1) EVALUATING UNIVERSITY POLICIES AND PRACTICES ON THE USE AND EFFECTIVENESS OF TECHNOLOGY BASED LEARNING: LESSONS FROM THE WORKPLACE (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $590,000
Academic Members:
David W. Conrath (PI), Dean & Professor of Management Science/Information Systems, Michael G. De Groote School of Business, McMaster University, Carl Cuneo, Professor, Dept. of Sociology, McMaster University, Brian Campbell, Associate Professor, Dept. of Sociology & Anthropology, Mount Allison University, Richard Schmid, Assoc. Professor, Education Department, Concordia University; Sam Lanfranco, Assoc. Professor, Economics Dept., York University; Fred Evers, Assoc. Professor, Co-Director, Centre for Educational Research & Assessment, University of Guelph; Jane Webster, Associate Professor, Dept. of Management Sciences; University of Waterloo ; Jon Baggaley, Chair, Education Technology, Athabasca University
David Conrath will lead the above team of academic members . He is an expert on management, organizations, administration, communications and information technologies. Carl Cuneo, as a member of the President's Task Force on New Learning Technologies, is writing a report on administrative procedures regarding faculty incentives related to new learning technologies. Besides providing information from this report, he will contribute his expertise in qualitative and quantitative data analysis. Fred Evers, an active member in the C-METO network application on measurement of learning outcomes, has agreed to join this project to build inter-network relations and to contribute his expertise on organizations and the measurement of learning outcomes of educational administrative policies. The other researchers listed above will facilitate access to their own university administrators for the purposes of collecting interview and questionnaire data for this study.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organizations:
Libby Ackermann - Director of Training, Skills for Change, Tom Gram - Director, Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies, Mount Allison University, David Wells - Internship Coordinator, Education, Concordia University, Ari Riven Kugler - President & CEO, Systemcorp, Marie-Claude Tremblay - Multi-media Development Consultant; Lynette Gillis, Director, Evaluation & Design, Knowledge Connection Corporation.
Universities and Community Colleges participating in EvNet will act as sites for the collection of data from senior administrators on managerial practices in instructional technologies. They will also participate as sounding boards for the policy recommendations coming out of this project. Systemcorp, with a focus on the issues of organization change, a company specializing in the research, development and commercialization of multi-media base software products, will contribute advice and a CD-ROM on the Learning Organization and Management. NBTel, a leading firm in the delivery of commercial multi-media distance education products, will contribute its expertise on management issues in digital communications. The Canadian Association of University Teachers, the national voice of university academic staff in Canada, has a stake in policy changes in the area of faculty incentives. Discussions are continuing on a more active role for CAUT. Skills for Change will provide advice on how non-profit community organizations develop managerial policies to provide skills training in computer literacy to women and immigrant minorities. The Association of Canadian Community Colleges (ACCC) will provide input regarding the administrative policies on information technologies in the community college sector. Andersen Consulting, an international consulting firm in workplace training, will provide lessons to the project from the administrative practices of private training organizations. Eduplus, a management consulting company specializing in education and development in over 40 countries worldwide, will provide lessons on how managerial policies and practices in information technologies are implemented in private workplaces. Knowledge Connection Corporation will provide advice on the evaluation of administrative practices and faculty incentives policies.
THEME 2: EVALUATING DESIGN ROLES: COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF INSTRUCTOR APPROACHES TO ALTERNATIVE MEANS OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING DELIVERY
2A) DIFFUSION OF COMPUTER TECHNOLOGIES INTO UNIVERSITY TEACHING: PROFESSIONAL PRACTICES (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $92,000
Academic Members:
Brian Campbell (PI), Associate Professor, Dept. of Sociology & Anthropology, Mount Allison University; Philip Abrami, Professor, Dept. of Education, Director of Centre for the Study of Classroom Processes, Concordia University; Carl Cuneo, Professor, Sociology Dept, McMaster University; Jane Webster, Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Management Services, University of Waterloo.
Brian Campbell has analyzed general computer adoption and its application to teaching among university faculty at Mount Allison (Campbell and Proulx, 1996). He will direct the instrument development and study design. Instrument refinement will be done in cooperation with the other Theme 2 Projects, particularly Project 2c by Webster on attitudes toward telelearning, to ensure the comparability of data. The other members of the team will participate in the collection of data in this project from their own home institution.
The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has an interest in this study, but is unable as of yet to commit resources to it. Discussions will continue. The Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies, established at Mount Allison to undertake research, training and product development in partnership with the private sector, will assist in the development of cognitive approaches to designing computer mediated learning environments.
