups do not necessarily have to be established on a regional basis since by utilising communications technologies they could easily work on a national basis. At this point it is not suggested that learners are members of the groups. However since they are also very important end users it is suggested that this should be considered at a later stage. A number (70+) of FE tutors that could be approached to join existing subject groups are already known to the Collections Manager, Learning Materials from a variety of colleges.

We should also utilise the skills and experience of existing subject groups in other agencies. In particular we should collaborate with the Scottish Further Education Unit and take advantage of their knowledge and understanding of the Scottish FE sector – a document outlining a number of areas of potential collaboration between the SFEU and the JISC will be submitted to CWG separately.
Activity Seven: A new post of Subject Liaison Manager will be created within the DNER (either with the DNER team or as a new "Focus" post located in one of the JISC services. The postholder will need to scope the full range of existing subject groups with which to liaise, and will fill any gaps by creation of new groups for an appropriate length of time (e.g. a day focus group or a longer term working party). Subject experts should be asked to evaluate DNER collections and services for applicability, recommend suitable ways of filling gaps, and facilitate two-way communication to enhance DNER development. Budget: £50,000 2001/2002; £50,000 2002/2003

Resource Guides for FE-specific subjects

JCALT and JCEI currently co-fund Resource Guides for collections and services of relevance to social sciences and arts&humanities. In cooperation with resource providers these Resource Guides provide information, documentation and training opportunities to staff and students who are working or studying in UKFE and UKHE. The two existing Resource Guide programmes are being evaluated with a view to extending this model right across the curriculum for UKFE and UKHE. Some subjects (e.g. hairdressing) will be specific to the FE sector, and so some provision should be made for establishing relevant resource guides.

Activity Eight Create Resource Guides for FE-specific subject areas.

Budget: £60,000 in 2001/2002 for one Resource Guide, £120,000 in 2002/2003 for two Resource Guides

Developing a presentational layer into DNER resources for learners and teachers

Discussions to date have indicated that where knowledge of JISC services exists in FE it is often fragmentary and confused. More cohesive and engaging mechanisms need to be developed to raise the general level of awareness and understanding of the DNER and its potential for learning and teaching. JISC should consider ways of simplifying access to avoid causing confusion and frustration to users. A presentation service needs to be established and used to facilitate quick and engaging access to the DNER, and a specification for such a service will be provided to the JISC's Content Working Group. It is suggested that this might serve as a model by which presentation services could also be created for senior managers, information intermediaries, and research staff/students.

Materials and information available on the DNER shop front should not be limited to that offered by the subject gateways. Instead, potential content from the whole range of JISC services should be considered and prioritised however the first resources listed should come from those in Section 4.1. Ideally we would build this service on and around RDN-type functionality, and interoperability would be assured. A separate presentation service may be necessary although in the scoping for such a service synergy with the RDN should be explored.

The DNER shop front might also include the JISC projects and services that are being developed or expanded under the JISC Circular 5/99 call for proposals to enhance and build up the DNER for teaching and learning. It could include, for example, the Maths Portal, the Nursing, Midwifery and Health Professions Gateway, ARTWORLD, or Information for Nursing and Health.

It is suggested that the learning and teaching presentation service will potentially offer content from the whole range of JISC services. The subject groups, working in conjunction with the Subject Liaison Manager will choose and suggest suitable materials and resources for inclusion. However it is also suggested that the two services identified as currently of most relevance to FE – BUFVC and the RDN – are offered as "primary" services for FE on the shop front. It is vital to the success of this proposal that the services with suitable content fully subscribe and are happy to allow elements of their content resources to appear in the new presentation service. There may be longer-term funding as well as organisational and structural implications.

Over time, as what will be mainly new users to JISC services gain more knowledge and experience of the range of services on offer, they might go direct to whatever service they require and skip the learning and teaching presentation service altogether.

This presentation service for learning and teaching should also be the focus for "learning exchange" and "ratings" development activities in the for development plan for the DNER. The "learning exchange" would provide a service to FE and HE which supported a range of services involving the evaluation and exchange of learning materials. It would provide a shared communication space, tools for link to and describing learning materials, and an evaluation and recommendation framework. The "ratings" initiative would allow a rating of value to be associated with resource descriptions of interest and would provide an additional level of filtering. This might be used to, for example, indicate the suitability of a resource to serve particular curriculum needs.
Activity Nine: An essential "presentation service" needs to be established and used to facilitate quick and engaging access to DNER resources for learners and teachers for new users from FE and HE. This presentation service might be based on the RDN, but could be separate from it. As well as facilitating quick and easy access to a range of JISC collections and services identified by subject specialists as of most relevance and flagged according to aspects of curriculum that they best support, the shop front should link appropriately with the NLN website, the NLN central repository, and JISC Resource Guides.

