 Hello and welcome everybody. Welcome back here to the winter conference. I'm really thrilled to welcome all of you here for a session about Amplify of E and showcasing excellence in our communities of practice across that sector. I'm thrilled that we have a co-presenter here today, so hi Lynne, do you want to introduce yourself? Oh hello, hi Maryn and good afternoon everyone, it's lovely to be with you today. My name's Lynne Taylorson, I am a teacher educator and mentor in further education. You can follow me at real-time EDU there and I've been really excited to be working with Maryn and the team on a wonderful piece of research and engagement that's Amplify of E, which is what we're here to chat to you about this afternoon. That's right and normally my day job I'm the CEO of ALT but in this particular session and for the purposes of the Amplify of E project I'm one of the individuals who's working on this new community of practice and also on a bit of research that we want to talk to you about today and particular our sector audit. So we're going to jump right in, this is going to be a really interactive session we have a few things to share with you and some remixing to do as well. So hi to Sam who has already settled on the chat, if you do want to say hello please do comment in the chat and post any questions you might have as well throughout the session. So Amplify of E is a network led by ALT in partnership with UFI, the Vogue Tech Trust and I want to give a big shout out to UFI because they are the funders of this project which is now in its second year. We launched Amplify of E in October last year and it already connects over a thousand professionals in further education and vocational education providing a strong networking community for us to share collaborate and learn and we want to first talk to you about today our sector audit which is a key part of the work that we do. Now the initial sector audit looked at close to a hundred different communities of practice in total. We looked across all of vocational education, NFE and audited online groups, networks set up by sector bodies, technology companies, independent ones as well as those led by individual groups and practitioners. The data we collect includes key indicators such as how active such a group is, the number of members involved, subject focus, governance, platforms are tool used and so on. This year we've looked at how things have changed from the last year, how many communities have stopped or started the activities and important changes in the sector landscape. So some of the findings are here on this slide now and I'll also put a link to the sector audit into the chat but Lynn I'm going to come to you in a minute just to see if you want to highlight one or two findings from this slide. One of the things that I wanted to start off with is the first number on the screen which was that actually there's a 30% increase of the number of networks that we audited this year which I think reflects the increase of collaboration and connection within the sector. What do you think Lynn? Yes I think you know it shows the real balance of what's going on. I think I'm not alone in saying that many people in NFE really really felt it when the tears further the FE communities were closed and that was individual forums, dedicated news. It was a really difficult time but it was amazing to see you know we're looking there on on the right hand side. Twitter stepped up and filled that community gap. We got 36 new communities adding to the landscape and these communities really sort of I suppose making lemonade from the lemons of the pandemic you know on Zoom, on Teams, particularly on Twitter and I think it was just great to see them burgeoning and for me one of the really important things that we've seen in the last year is those individual communities coming together. What Lou Mycroft would call constellations actually grouping and working together at times and there's been some fantastic collaboration which I think has been you know really encouraging. I agree completely. I think it also reflects on how much practitioners and researchers in the sector have decided to do it themselves rather than rely on kind of short-term funded networks or groups that are being set up and that come and go very quickly which is I think one of the key problems we identified over the last you know period is that so much discontinuity and I think the the TES communities closing all 74 individual forums including those dedicated to FE is a really good example of that. Now you've talked a little bit about joining things up and one of the things that we established last year is a community map that is being remixed and in a minute we might get the audience involved but first Lynne who is on the map at the moment and do you want to give any shout outs to to those on there? Of course you can see you know on our map there we've got we've got a list of some stars you know and this ranges from everything with very specialist interest groups for example English FE to things like everyone in education. We've got FE Tapestry which is a community that grew out of PD North which actually is it's got so many different purposes there's online support there are videos to do with using ed tech there are FE teachers on their blogging about their experiences with ed tech so FE Tapestry is a great one to check out again specific things like ESOL chat but also I think it's been phenomenally encouraging to see the FE and I'm sure HE communities research communities actually moving online so things like FE research meets