 Good morning, let's make a start. I'm Steve Ryan and I have a pleasure of chairing this session. And I'm delighted to introduce Aaron Porter, who's vice president of the National Union of Students. I think it's truly brilliant planning on behalf of the organisers that Aaron follows directly on from Michael's discussion so we can continue with student-focused element. Aaron's going to talk about a student perspective on institutions and use of technology to enhance teaching and learning for the 21st century. So without further ado, over to Aaron. Good morning everyone and thanks very much. And I've learnt something already today because I have learnt that PowerPoint corrupts and therefore perhaps it was just good coincidence or that I haven't actually, I deliberately chose, I thought how can I stand out in this conference and I thought, do you know what, I'm not going to do a PowerPoint presentation, it's worked out absolutely perfectly. At the start of the day, Julie Sammon talked about opportunities and I couldn't agree with her more. I think we stand at a time where the opportunities for the way in which we can transform learning and teaching and the way in which students can experience that is absolutely astronomical and the bounds are endless and whether that's the way in which technology is being used in education prior to higher education and the way in which students arrive with a different expectation and a different set of skills that we should be able to try and take forward. Recently John Denham announced a series of reviews into HE and one of those was conducted by Sir Ron Cook and he was trying to put forward some views about how technology could help to transform higher education. But we're also in a reality whereby there is increasing pressure on universities to diversify the kinds of students that we admit. There's also increased pressure in terms of ultimately delivering higher education on an ever reducing budget and the amount spent on each individual student is likely to reduce. Whilst that's challenging of course in many ways, I think it presents a lot of opportunities and that's what I want to try and put forward over the next 15 to 20 minutes. I'm going to spend a little bit of time looking at the recent HEA report into HE in a Web 2.0 world and make some responses to that because I think there's lots from a student perspective that's very interesting. Then I want to close by talking about what I perceive to be a massive disconnect in the eyes of students between higher education and the real world. Whether it's the student that has to sit in a room with a pen and paper for three hours scribbling away in a sports hall. I can tell you the last time I did that was my final exam as an English Literature student at the University of Leicester. Or whether it's the fact that some lecturers will turn around and say, sorry, can you put the laptops away in the lecture theatre? There are countless examples of how a student I think sees what goes on in a university as completely removed from the world outside of universities, the real world afterwards and Michael touched upon that in his presentation. I think that we need to be honest about trying to make some changes to the way in which HEA is conducted and I'm also going to finish off by talking about students in the academic community because I think that we've seen the reasons why students are going to choosing to go to universities, the way in which they see themselves as participants of their higher education has changed considerably over time, I would suggest. I think fewer students, perhaps now than ever, genuinely see themselves as active participants and members of an academic community. I think the way in which students participate in things like social networking they genuinely see themselves as part of a community and I think again there's an opportunity there to allow that to be translated across to higher education so that we can see and students can see themselves as participants in a higher education community. I'm just going to look at the HEA Web 2.0 world and make some responses to that first of all. Clearly I think it is important that when we look at that we do talk about the digital divide and it was mentioned in one of the questions at the start but I don't think we can underestimate those that arrive in higher education with a set of skills and those that don't, particularly as we see a demographic downturn over the next ten years or so where there will be fewer numbers of 18-year-olds. I think it's important that whilst we continue to drive forward the quality and the volume of technology that's used in the delivery of higher education for those that turn around and say well there are some that are not up to speed and having the skills that should not be a deterrent to try and push forward with the use of technology. What it means is I think universities need to think a great deal more creatively about thinking of the induction and the ways in which we can upskill students that perhaps arrive without the kinds of skills and there are. I'll cite my mum as an example who's currently a teacher but would like to come back into higher education to study English as it happens because she's interested and the reason at the moment that she has said that she's not prepared to do that is she worries that she hasn't got the skills the IT skills to survive in an HE environment. I'm doing my best to persuade her that there are ways that she can get round that but I just cite that as an example of universities needing to be more upfront about what it can do to upskill those that don't arrive with the skills or the confidence to feel that they can participate in higher education. I also think we need to think about the relationship between the educational experiences that those have before they arrive in higher education. What are universities doing to link up