2B) OVERCOMING OBSTACLES TO TEACHER ADOPTION AND STUDENT USE OF TECHNOLOGY: COMPUTER- SUPPORTED COLLABORATIVE LEARNING (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $259,000
Academic Members:
Philip C. Abrami (PI), Professor, Dept. of Education, Director of Centre for the Study of Classroom Processes (CSCP), Concordia University; Bette Chambers, Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Education, Associate Director, CSCP, Concordia University; Anne Wade, Sessional Lecturer, Library Studies, Concordia University; Steven Rosenfield, Professor of Mathematics, Vanier College; Carl Cuneo, Professor, Dept. of Sociology, McMaster; Brian Campbell, Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Sociology & Anthropology, Mount Allison University; Jane Webster, Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Management Sciences, University of Waterloo.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organizations:
Anglophone Services, Ministère de l'Éducation, Gouvernement du Quebec, is responsible for the education services to Quebec's English community. They will provide access to the activities on the Small Schools Network (SSN) which will be used for dissemination purposes. The Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal is actively involved in bringing information technology into the classroom. It will provide access to the teachers in its system for this study of the obstacles to technology. Le Couseil Industrie-Éducation du Montréal Métropolitan (CIEMM) will assist in connecting this project to French and English schools throughout Québec for the purposes of facilitating access by the researchers to teachers through the province. The Sir John A. Macdonald School is a large inner- city school located in downtown Hamilton. It has just received a larger number of computers from the Ontario Ministry of Education and Training, and IBM Canada. These will be used for testing the reaction of teachers to the introduction of technology in their classes, in some cases for the first time. The Frontenac Board of Education is the largest school board in the Kingston area with a number of ESL programs. It will give researchers access to ESL teachers to study their reaction to computers in language instruction.
2C) EVALUATING TEACHER ATTITUDES TO DISTANCE TELELEARNING ON LEARNER OUTCOMES (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $105,000
Academic Members:
Jane Webster (PI), Assoc. Professor, Management Sciences, University of Waterloo; Patricia Rowe, Dean of Graduate Studies, Professor of Psychology, University of Waterloo; Gary Waller, Professor of Psychology, University of Waterloo.
Jane Webster as PI on this project will be extending her past studies of student reactions to telelearning by turning her attention to teachers' attitudes to the same technology. She will be responsible for the intellecntual direction of the study, and for the collection, analysis, and dissemination of data. Patricia Rowe, will assess the effects of telelearning on graduate outcomes. Gary Waller, in his capacity as Associate Provost for Academic and Student Affairs, is responsible for the management of Distance and Continuning Education for the university. He will thus be playing a critical role in following up on the policy implications of the findings arising from this study.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organizations:
The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has begun to develop a policy on teachers' time spent on telelearning and other innovative aspects of instructional technology, especially as they relate to faculty workload and incentives. It thus has a stake in the findings emerging from this study.
3A) EVALUATING FIVE MEANS OF DELIVERING DISTANCE EDUCATION COURSEWARE (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $120,000
Academic Members: Carl Cuneo, (PI), Dept. of Sociology, McMaster University; Robert Bernard, Professor, Dept. of Education, Concordia University; Gary Boyd, Professor, Dept. of Education, Concordia University; P. Holt, Associate Professor, Cognitive Science, Chair for Computing Information Systems & Mathematics, Athabasca University; Brian Campbell, Associate Professor, Dept. of Sociology, Mount Allison University.
Carl Cuneo, as PI on this project, has extensive experience constructing and delivering courses over the Internet and at a distance, as well as 23 years of more traditional teaching experience. He has constructed courseware websites (such as SOCNET) and 17 multimedia teaching modules in sociology, and has delivered both hypertext and hypermedia electronic refereed articles on the Internet. Cuneo currently delivers courses using e-mail, electronic course newsgroups, and interactive TV. He also has extensive experience in HTML editing (e.g., Hotdog Pro, Hotmetal Pro) and graphic design for web page construction. All of this experience will be brought to bear on the conversion of the five CCE courses in this project to the Internet, and the comparative evaluation of alternative modes of delivering them. Cuneo will supervise the research assistants in this project, and the collection and analysis of evaluation data. He will also facilitate the testing of these coursewares at other EvNet sites.
Participating Collaborator & Partner Organizations:
Gwen Crossan - Program Coordinator, Centre for Continuing Education (CCE), McMaster University.
The Centre for Continuing Education (CCE) at McMaster University is the primary partnering organization in this project. In cooperation with researchers and graduate research assistants from EvNet, CCE will develop for Internet and teleconferenced delivery five courses and conduct formative evaluations of the effectiveness of such means of delivery compared to more traditional modes. The five courses are: Skills for Distance Education, Ethical Issues in Human Resource Practices, Problem Solving: Concepts, Skills and Strategies, Introductory Financial Accounting and Addictive Behaviour. Gwen Crossan is a CCE program coordinator and course developer. She will supervise other developers in curriculum design, liaison with Internet conversion personnel, collect and analyse comparative evaluation data, write preliminary reports, select the CCE instructors, and administer the five courses. The Addiction Research Foundation (ARF) will contribute to the development of the "Addictive Behaviours" course. ARF work will be completed by personnel from its Education and Training Dept. The Canada Employment and Immigrantion Union (CEIU/PSAC), a trade union component of the Public Alliance of Canada, is interested in developing a trade union parallel to the "Skills for Distance Education" course, but more appropriately tailored for a union environment. It will supply the content and staff time toward the development of a course on the 'cultural' rather than the technical aspects of computer-mediated communications in order to run more effectively its regional staff 'peer-to-peer' electronic network. For a description of its current dilemmas, see the document, "Reshaping CEIU", in its website at: http://www.web.net/ceiu/eng_strc.html. ... TV Ontario will be approached, based on its stakeholder letter included in this application, about converting some of the CCE courses for televsion format and broader distribution.