Budget: £100,000 2001/2002; £80,000 2002/2003

Development of learning materials to make less accessible collections and services more relevant

The JISC already provides a number of DNER services that are suitable for use in FE, but there is also clearly a need for new content services and new ways into existing services. What FE and HE have in common is that regardless of level, it's now fairly well accepted that, in principle at least, learners, especially adult learners, increasingly need both subject knowledge and good information retrieval skills. They increasingly need to gather and manipulate information from various and multiple sources, and will shift from "maintenance" or "adoptive" to "dynamic" or "adaptive" learning. They already accept course content is more perishable. Correspondingly, teachers are starting to employ new skills themselves, with a student cohort that is changing in terms of subject mix, entry and exit points.

The role of the DNER is therefore to offer a range of relevant and valuable resources to all users across both sectors. But in the case of FE we have to recognise a substantially different sector to what JISC is used to catering for and one with substantially different needs.

We should in principle consider all JISC content services to be of potential value to FE. These include digitisation, archiving and dataset collections. However, as already stated, some services will be of less relevance than others and may take some time to start to offer services of greater relevance. Because of this, emphasis has been placed on prioritising and concentrating mainly on those services most relevant to FE in the shorter term – what we might call "primary" services as discussed above.

In the long term though we need to investigate ways of making all services more relevant. This will inevitably take time and may not fall within the time scale of this plan. Digital image collections, for example, although they may be of some relevance to a small number of colleges now - with some possible improvements in access – are not generally speaking highly relevant. However, over the longer term they could be of more relevance, particularly if, for example, JISC offers new ways of incorporating images from such collections into learning materials. Similarly FE as a whole has little need for access to datasets (although there will be some). However, where such data can be converted and incorporated into learning materials the relevance to FE increases.
At least a part of this will be dependent upon the longer-term development of the DNER and indeed of the JISC itself. But notwithstanding these wider considerations attention should be paid to laying foundations for these longer-term developments.

We should conceptualise the range of services provided to FE by the JISC existing on three levels. Level One would be primary services of most relevance to FE now, identified above. Level Two would consist of the commercial collections and content services made available to FE through special deals negotiated by the JISC. Some of these services will be of equal high relevance to FE. Level three would consist of services that are not of high priority to FE as a whole but which will be of value to different parts of the sector. These services could take a lead in extending the range of electronic collection and information resources available to and used by FE.

Below are listed some examples of level three type JISC services and collections:

Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS) - this could be a great source of contact for archaeology, history, language and literature, performing arts, and visual arts in FE colleges. The Performing Arts Data Service – and in particular the Film and Television or the Music resources could be a valuable service to relevant colleges. The Oxford Text Archive would be useful for A Level and HE students. The AHDS is perhaps a bit academic but these particular services might suit FE.

Archives Hub - "The UK HE Archives Hub service aims to allow users, ranging from the novice to the experienced researcher, networked access to quality records of all archival collections in the UK HE sector.". It is not clear how the Archives Hub would serve FE but it could be a model for how we might serve up information about learning materials distributed around the community
AXIS - contemporary art database, images and multimedia, all living artists brilliant example of contemporary practice very good for art courses of all types.

BIDS - The Reuters business information service hosted by BIDS is relevant to FE. Some more evaluation work needs to done but this particular service looks to have great potential for FE level Business Studies courses

CHEST - The CHEST is currently re-tendering for this service, and will take this opportunity to ensure the new service provider has appropriate awareness of FE collections.

Data Archive - remains to be investigated

EDINA - there are a couple of collections up there that would be useful, plus the Digimap Service for geospatial resources. Digimap FE pilot should be mentioned here. – I have been trying to get some colleges to trial it. Also been trying with Alistair McNaught, a geography teacher, FERL "South" and also a private developer of geography software for A Level. Definitely include

Higher Education Digitisation Service (HEDS) - does not appear that relevant at the moment, It is much more common for FE teachers to seek readily available materials or to author from scratch within standard packages or, in the near future, using authoring tools in their college VLE. But there may be some use for digitisation services as more FE teachers increase their use of ILT in teaching and learning and as their skills as well as the functionality and use of VLEs become more sophisticated.