have been going for several years you know at colleges around the country who host them and I think it was really fabulous to see that community moving into online gatherings so that FE research is still being shared and disseminated and people are celebrating it and then finally at the bottom we've got things like Joy FE which is you know a values led community so we've got things there that are rooted in pedagogy in specialist subject areas in FE but also those identity and values based communities which is just so phenomenal I think to see the richness Marin I agree and one of the things I really enjoyed seeing this year is that there are quite a few communities showing up that are branching out beyond their core group and into broader communities like the adult conversations for example I know that Joy FE isn't exclusively FE either it does include and welcome everyone so I think that's one of the things that we were hoping to encourage with the Twitter chat we had earlier today and big shout out to everyone who took part I thought it was a fascinating conversation it was absolutely it's lovely to see again Twitter almost proving the hub where these communities can come together and actually the engagement with it you know things like UK FE happening at nine o'clock on a Thursday night you'd think oh will people really turn up and yes they do because it really speaks to FE practitioners well we invite you now to have a bit of a practical couple of minutes with us and have a bit of fun if you haven't come across it before I really recommend you have a good rummage around the visual thinkery remixer or the fabulous remixer machine as Brian Mothers the creator calls it now we've been working with Brian for a long time and those of you who've seen the little videos at the start and end of all the sessions will know that he's made many things with our community but this map is one of the things we've been working on with him in the past year and you can add yourself to the map so if you have a hashtag that you want to include here is your opportunity I've posted the link in the chat on how to do it and go to the map and select somewhere you want to go I'm not sure if I'd rather hide on top of the snowy mountain ride now Lynn or go to the little island that's got a sandy beach but I'm sure we're all looking forward to our holidays enough to want to escape I bet everyone's going to head to the beach it's just logical isn't it absolutely so yeah we're really looking forward to to watching you know people and themselves to the map so we can leave a couple of minutes and let people get on with that here is what to do if you do want to have a go and please do doesn't have to be an fe hashtag if you're joining in I know that the LTAG chat for example is on there but add your tag and you can customize the size and the color of the text then orientate your your map and then you should be able to save your remix and that way add yourself to the map so yeah we'll have a go and you can have a look at how it develops and I'll just have a look and see if I can my screen is just loading and I wanted to see if I can maybe share what that looks like right we got it yeah I've got it coming up so I'm just going to see if I can share that particular tab there's a huge switch over and cross working between fe and he that it's lovely to see he or he and fe people adding their tags onto there so we would encourage that oh that's fabulous so you can see um there's new tiles being added and I can see the open edsig for example is one of the ones that is on there and that's going to come up in about two hours I think a session with Teresa and colleagues the open house session so if you want to do some remixing with us please do feel free to add yourself to the map now I'm going to switch back into our presentation because we certainly have more to share with our audience today and one of the things we wanted to share and specifically is a showcase of excellent practice within the sectors that includes some fascinating examples of different types of work that's being carried out and one of the ones that I wanted to highlight for you is an immersive learning platform designed to with VR um called body swaps which we had um and one of our case studies and here's a link to all the videos um for you to have a look at um then I'm going to come to you in a minute in case there's one that you wanted to highlight in particular or talk about I know that there's um quite a few that that you know more about but one I wanted to highlight was digilearn sector which is a community wide hub for collaboration and knowledge exchange from UCL and CCL so I'm just going to um put a link into that as well um into the chat so in case you want to have a look at digilearn sector um and start exploring that's one of the ones that I discovered through this what about you Lynn is there any that you want to highlight oh there there's so many I think the the the wonderful thing about this showcase is that um it's it's not a long read it's actually community founders and people who are active with the communities actually on video talking about them and their ethos of the community so I think that's a great way of really putting over what they do I mean I'll come back to something like um PD North which is um something that's evolved from initially an ETF funded program and it's one of those wonderful things where we're seeing a community that's become independently sustainable which is what we want um and it's just so good I think to see FE teachers finding their voices and and blogging and