3B) EVALUATING MODULAR CURRICULA DESIGN IN DISTANCE EDUCATION (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $218,000
Academic Members:
Peter Holt (PI), Associate Professor, Cognitive Science, Chair for Computing Information Systems and Mathematics, Athabasca University; Jon Baggaley (PI), Chair, Dept. Of Educational Technology, Athabasca University.
Baggaley and Holt have experience in the development of educational technology and in formative and summative evaluation. Holt has a background in designing courses for computer mediated delivery and in intelligent tutoring systems. In this project, Holt will carry out the modular construction of courses, while Baggaley will supervisory a small staff of seven personnel, and co-ordinating the project with personnel from Grande Prairie Regionale College. Baggaley will direct the evaluation and integrate the research plan into the Ed Tech department plans and MDE programme development. Holt will supervise research assistants and integrate the research plan into developments in the CCISM and MDE programmes. Later in the research programme both will play a role in the exchange of learning materials with Mount Allison and McMaster for further formative evaluation. Brian Campbell at Mount Allison will be instrumental in the the design of the project, assessing collaborative behaviors across sites.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organizations:
Franco Carlacci - Instructor, Grande Prairie Regional College, Reddy Ganta - Insructor, Grande Prairie Regional College
Reddy Ganta, and Franco Carlacci are respected practitioners at Grande Prairie Community College and recently have become involved in distance education endeavours. Along with Athabasca University , the College is involved in the provincially funded Alberta North network for the delivery of the 4 year BSc degree in computer studies. The Grande Praire research group will conduct a study of the collaborative activities of community college students taking paced electronic modular courses developed in this project at Athabasca University. Professor Libero Fibonneci at Grande Prairie College will coordinate the assessment of collaborative behavior of the community college students.
Athabasca University. Besides the commitment to EvNet, Athabasca University has committed $850,00 per year to educational technology. All of the 16 computer sciences courses in the BSC program will be offered on the INTERNET within 2 years. As such Athabasca provides the only testing ground available in Canada where an entire undergraduate discipline will be offered with electronic delivery as the major mode. This provides a testbed for the collaborative learning of modular courses constructed in this project for students working almost entirely at a distance from home and the workplace. Ferst Communications will underwrite some of the costs of the Internet Services for students testing the effectiveness of modular courses designed for distance education. Sunrise Higher Education Foundation, a non-profit educational cooperative for native students, will provide learner support for the Computer Science 200 Course to be developed and evaluated for Internet use in this project.
TELUS, with a commitment of $100K in cash and in-kind contributions, will connect Athabasca University to schools throughout Alberta. This network will be used in evaluating the effectiveness of using modular courses at a distance in the K-12 school system. TELUS is particularly interested in one of the courses to be developed in this project - Data Communications and Rapid Applications Development With JAVA. It will be used in its corporate training program for its employees.
3C) EVALUATING THE EFFECTS OF FIRST CLASS CLIENT AND THE WEB ON PROBLEM BASED LEARNING AMONG MEDICAL LAB TECHNOLOGISTS (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $165,000
Academic Members:
Delsworth Harnish (PI), Associate Professor, Pathology and Biology; McMaster University; Carl Cuneo, Professor, Sociology, McMaster University.
Delworth Harnish will act as principal investigator on this project. He will design and implement a problem-based learning approach tailored to the needs of medical laboratory technologists with respectto the development of inquiry and critical thinking skills. Carl Cuneo will provide advice on the design of the formative evaluation model to be used to assess the effectiveness of First Class Client in collaborative and problem-based learning.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organizations:
Alan Blizzard, Director, Instructional Development Centre, McMaster University; Dale Roy - Educational Consultant, Instructional Development Centre, McMaster University. Mary Caughill, Program Consultant, Continuing Education Division, Michener Institute; Cynthia Cowling, Director of Development, Michener Institute; Gretna Joan Laurie, Senior Instructor, Michener Institute .
The Instructional Development Centre at McMaster through Alan Blizzard and Dale Roy will provide consultation services on the design of problem-based learning environments, an area of expertise among instructional developers and medical faculty at McMaster. The Michener Institute for Applied Health Sciences, one of the largest providers of continuing education in applied health in Canada, serves over 5000 health professionals nationally and internationally. It would like to utilize the technology in this project to develop and deliver a computer-aided instructional course to provide for collaborative learning and distance education. Connaught Laboratories is an industrial developer and supplier of vaccine products for infectious diseases and biotherapeutics. By offering their staff and services, together with their collaborators and researchers, they would like to upgrade the skills of medical lab technologists through courseware developed in this project, mounted and run via First Class Client on Learn Link at McMaster. Softarc Inc., a privately held company specializing in the development of the multi-platform communications software called First Class, will contribute its software to the project team in EvNet. It will research how to utilize existing technologies to develop and deliver computer-aid instructional courses for collaborative learning and distance education. Environment Canada, a government agency with particular expertise in pollutant monitoring in the environment, will provide scientific staff and their facilities to try and bridge the gap between R & D and operational applications in a production environment as well as develop and maintain 'leading edge' technological capability.