with primary schools and secondary schools so that there is a greater understanding of the kinds of skills that students are getting in primary and secondary schools now. When I get the opportunity I try and talk about careers and the advantages of going to university in a variety of different skills and I'm absolutely staggered in a really good way about the use of technology that I'm seeing in some secondary schools but again as I look at some of the conversations that happen at the top tables of some universities I'm not sure that they're fully up to speed with the skills that many school children are managing to get and therefore for some students arriving at university is often a step back in terms of their interaction with technology and I don't think that's acceptable for a higher education system that regards itself to be world class and genuinely trying to stretch students and so I think that's an important challenge that universities need to take right at the very heart of what they're doing and if that means genuinely including it in a university strategic plan and how we engineer change in universities these days then it absolutely needs to be taken seriously and I think there are many students who I come into contact and they are in terms of expectation it's not met in terms of what they're expecting to get out of the use of technology in their higher education experience. I want to link use of technology and face to face contact because of course there's what I consider to be a myth between the opportunity cost between the both of them. At the start of the last academic year NUS did some research into the student experience and one of the questions we asked students was we researched how much contact time face to face contact students were getting and what their satisfaction was with that. 85% of students regarded the face to face contact that they got as excellent or good but I was also pleased that 75% of students regarded the quantity of contact that they got to be excellent as well and I do find it troubling that when I open pages of the Times Higher I hope there's no reporters in the room that we continue to hear that students aren't getting enough face to face contact I don't think that's necessarily what students are saying yes it might be the case in some universities and perhaps arts and social science students were slightly less satisfied than students in other subject areas but by and large students are satisfied with the amount of contact they get and therefore I genuinely think that gives us a platform to go forward and try and look at how we can enhance what students get by truly blended learning experience and utilising technology to provide more flexibility because the interactions that I get is not that students as I say are upset with the quantity of what they're getting they're not necessarily happy with the flexibility in terms of when things are scheduled or the feedback that they're getting and it seems to me that technology can play a particularly useful role in trying to solve some of the problems that students get around wanting to have a more personalised experience and the ability about when they, for instance, get feedback on work that they've handed in I'm going to talk about feedback and assessment and link that into what I see to be the detachment between students going through a feedback and assessment process and the world outside of higher education As I said, the last time I sat in a room with a pen and paper and scribbled frantically for three hours was essentially my last day at university my final exam as a student at university Why is it that so few universities are allowing students to conduct exams on perhaps using computers or laptops? Yes, of course, there's a question about are there enough computers in a university but I think we need to start being a bit braver ever since I've left university I'm using computers on a daily basis so when I was writing essays that I would submit often the first paragraph in an essay would be the very last thing that I write and so the way in which I was thinking about essays was very different during the term time and then when I got to the exam period it was a very different experience I was having to go through and I think students recognised that as one example of that detachment but when it comes to feedback, for instance complaints around timeliness, legibility not being delivered in a format that the student wants again, I think technology can play a role in trying to solve some of these key problems I cite something called the Amazon solution to feedback I think the vast majority or many students are familiar with buying something on Amazon where you can track the purchase throughout so you select something, you can see whether it's been sent from the warehouse whether it's ready for collection you can leave feedback on the process and other people can read your feedback and I don't think something dissimilar wouldn't work for feedback why is it that I don't see any university systems where a student hands in their piece of work and they can then track the feedback they can see whether it's been collected whether it's been first marked whether it's been second marked whether it's been a tutorised format students can then respond to that feedback perhaps electronically and then maybe other people could then interact and look at the feedback as well so again I think technology could play an absolutely prime role in solving one of the biggest problems as borne out by the National Student Survey and also the H.E.A.'s postgraduate taught survey as feedback being a problem for postgraduate taught students as well looking at students as participants in an academic community as part of the research that NUS did looking into the student experience one of the questions that we asked right at the very beginning was what was the main reason that