that's a great site for that so there's not only you know practical things like posting to cpd opportunities conferences events like this um and lots of really useful sort of bite-sized learning videos around things like zoom and and using things like jam board in FE but actually you've got the richness there of of FE teachers doing a blog on esol doing a blog on um the challenges with integrating technology and I think you know that that's bringing it's such a such a diversity and we can see that in quite a few of the other communities there you know like um sector share there's a real real richness of technology recommendations but also resources and I think one of the things that we've always found is that there's little silos in FE and too many of these things are well kept secrets so it's great to see things like amplify FE bringing those you know to to wider attention I think Maron yeah I agree and and I have to say that's one of the real um benefits I think of trying to join up the dots and one of the reasons why we're so pleased to be here today is because there are a lot of best kept secrets and a lot of I think wasted effort trying to reinvent what other people have already done um just because it's hard to to find that and joining the dots is one of the key things we want to do um so I was thinking sort of from a strategic point of view as well and I know many people here in the room um will will be working in in FE and HE or maybe across different sectors um but I wanted to just highlight the sort of strategic importance of the work that we're doing and I wanted to share this quote with you from Jeff Greenwich one of the trustees from U of I about sort of what they see as the strategic importance of the communities of practice piece um and why that is so important particularly in the current climate so it's one of the things I think events like this help us to make a little bit of time for um but that is a really big challenge at the moment um having any kind of time um for any of the for any of the things that we don't necessarily have to do um one Zoom or team meeting after the other so the last piece of work that we want to share with you today um is around online interaction and getting to know different communities of practice because that's one of our key missions is to try and help connect those who aren't already connected and then in the minute I'll hand over back to you to talk a little bit about this particular article and and this resource but I just wanted to give some examples of some of the things that we've been working on to help individual particularly staff or maybe not well networked already get started so one of the things we try and promote is how to select different communities for yourself and how to for example find hashtags on twitter um even how to use twitter um also there is a networks page where you can find different types of communities um some of them are quite formal um some of them are more subject focused um some of them are industry led and some of them are um teacher led so I think it's good to see that there is a whole range of kind of formal and informal opportunities to getting involved with and there's also I think a lot of different twitter chats for example that you can get involved with and one of the ones that we mentioned earlier for example the UK FV chat I think that's one of the biggest ones and I know many people in the room here will be familiar with the LTAG chat which is weekly but on a Wednesday evening I'm thinking that might be actually tonight um but there's also more subject focused ones like maths ones English ones um English as a foreign language ones so there's particular ones um no matter what you're interested in and at the at the twitter chat at lunchtime today we ask people about resources that they go to and communities that they go to so I was really interested to see where people go and I think the sort of personal learning twitter network came up quite often um how about you Lynn sorry I've been chatting away how about you what your thoughts on this I share your um confusion I'm not quite knowing if it's Wednesday or not or Thursday so I'm right there with you yes I think that's and again that's coming back to the richness of some very general communities and then some really specific ones and I think that particularly for um FE or HE practitioners who are just getting into using Twitter they might be more familiar with something slightly more formal like LinkedIn and Twitter can seem you know quite a bewildering community it's got its own language it's got its own etiquettes um and it can I think for a lot of people um feel a little bit like falling into a fast flowing river particularly if you go along to something like UK FE chat where you're bombarded by um something like six to ten questions in a packed hour and everybody sort of piling in and answering so I think it's invaluable to have you know work that's been done and by by Emma and Chloe looking at online interaction and just saying to people look just dip your toe in the water you might choose one of the smaller communities perhaps in your subject specialist area you know like the Netecla or Esol communities just to dip your toe in the water and and it's I think it's just so valuable for people who are getting into Twitter or looking to expand their network just to have the signposting that Amplify FE has been able to do because I think I'm right in saying it's it's the first time that this kind of resource has been here as a one-stop shop where somebody who's looking to expand their Twitter