3D) EVALUATING COMPUTER-ASSISTED LITERACY LEARNING (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $141,000 (Procter)
Potential Project Assets: $121,000 (Meyers)
Academic Members:
Margaret Procter (PI), Coordinator, Writing Support, University of Toronto; Carl Cuneo, Chair, Teaching & Learning Commitee, Faculty of Social Sciences & Professor of Sociology, McMaster University; Maria Myers, Associate Professor, Faculty of Education, Queen's University; Philip Abrami, Professor, Dept. of Education, Director of CSCP, Concordia University; Bette Chambers, Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Education, CSCP, Concordia University.
Margaret Procter [PI] is a specialist in writing instruction. She will assist in the design and observational stages of the computer conferencing at the Sir John A. Macdonald School in Hamilton, and will supervise the analysis of software use there. She will also supervise the data collection at Skills for Change in Toronto, help rewrite and retest any improved material from this project. Carl Cuneo will design strategies for quantitative and qualitative analysis and will supervise data collection at Sir. John A. MacDonald Secondary School. As a social scientist, he has done considerable work in survey research, in qualitative interviews, and in computerized qualitative text analysis. Marie Myers will analyse the kinds of language learning taking place at the research sites in the Kingston area. Her knowledge of the psychology of language acquisition will be applied in supervising obser vation of students, and in evaluating the uses of software and courseware in all sites. She will participate in revising and retesting any material developed in this project. Philip Abrami, as Director of the Centre for the Study of Classroom Processes (CSCP) at Concordia University, together with researchers Catherine Fichten and Bette Chambers, will supervise the design and data analysis of the Success For All literacy study in the Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organizations:
Cheryl Ende - Department Head, ESL, Sir John A. MacDonald Secondary School, Gord Burlison, Teacher, Mathematics, Physics and Computer Science, Sir John A. MacDonald Secondary School, Libby Ackermann - Director of Training, Skills for Change, Horst Wohlegemut - Superintendent of Education, Frontenac Board of Education, Pat Finucan - Director, Applied Arts, St. Lawrence Community College, Cathy Ciavarella - Director, Kingston Immigrant Services, Eleanor Rogers - Director, Queen's University School of English
Sir John A. Macdonald Secondary School , whose teachers requested our initiative, is the primary research site for this project. Its large population of 1,100-1,300 second-language learners (50 languages from 68 countries) and stock of 160 networked computers provide an excellent base for observation of computer-aided learning. The Hamilton Board of Education chose it as the computer technology pilot school in the district. Cheryl Ende, ESL teacher at this school, is a research collaborator whose initiatives in ESL teaching have already won her a national prize. She will experiment using e-mail and First Class "chat" connections in her high-school ESL classes, and will provide contacts with students and teachers to allow for observation of student outcomes and attitudes in both formal and informal learning situations. Gord Burlison , a computing teacher at Sir John A. Macdonald School, and a collaborator in this project, will facilitate the setup of Internet connections and track the changing uses of computers at the school. He will help adapt the technology for experimentation, advise on technical aspects of rewriting software, and provide ongoing input about students and learning effects at the school.
Skills for Change (Toronto) is a community agency with a record of success in preparing immigrants and refugees to enter the workplace. All trainees are on social assistance. Their previous education ranges from elementary school to postgraduate university. All the various training programs include instruction in cultural patterns of communication. Even the most basic ESL programs give some exposure to computers, and instructors encourage students, as they struggle to master the new technology, to use English for questioning, collaborative learning and social contact. Libby Ackermann (founder and director of training, Skills for Change) is a research collaborator from a community setting. She will provide contacts with instructors and trainees at her non-profit agency, and will help design analysis and evaluation of the teaching methods and strategies being used. She has also offered to chair the EvNet Training Committee (see Part E: Management).
Frontenac County Board of Education (Kingston) has encouraged analysis of its language-teaching programs, including those at one secondary school with a high immigrant population. A study group on ESL issues already exists and will facilitate our study. Horst Wohlgemut (superintendent, Frontenac District Board of Education, Kingston) is a research collaborator who will facilitate contacts with Loyalist Collegiate and Vocational Institute and other secondary schools in Kingston. As chair of a work group on ESL, he will coordinate contacts with teachers and students within the board. He has agreed to sit on EvNet's Dissemination Committee.
St. Lawrence Community College (Kingston) teaches communication skills to students in postsecondary technical and business programs and also offers language courses to the public. It has offered itself as a research site, with an interest in validating its use of computer-assisted instruction as part of these programs. Pat Finucan (Chair, Applied Arts, St. Lawrence Community College, Kingston) is a research collaborator who will coordinate contacts with instructors and students in technical programs, and in interest classes offered to the public.
Queen's University School of English offers courses on English as a second language to university entrants and to employee groups sent for special training. It will be a research site for comparative study. Eleanor Rogers (Director, School of English, Queen's U) is a collaborator who , as director of a large training program in English as a second language, will create contacts with a variety of student groupings, ranging from adolescents studying for university entry to employee groups, such as Hong Kong stewardesses sent for training in the workplace use of English. She has donated time from her staff researcher to work on EvNet's literacy project.