MAAS - Managing Agent can help clear the copyright and arrange the access conditions for any moving picture and sound content of interest in FE,

MIMAS - Some FE sites have already expressed interest in the census data hosted by MIMAS. This data is technically challenging to engage with, and development work will certainly be necessary to make it usable in learning and teaching.

NESLI - The JISC is currently re-tendering for this service, and will take this opportunity to ensure the new service provider has appropriate awareness of FE collections. Colleges are likely to want to subscribe to a much more restricted range of titles than are universities, so new models will need to be developed with publishers.

Resource Discovery Network (RDN) - more relevant, but more work could be done. In particular more resources would be useful in childcare and development, hospitality, catering, sports, and vocational IT.

SCRAN – this has got it all, history, culture and art, its probably more suitable at present for FE than HE actually. SCRAN have done some brilliant curriculum navigation tools and stuff; they would do a project to work with FE as fast as you can imagine.

Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI) - can help promote the use of image collections, and also help people embed these in their learning materials.

UK Mirror Service - The free content here is of potentially great interest to FE, but currently the information on service website is felt to be poorly organised and off-putting.

UKOLN - UKOLN's Interoperability Focus is of relevance to managers in FE and funding could be made available for Paul Miller to expand his team to take responsibility for some activities (e.g. his recent work with MEG, integrating learning materials with MLEs). This work should be co-ordinated with the JISC MLE Steering Group Co-ordinator via the FE Operations group.

Once created, any materials developed to make these services more relevant to FE will need to be updated. This was an important lesson learned by the HE sector's TLTP project: materials must be updated as the curriculum changes or they will quickly fall out of use.

Work to tailor these services for FE should be carried out by visiting FE experts seconded to work in collaboration with DNER services.

Activity Ten A fund will be made available to which JISC services can apply for funding to second FE experts for specific tailoring/dissemination/updating tasks.
Budget: £100,000 2001/2002; £150,000 2002/2003

Getting the DNER used

The last section of this plan was all about ensuring the DNER was useful and useable for those in FE. This section is about making sure it gets used. Activities in this section of the document should be developed in collaboration with JCALT and its officers, including staff at JISC Assist. Key strategies to achieve this aim can be described by the verbs:

* Evaluate
* Reflect
* Update
* Improve

Generally speaking evaluation will be a continuous process undertaken by the Collections Manager for Learning Materials, the FE Operations Group, the DNER team, JCEI and its committees. There is a formal formative evaluation of the DNER ongoing, and tailoring it for use in learning and teaching is a major focus. Other JISC sub-committees, notably JCALT, will also be commissioning regular evaluations of user needs and activity to meet them.

Specific quantitative measurements that will be assessed include usage statistics from key resources, levels of "hits" on key websites such as the "presentation service" for learning and teaching, and numbers of subscriptions to commercial datasets. Qualitative evaluation will include both informal and formal feedback from subject specialists, FE experts seconded by services, RSC staff, consultants, visits to college sites, and general contact with the sector.

Support Management of Culture Change

College SMTs will face significant culture change challenges in order to embed the use of DNER resources in their colleges.

Activity Eleven: A fund should be set up to which they can quickly apply for resources to aid them in this. Examples might include funding to implement ATHENS for off-site access to DNER resources, embed DNER resources in local MLEs, enable some locally created learning materials to be deposited in the DNER for wider dissemination, or embed tools such as RDN-include and the Resource Guides in college information services.

Budget: £100,000 2001/2002; £100,000 2002/2003

Consultation

Subject groups should not be the only means of dialogue and exchange with the sector. Potentially there are many sector practitioners who would welcome the opportunity to take part in JISC activity and help to influence the development of JISC services but are unable to take part in subject groups. Learning Resource staff for example have a cross-college remit and could play a key role in disseminating information.

Robust train-the-trainer sessions need to be established along with "Meet the DNER" sessions tailored for key stakeholding groups.