you chose to come to university and it was striking that over 60% of students said that the key reason for coming to university was for career enhancement for career progression or to get a step up on the career ladder I don't have any longitudinal data about whether that's different to where we were before what was particularly striking was only 22% of respondents cited what we called or what I tried to describe as academic reasons that they were particularly interested in the subject that it was something that they wanted to be stretched intellectually stretched by and I think that that sense of not being part of an academic community is proliferated for a number of reasons I'm not going to use this platform to talk about the way in which I think fees has changed the way in which students consider themselves but I think undoubtedly that has had a role but I do think we need to not see that as an excuse for not wanting to get students to consider themselves as part of an academic community but rather try and find what the solutions can be to get them considering themselves in that way or at least greater numbers considering themselves as part of an academic community I do think that the induction process is a fundamental way that we can try and change that to spend myself when I was a student would spend hours over the course of a week and often on individual days as part of networks whether that was on Facebook or on Twitter and I genuinely considered myself actively part of a community there I didn't particularly see it as any kind of academic community and I do think it's interesting to see how we can try and stimulate a sense of academia through social networking I don't think we should be trying to force students to come into different territories we should be looking at where students are taking part not trying to take over those territories but getting students to think about how they can utilise themselves in an academic way and unfortunately I don't have the answer for that but unquestionably when I looked back at what some of my interactions were often I would use things like Facebook to have a discussion about a particular seminar or suggest or try and find out what might be a good essay to read and follow up to a book that I've read sometimes that was part of a group discussion sharing ideas and exchanging ideas and I won't pretend that that was the primary way in which I used something like Facebook but that was a part of what I used it for but yet whilst I was a student I didn't in any shape any way shape or form consider my interaction like Facebook as part or adding to my academic experience and I think it is interesting that I presume that over the coming years students will continue to use might not be Facebook in a couple of years time it might be something different but how can we try and get students to stimulate their thinking about how they're utilising some of these social networking we'll turn to the question closing the feedback loop and also the role in which technology might have to play here one of the questions that we asked in the research was how many students feel that you get the opportunity to give feedback on a particular module and 92% of respondents this was an undergraduate 92% of students said that they felt they were given the opportunity to give feedback on their module yet only 25% of students felt that their feedback was acted upon and as someone that sat on staff student committees I know that in my particular department they actually used to spend a fair amount of time looking over the module evaluation forms and making future and trying to suggest future changes and ultimately making some changes out of the feedback that students had given but that wasn't ever as far as I was aware obviously given back to students and I link that to being part of an academic community for someone that's giving feedback and giving ideas and not to get any response and to be blanked it's quite easy to them feel that you might want to withdraw from that particular community and I would say again that feedback is instrumental in trying to foster a sense of community and again I think it's something that universities perhaps don't do quite so well so how can technology perhaps play a role in trying to make some solutions I don't see many online module evaluation forms surely it would be much quicker to process the results maybe send an email back within a week of some of the top line top line results I do think we need to think a little more creatively about how we can use technology to communicate with students and to get them thinking about being part of a community I want to close by saying that there's a lot of talk in the UK about having a world-class higher education system and I think by and large we do I think there's some high quality teaching undoubtedly some world-class research and we've got a diversity of different kinds of institutions that we should be truly proud of but as I look forward and try and perhaps to forecast what might happen over the next decade the next 20 years we're seeing lots of very exciting and other emerging higher education systems across the world and I think and I genuinely think the way that the UK can create itself a real competitive edge over some of the other systems is to think about how we take a lead now in utilising technology and really thinking about how we can transform the lives of students that go through a higher education system there's lots that we do well at the moment but it's not really enough sharing of good practice within institutions and across institutions but the expectation of students is starting to change and it's changing in a very quick way and so the things that I would finish off by saying is that I think universities need to think a little more carefully about what skills students are arriving with at university they need to be a lot more