Kingston Immigrant Services (KDIS) is a community non-profit agency that provides initial and intermediate language training for a range of new Canadians. Computer use is part of these programs, and the agency has welcomed comparative study of their effectiveness. Cathy Ciavarella (Director, Kingston & District Immigrant Services [KDIS]) is a collaborator who will provide access to publicly-supported language programs for new Canadians. The groupings at this site range from adults in day classes to families served in home visits.
The Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal (PSBGM) will participate in the Success For All phase of this literacy project by giving EvNet researchers access to 400 elementary students from three inner-city schools. Charley Levy, the Director of Instructional Services at the PSBGM, will be responsible for the approval of the program and deciding which schools will participate. Anthony Lecroche, the Director of Region Four, will manage the budget from the board level. Elizabeth Johnston, the Language Arts Consultant and Greta Govin, a Special Education Consultant, will work with the EvNet team on designing the tutoring programs.
This project has also a number of publisher stakeholders who will double up by sitting on EvNet's Dissemination Committee. Harper-Collins Publishing is interested in developing Canadian literacy and ESL materials. Brian Henderson, Acquisitions Editor, will provide software for testing and consult during the design and retesting process. Nelson Canada (Andrew Livingston, Acquisitions Editor) is interested in our research results for the development of Canadian courseware and software. Cliff Newman, Vice-President Editorial, Prentice-Hall Canada and Allyn & Bacon Canada, is interested in our research results, and will commit software for testing.
3E) Computational Support Mechanisms for Spatial Literacy In Education: Evaluating Computer-Assisted Spatial Literacy Learning Environments (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $507,000
Academic Members:
Robert Wright (PI), Chair, Programme in Landscape Architecture, University of Toronto; Rodney Hoinkes, Assistant Professor & Head of Design Applications, Centre for Landscape Research (CLR), University of Toronto; John Danahy, Associate Professor & Director for Centre for Landscape Research, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, University of Toronto; Sylvia d'Apollonia, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Centre for the Study of Classroom , Dawson College; Christina DeSimone, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Centre for the Study of Classroom Processes, Concordia University; Helena Dedic, Adjunct Professor, Centre for the Studies of Classroom Processes, Vanier College; Steven Rosenfield, Professor of Mathematics, Vanier College.
Robert Wright at CLR will be responsible for research coordination and development of the pedagogy and evaluation framework. Rodney Hoinkes, who has taught design studios at Harvard and the University Of Toronto and designed CMC tools for the Web, will conduct evaluations of traditional vs. virutual design studios and related pedagogical tools. d'Appollonia, DeSimone, Dedic, and Rosenfield will run a test bed at Dawson and Vanier Colleges in Montreal for the CLR tools, randomly assinging students to face-to- face and virtual on-line groups in order to evaluate the two spatial collaborative learning strategies of concept mapping and knowledge mapping.
Participating Collaborators & Parter Organizations:
Bell Canada's main interest, backed by a $100,000 contribution, is to ensure educational software and courseware produced is effective both technically and pedagogically which will be used for corporate training needs and distance learning solution. It will provide access to high speed digital networks and computing facilities. Bell Canada./MediaLinx wants advice on the technological demands of high-end multiple-media oriented professions and their implications for networked education and training. Centennial College/Bell Centre for Creative Communications, Canada's largest interactive multimedia centre, in partnership with key information and technology providers and the Centre for Landscape Research, will investigate the applications of digital communications technology and evaluation as they relate to training and dissemination to the private sector. The Information Commons at the University of Toronto, North American leader in informational technology and instructional design, are interested in the development and training of instructional computing techniques for the faculty and the exploration of Spatial Literacy. The Robarts Library Information Commons will provide staff time, computational equipment support, and assistance in courseware evaluation. It will provide lab access and $25,000 worth of faculty release time in support of this project. The Architecture and Urban Design Division of the Planning and Development Department of the City of Toronto will contribute staff time, hardware and software resources, and access to its 2D and 3D mapping and modeling resources in support of this project. The four architecture schools in the Canadian Association for Computers in Design (CACD) (University of Waterloo, University of British Columbia, University of Manitoba and the University of Toronto) will commit faculty time, equipment and in-studio testing in support of this project. In support of the Montreal phase of this project dealing with the comparative assessment of concept mapping and knowledge mapping, Vanier College will provide Helena Dedic with technical support in classes and labs, internet access, software support, as well as release time ($27,000 per year). Dawson College will give Sylvia d'Appollonia 25% release time in four of the five years of this project. LDF Publishing Incorporated will provide the researchers at Dawson a substantial discount, $3.00 each for 600 copies of its software, Making Your Mark, for purposes of evaluation and adaptation in the project (retail value per copy is $49.95).
4A) STUDENT SUB-CULTURES, GROUPS, HOME STUDY AND INFORMAL LEARNING: FACE-TO-FACE VS. COMPUTER- SUPPORTED COLLABORATIVE LEARNING (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $93,000
Academic Members:
Brian Campbell (PI), Associate Professor, Dept. of Sociology & Anthropology, Mount Allison University; Carl Cuneo, Professor of Sociology, McMaster University; Richard Schmid, Associate Professor and Chair, Education, Concordia University; Robert Bernard, Professor, Dept. of Education, Concordia University, Gary Boyd, Professor, Dept. of Education, Concordia University; Peter Holt, Associate Professor, Cognitive Science, Chair, Computing Information Systems, Athabasca University.