Activity Twelve Specific strategies should be developed for consultation with each of the following groups:

* Senior Managers (JISC ASSIST should lead)
* Information Intermediaries (in collaboration with the RSCs)
* Teachers and Learners (in collaboration with the LTSN, NLN, Resource Guides and RSCs)
* Research Staff and Students (in collaboration with Resource Guides)

Budget: £100,000 2001/2002, £100,000 2002/2003

Case Studies and Lesson Plans

It is proposed that work be undertaken to provide examples of how DNER materials and services can be embedded in FE pedagogy. These should be made available at the regional workshops outlined above, but they should also be made available on the WWW via the presentation service and could be disseminated in hard copy by JISC Assist. It is important to emphasise though that these case studies and lesson plans should be based on and drawn from FE, and not based on similar activities undertaken in HE. Recurrent funding will be needed for this activity, as it is essential that materials are kept up-to-date.

Activity Thirteen: A series of case studies are commissioned, and their authors are asked to collaborate on designing some example work or lesson plans that incorporate DNER materials. Again this activity would be tied closely with JISC Assist.

Budget: £45,000 2001/2002; £45,000 2002/2003

Collaboration & Interoperability

It is vital that JISC works with, and is seen to work with, the FE sector and its agencies. This has been achieved so far with the NLN, particularly in the establishment of the RSCs and in interaction with the NLN Operations Team.

Metadata & Standards

Becta and the Ufi have already established formal collaboration in order to facilitate greater interoperability between materials developed and provided by the NLN and learndirect. This makes sense to all of course. The JISC has been involved in the issue of interoperability for some time now, and closer ties need to be made at all levels to make this experience and knowledge more widely available and to ensure that appropriate interoperability is achieved between the NLN, the Ufi and the DNER.

The Metadata in Education Group, organised by the JISC's Interoperability Focus, will be essential in this respect. In order to increase links, funding UKOLN for appointment of an FE Interoperability Focus to support Paul Miller seems appropriate.

The DNER Team and BECTa staff will continue the working relationship they have established with regard to interoperability. BECTa staff have input to the development of the DNER technical architecture. BECTa, the DNER team, and DfEE have jointly commissioned a review of the application of standards across national learning and information initiatives to further inform common working. This reports shortly.

It is essential that accurate and timely information about metadata and standards be disseminated to FE Colleges.

Activity Fourteen: Increase the flow of information about interoperability work underway at the JISC into collaborative organisations in the FE sector.

Budget: £50,000 2001/2002; £50,000 2002/2003

Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales

More work needs to be done to understand how best the JISC can contribute to FE agendas in Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. The NLN serves as a unifying focus for these activities in England, but it is clear that there are some differences in the FE curriculum across the UK. JCEI staff and services will need to better understand these differences, and the ICT strategies endorsed by the FEFCs in each part of the UK.

Activity Fifteen: The Collections Manager, Learning Materials to liaise with appropriate colleagues and agencies in Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.

Regional Collaboration

The establishment of the RSCs presents us with a new opportunity for collaboration with other sector agencies at a regional level. Over time it is likely that this regionality will become increasingly important, particularly with the Government's establishment of the Regional Development Agencies.

Discussions have already taken place between JISC and NILTA in regards to ways to achieve such collaboration, and proposals are being considered at present. Since several other agencies are likely to be involved in RSC activity in some greater or lesser way, similar such discussions and proposals are likely to occur with them.

Activity Sixteen: The DNER must be fully incorporated into regional collaboration, including, in addition to activities of the RSCs, collaboration with NILTA, FERL, the Learning and Skills Councils, the Learning and Skills Development Agency, and the Further Education Research Network.

Formative Evaluation

Formative evaluation of activities designed to embed the use of the DNER in Further Education is essential. This plan covers the period up to August 2003. If after evaluation parts of the plan are considered to be unsuccessful revisions will be made and presented to JCEI as appropriate.

Generally speaking evaluation will be a continuous process undertaken by a variety of agencies including:

• Collections Manager for Learning Materials and others on the DNER team
• JISC's Monitoring and Advisory Unit
• DNER formative evaluation project team which is looking at activities underway to make the DNER more applicable for learning and teaching
• evaluation activities formally undertaken by JCALT to monitor the impact of the entire JISC programme on FE (e.g. the monitoring framework, surveys of user needs, etc.)
• services or service providers receiving funding under this plan will be required to evaluate their activities both qualitatively and quantitatively

Summative evaluation will also be essential, but it may be most appropriate for this to consider all JISC activities of relevance to Further Education as a whole.