explicit about the training and I feel confident to use IT and other forms of technology and finally I think we need to see technology as a real solution for getting students to think of themselves as part of an academic community and I'll stop there and leave some time for questions thanks very much I was very struck by what you said about the induction into an academic community I think it's very important we were never very good at it back in the Stone Age so it's no surprise that we haven't got better with the advent of various new kinds of technologies but I think I mean I I think it resonates very strongly in a technology context with the old question and it is an old chestnut but who is the user right so students think in terms of technology as a solution to the institutions problems and the more that they think in terms of the students as being sort of raw material that gets processed and kind of degreed up and then out the door the less students will feel that they are being inducted into and so I would make sense to you I think so stop me if I go off track but I think that first and foremost universities have to accept the regional route through schools particularly school to university the motivations for those coming to university is something that I think universities are going to struggle to shape before we get there so I think that means we need to be the onus is when students arrive to be genuinely I have no problem with universities wanting to be and trying to be genuinely challenging with students when they arrive asking them questions like why have you come here what are you planning to get out of it what should be different about you in terms of the way that you think the way in which you learn at the time that you leave and I don't hear those questions being asked and I think there is a role for and undoubtedly I think we can use technology to start stimulating some of those things because in some ways it's more obvious to show your sort of contribution towards some sort of work through I'll start in particular I mean wikis for instance I just think is a particularly good way in which we can facilitate group work students can see the contribution that they've made it's part of a bigger piece of work why aren't for instance undergraduate students sometimes making contributions towards some of their professorial staff that are doing bigger pieces of work students trying to make a contribution towards things like that I think that students will see themselves as genuinely trying to be part of an academic community and there's lots more besides but fundamentally we need to go back to basics to think about the challenging questions that we're asking at the start because I don't think they exist follow up questions get off lightly you mentioned the use of wikis indeed you talked about social software and other tools what kind of advice would you give teaching staff in using these tools to students isn't there a danger that they might appear to be trying to jump on a bandwagon if perhaps they don't fully understand a couple of things spring to mind I think students are acutely aware of staff that have thought perhaps a bit more deeply about genuinely integrating the use of technology into the way in which they're delivering a particular module or particular series of teaching and staff that have just sort of bolted it on and there's also I think it becomes pretty obvious pretty quickly a member of staff that's not particularly proficient at the use of technology sometimes that can become obvious and I think that can often be quite disconcerting for students if that isn't dealt with in the right kind of way so I think there's some stuff about staff development there as a first but I also think there's some critical I wouldn't call it ground rules but they sort of are ground rules which need to be established particularly if you're doing something like group work through the use of a wiki lots of students and I find this a bit disappointing lots of students their initial reaction to things like group work is they're worried that either they're going to be the students going to do all the work and they're not going to get the recognition that they deserve or they're going to be lumped with someone they really don't like but I think if something is introduced in the right way and perhaps there's some honest and I think the students themselves I think that's the fairest way for them to go through that process and so long as those rules are justly applied afterwards I think you can get a hell of a lot out of group work just the exchange of ideas often I did a hell of a lot more private study when I was doing group work or work outside of the formal contact time when I was in group work than I ever did when I was doing individual work and I think that's an additional benefit that we would see as well but I think it's establishing the ground rules getting the students to establish the ground rules and then a track record of that being justly applied afterwards In terms of my personal experience I actually used to feel quite comfortable when I had lots of things going and I think the reason for that is I don't know whether this is a personal thing or something that's more general about the generation that I'm in I would get quite anxious if I didn't know what was going on in a series of different places so I'd be quite anxious if I didn't know who had just twittered or the rolling schools on the BBC sport website whilst I was writing an essay and whether that has a positive or a negative impact on the work that I was writing I don't quite know but I had a sense of anxiety if I didn't know what was going on elsewhere and the ability to just flick between various different windows was something that I found quite reassuring I mean, yeah so and on that erudite note I think we have to call this session to a halt Thank you very much