Brian Campbell, as PI, will be responsible for the overall direction of this project, and for supervising the construction of questionnaires and the qualitative phases of this project. Carl Cuneo at McMaster, Richard Schmid, Gary Boyd and Robert Bernard at Concordia, and Pete Holt at Athabasca, will co-ordinate data collection at their respective sites in subsequent years of the study.
Participating Collaborators & Parter Organizations:
Mount Allison, McMaster, Concordia and Athabasca Universities will provide office overhead, student names for sample construction, and access to in-course and residential students. NBTel has a strong commitment to the informal student interaction work of this project becasuse of its interest in selling remote educational services. It wants to know how interaction and involvement can be created remotely. It wants to foster informal educational communities. This will help to maintain motivation and commitment to purchasing NBTel's services. A highly interactive learning community, which is the model exemplified by Mount Allison, is the one NBTel would like to see transferred with the use of information technologies to a broader client public. It has therefore committed $50,000 in its experts' staff time to assist EvNet in the evaluation of learning technologies generally and this project in particular. Academic Technology, Faculty of Arts and Science, Concordia University, will provide internet and lab access to students who are the subjects of the study of informal learning in the Concordia phase of this study. It has commited substantial resources for this purpose. The Athabasca University Student Union has a critical stakeholder interest in the impact of instructional technologies, especially at a distance, on student's informal, personal, and extra-curricular activities. They will be consulted in the Athabasca phase of this study.
4B) FACE TO FACE VS. COMPUTER-SUPPORTED COLLABORATIVE LEARNING AMONG STUDENTS WITH PHYSICAL DISABILITIES (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $100,000
Academic Members:
Catherine Fichten (PI), Professor, Psychology Dept., Dawson College; Philip Abrami, Professor, Dept. of Education, Director of Centre for Study of Classroom Processes, Concordia University; Bette Chambers, Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Education, Associate Director, Centre for the Study of Classroom Processes, Concordia University.
Catherine Fichten is one of the best known scholars in North America in the area of postsecondary educational opportunities for people with disabilities. She has held research grants since1982 and has published extensively both on the social integrationof people with disabilities as well as on postsecondary education. Her role in this project is to coordinate and execute the various studies related to technological adaptations and computer-assisted collaborative learning for people with disabilities. Philip Abrami is a renowned expert in the area of cooperative learning. He will coordinate with Dr Fichten and provide expertise related to methodology, measurement issues, attitude evaluation and meta analyses. Bette Chambers has expertise in evaluation of concerns and programming related to underprivileged students. Because of her linkages with the public school system and her expertise in "politically correct" terminology and sensitivity to testing issues with minority children, Bette will advise Dr Fichten and her team on minority issues.
Collaborators:
Eva Libman - Director, Sleep & Aging Project, Jewish General Hospital, Alice Havel - Coordinator, Services for Students with Disabilities, Dawson College
Participating Collaborators and Partner Organizations:
Ordinateurs Dream Scape Computers. This young, innovative company specializes in internet research, software installation and troubleshooting, creation of posters for special events, computer consulting, computer training, and internet training. A specific interest of Mr. Lavers, President, and his firm involves computer training and adaptations for people with physical, sensory and intellectual deficits. Not only does his firm specialize in services for peoples with disabilities, but Mr. Lavers also has personal experience with this topic, as he has a disabling medical disorder and is legally blind. He and his organization will provide expertise, software adaptations, data entry and networking services to Dr. Fichten's group in this project.
Another partner is Dr. Eva Libman of the Aging Project of the Jewish General Hospital./ The Project, which has been in existence for over 5 years, has as its goal the promotion of wellness among seniors. Dr Libman and her research team have been exploring characteristics and interventions which contribute to active,successful aging. One aspect of well-being which interests Aging Project members is the continuing ability of seniors to follow intellectual pursuits, including college and university courses. Because their interest are in wellness and successful aging rather than impairment and illness, many of the Aging Project's research participants have been seniors who are attending colleges and universities in the Montreal area. Dr. Libman will make available to Dr. Fichten's research portions of the Project's laboratory, computer facilities, and research sample as well as the active support of research team members, including their staff time.
Dawson College is a large urban junior - community college in downtown Montreal. With an enrollment of approximately 7 000, DawsonCollege provides educational opportunities to students from awide variety of minority backgrounds. As part of the diversity of its students, Dawson College provides educational opportunities to well over 200 students with physical, medical, psychiatric, learning, and sensory disabilities. Dr. Alice Havel is Coordinator of Services to Students with Disabilities. She is prepared to assist Dr. Fichten and her research team through information dissemination, by publicizing the research project to students with disabilities and by making available adapted software, computers, and facilities. In addition, several other groups at Dawson College have agreed to act as partners of Dr.Fichten's research; their contributions include 25% release for Dr Fichten from her teaching as well as a variety of in-kind services totalling $690,000 for the work of Drs Fichten and d'Appolonia, and in support of Michelle Clabrough. We have reduced this estimate in Figure 14 to $414,200 by taking ten per cent of Dawson's computing facilities.