use in FE you can just go along and get all of these recommendations so so yes I'd absolutely recommend the article in Intuition but also the Amplify FE site with those lovely signposts and guides for how to dip your toe into the water and then how to expand your network once you feel that you're ready to. Thanks Lynn that's a really good point actually and we're coming up into the last couple of minutes of our presentation and I wanted to just reflect and maybe ask you as well because I know that you work with lots of professionals from different backgrounds and sectors and I wondered if there's anybody here in the room who's trying to kind of you know branch out beyond their current known colleagues and their own sort of little bubble. Do you have any recommendations of you know how can you try and learn about what you don't already know? Well I think you know Amplify FE is an absolutely great start because you'll see general communities and then more specialists but actually if you want to dip into the existing communities just because UK FE chat happens on a Thursday night for example at nine or you've got your LTHE chat going on in different slots doesn't mean that you can't use that hashtag on a Monday afternoon to say hey I'm a lecturer working in construction or I'm an adult in community language lecturer hey Twitter community use the hashtag Amplify FE use the hashtag FE what would you recommend and actually putting those shout-outs and asking people to retweet can be a fantastic way you know I've done it to discover communities that I've not heard of so I think the message is it's it's very very welcoming there and you will get people who will step in and be really really free and generous with recommendations and and things that you should do. I can only echo that and I hope that some of you in the room will take us up on that encouragement and use the hashtag Amplify FE even if it's just to lurk and have a look around but if you're feeling brave if you want to engage please do maybe do more than lurk and and get involved in the conversation so that's really our call to action and before we finish Lynn there's a couple of things that I just wanted to highlight that are coming up in the next year because while we do have a huge amount that's happened this year there's actually more in store for next year so one of the things I wanted to highlight is that there is going to be the next sector audit and we've got funding to do it for two more years so next year there will be an expanded version of the sector audit and one of the focuses for next year will be diversity and inclusion so that's one of the key things we want to look at next year and then we're also expanding our community activities and I think there will be a new special interest group dedicated to vocational education and FE just to help provide some more structural support for all these different individual bubbles of practitioners who are already sharing their practice and there's a lot more in store which is very exciting I think for us to see what's happening and is there anything on the calendar for 2022 other than potentially seeing each other in person that you are particularly looking forward to? Absolutely you know there are a few tentative bookings of conferences in you know June and July and I think Marin you were actually teasing the idea of an out-sea face-to-face which you know we can only cross our fingers you know but I think it's really really really welcome to see the idea of a special interest group for vocational education it's very very welcome and I think that these communities hopefully I can see them as something that will morph over time sometimes they're face-to-face maybe once a year then they're going to have monthly get-togethers and I think it's it's all part of the I hate to say it new normal but I think it's something that we should encourage so yeah we're looking forward to all of these things and I think we would just appeal wouldn't we put yourself on the map so there's another sector audit happening so if you're not on the map yet please get there or just tweet with the hashtag AmplifyFV and let let us know about you and the wonderful things that you're doing absolutely I can only echo that and we've run out of time now so we are at the end of our formal presentation but Lynn and I will stick around for a few more minutes and answer any questions that you might have so this is the moment where you can post anything you want to know or tell us want us to tell you more about in the chat and if you have to rush off and get going to the next session or whatever Zoom or Teams call you're on next then I want to say a really big thank you for joining us where I think we all appreciate at the moment how much time pressure everybody's under and it's a special privilege that you came to our session today and to hear and learn about AmplifyFV so thank you to everybody who's joined us from Durham from South London Gloomy Glasgow that caught an Oxford cheer it's been an absolute pleasure and yeah do please post any questions you might have in the chat yes thanks so much everybody it's been lovely finding out where you're from we certainly got the country covered in this in this section yeah I think so too yeah all right Lynn I can't see any questions just yet in the chat so what I might do is say thanks again and then end the broadcast but Lynn and I will continue to have a look at the chat and if you have any questions do please post them into the chat and we will pick those up so again thank you very much everybody thank you for joining us