Other partners of Dr. Fichten's research are members of the Higher Education and Disability Research Network (H.E.A.R.D.), a research-minded grouping of Canadian coordinators of services to students with disabilities. They offer the opportunity to consult with Network members concerning their experiences with computer adaptations and collaborative learning for students with disabilities as well as the possibility of serving as a vehicle for dissemination of reportsof research and findings to the concerned milieu. (Please consult the letter by Ruth Walsh from the Memorial University Roy Blaudon Centre).
4C) WORKPLACE APPLICATIONS OF COMPUTER- SUPPORTED COLLABORATIVE LEARNING (CSCL): COMMUNICATING AND COOPERATING (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $843,000
Academic Members:
Richard Schmid (PI), Assoc. Professor & Chair, Education Dept., Concordia University; Gina Walker, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Education, Concordia University.
Participating Collaborator & Partner Organizations:
Ari Riven Kugler - President & CEO, Systemcorp, Marie-Claude Tremblay - Multi-media Development Consultant
The Institute of Canadian Bankers (ICB) plays an important role in supporting the network of Canadian banks in their efforts to educate and train their employees. It offers programs consisting of courses offered by colleges and universities for the professional development of bank employees. In responding to the expressed needs of the banks, the ICB has a strong commitment to distance education in the delivery of its courses, and is quickly moving in this direction. In fulfilling this commitment, the ICB is interested in better understanding the strategies required to increase the effectiveness of means of delivery, such as those which support collaborative learning. In addition, it is very interested in examining the application of new and emerging technologies to education and skills development in the workplace. As the ICB begins to focus on the impact of technology-based learning in the banking environment, as well as the dissemination of its own courses, it is particularly interested in assessment and evaluation issues. For this project, it will provide the Concordia researchers access to its distance courses for purposes of evaluation and assessment. It will contribute its own staff time in designing, developing and administering the evluation tools for its INTERNET pilot, and for analyzing results. It will also provide logistical support of the field work involed in distributing to, and collecting from, students the data-gathering instrument.
The Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) plays a critical role in providing financial and non-financial support to the growth and development of Canada's small to medium-sized businesses. Its focus is to foster Canadian entrepreneurship to enable such companies to compete successfully in the global economy. It is the only bank that is exclusively dedicated to small and medium-sized companies. In supporting Canada's entrepreneurs, BDC offers training courses to promote business development skills in this small business sector. Such courses have been classroom-based; BDC is now interested in the larger audience accessible through electronic networks. As an organization with wide-reaching impact, BDC is interested in working together with the research community to achieve a greater understanding of how to achieve more effective delivery through such means. The BDC will provide $10,000 for resources to develop its first such course that uses computer- supported collaborative learning techniques.
Systemcorp is a privately owned company involved in the research, development and commercialization of multi-media based software products. Their products are designed to reach both private and public organizations, addressing topics generally related to the improvement of management and process re-engineering. To improve their methodology, their instructional technologists, programmers, and graphic designers would work with the EvNet/Concordia team to carry out advanced R & D in the art of producing multi-media, networked software which is cost-effective and timely. In this project, issues of networking (CMC), collaborative workspaces, media mix and instructional strategies, combined with learner characteristics, will be addressed, involving contract work with a number of existing and potential clients as well as in-house productions.
Le Groupe Conseil Eduplus Inc. The Eduplus group is a branch of the Tecsult Groupe, a multi faceted management consulting company. WIth nearly 20 years of experience, Eduplus is the best in its field in Canada and is gaining world prominence in its human resources educational project and development. Its clients are found in over 40 countries in Africa, Latin America, Asia, and East Europe. Because of its experience and skill, Eduplus in the last few years is involved in the sweeping new information technology. It is involved in the design, delivery and management of educational and human resource development projects around the world.
Eduplus is allied with Tele-university to experiment with distantcollaborative work. It is using the methodology and tools developed by Tele-U in its main activities. Eduplus has already experimented certain aspects of the information highway.
Its pilot project investigating collaborative distant education is in 3 countries - Burking Faso, Ivory Cost and Mali. The support given by the Quebec government in the FAI (Information Highway Funds) allows us to experiment with new ways of managing international projects.
Eduplus is interested in the development and methodology in evaluating the information system and support from a distance. The research on the technological and human structures will permit optimal learning and productivity in a communication context.
EduPlus' participation in EvNet will be dedicated to further developing and improving their existing methodologies in new uses of information technologies, and experimenting with approaches to support collaborative work at a distance as well as technological approaches to regular and distance training.
Eduplus is ready to collaborate with the Concordia team in the EvNet project and the development in this field. Its contribution in services to EvNet is approximately $600,000.
More precisely, the Evnet researchers: (1) Will participate from the beginning in the activities of distance formation mediated by the computer; (2) Carry out case studies once the projects have identified the human variables, social and technological in favour of learned experience. (3) Participate in the development of methodogy and instruments of formative and summative evaluation based on the case studies of previous works.
In a further elaboration of its letter in Appendix F, EduPlus has provided the following categories of contribution to EvNet:
Here is the cost breakdown from Eduplus:
Le Groupe MENTOR is concerned with technology-based solutions to education, ergonomics and information processes. It examines work from three associated subsystems: the design of an organization's training, the design of electronic performance support tools, and the information systems it consults. The applied research it plans to carry out involves the design of the work itself, associated training, and support technologies. Process control is ensured by the principles of quality, guaranteed, measurable results, system adaptability, economy of resource use, and the importance of people.
It is interested in exploiting technologies for conducting task analyses (involving the three systems cited above), and supporting access to and usefulness of information. In particular, EvNet researchers will work with them to: Evaluate the type and breadth of the respective impact of: the design of the work, the design of the interface, the practical training, and the support of work productivity with information systems. Possible research variables include: complexity of the work, aptitude of the workers, and the importance of the information to the tasks).
In the framework of the Evnet, we wish to become a partner to evaluate and improve our procedures, our tools and our ideas. We already have a good relationship with the team at Concordia U (Graduate Program in Educational Technology) and our technologists will be delighted to collaborate in this project. We expect to combine concrete things in this project, our expertise in the elaboration and establishment of training tools, supports for the task/piecework for the information workers with those at Concordia in the domaine, cognitive principals and effective design, evaluation methodology.
We estimate the value of our contribution to be $350,000 for the duration of this project, this amount includes salaries, equipment costs, infrastructure, production costs associated with this product.
EduPlus vs Mentor: The key difference between Mentor and Eduplus is that Mentor is more involved with performance enhancement via technologies, and the design processes which lead to better productivity. Mentor does not emphasize collaborative work at a distance. It is just interested in technologies in the workplace, regardless of the application.
4D) LABOUR/LEARNING AND THE VIRTUAL WORKSPACE (Appendix D)
Potential Project Assets: $88,000
Academic Members: Sam Lanfranco, York University, Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CERLAC), York University, International Development and Research Centre (IDRC), Ottawa; Alejandra Rojo, Ontario Institute for Secondary Education (OISE), Toronto. .
Sam Lanfranco (PI) will supervise the design and operation of the research strategy in collaboration with an existing network of researchers around the world, anchored in the labor-l listserv. He coordinates the Distributed Knowledge Project, is a member of the Economics Department, Fellow of the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CERLAC), Associate in the Centre for Health Studies, and on partial-secondment to the Bellanet Initiative at IDRC in Ottawa. Alejandra Rojo is a recent OISE (Toronto) PhD and now a funded post-doctoral fellow. As a specialist in how academics use electronic workspaces to carry out their work, she will extend her work into a new area, labour and social process, and combine her dissertation methodologies with the approaches of this project.
Participating Collaborators & Partner Organization:
Peter Waterman, Institute for Social Studies, the Hague, is a collaborator on this project. He has devoted over a decade to research in the are of how labour uses the electronic virtual workspace. He will be contributing his 3,000 plus labour database and his expertise on Latin America and Europe.
Canada Employment and Immigration Union (CEIU/PSAC) will contribute content and staff consultation on evaluation and development of 'best practices' for a 'peer-to-peer' regional union network staff guide.
Pathfinder Learning Systems Company (PLSC)l is a successful private sector producer of computer based learning management systems used across Canada and increasingly abroad. PLSC, widely engaged in training and self-paced learning, is looking at the uses of its approaches for collaborative capacity building beyond strict curricular and job skills training. It will offer test sites for aspects of the research agenda, as wall as a critical private sector perspective on the overall research work. It will behave somewhere between a supporting partner and a collaborating venue.
Web Networks (NirvCentre) is a non-profit electronic networks service provider with over 4,000 Canadian NGOs and individual subscribers engaged mainly in non-profit sector work. Much of it has to do with sustainable development, the environment and social justice. Web Networks is the venue for hundreds of electronic conferences, including a number on labor. Several, including Labornet and Union Net, serve as venues for Canadian informal, organized and non-union labor seeking a venue to pursue labour issues. In the model of research being proposed here, Web Networks and its subscribers are linked as partners and stakeholders, as well as collaborators in the research. This is part of the new reality of collaboration within the virtual workspace.
Asian Monitor Research Centre (AMRC) participates in Labor-L. We are collaborating on their efforts to launch a Workers Education, Training and Information Exchange in conjunction with other regional and local NGOs in Asia. The first concrete proposal is for a pan-Asia on-line dialogue centred on workers perspectiges on the Social Clause in Asia. As with the thrust of this EvNet project, AMRC initiative is about labour using the electronic venue as a social process learning and training environment, not for job skills training. Other Stakeholders: Quite likely, given the existing links through LABOR-L, Labornet, Union Net, and the three dozen regional and more specialized on-line labour groupings, as well as the hundreds of local electronic services run by the subscribers to LABOR-L et. al., this project will have links to a largernumber of key stakeholders, and at the lowest cost, than for any learning research project funded in Canada. As well, the venue is quickly becoming unparalleled as a vehicle for dissemination and knowledge diffusion, both occurring in a venue which allows stakeholder feedback. This research project is not about whether this happens but about how it happens and what that means for social process.
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