EDGE: EdTech Greenhouse
EDGE: EdTech Greenhouse is an exciting initiative where identified Technology-enhanced Learning (TEL) projects arising from either pedagogical experiments or research labs undergo an incubation process to ensure effective translation to campus-wide IT solutions accompanied with resources to support faculty and students. Such projects can significantly impact the quality of learning but are not within the means or ability of any single faculty or unit to scale independently and would often require multi-disciplinary skillsets to develop, implement, review, scale and support. Initiated by the Centre for Teaching Excellence (CTE), this cross-functional team leverages tripartite collaboration with Integrated Information Technology Services (IITS) and Schools, to bring multi-disciplinary perspectives and skill sets to delve deeper into understanding user requirements to produce unique and better solutions.
The Competency Analytics System (CAS) is an example of how EDGE translates research projects to campus-wide solutions. CAS was initially developed by a School of Computing and Information Systems (SCIS) Instructor as part of a research project, it worked well and benefitted SCIS students who were able to identify gaps in their competencies and work on bridging their learning gaps as part of their personalised learning process. CTE has taken on the project management role, engaging potential stakeholders, curriculum mapping and alignment. CTE has developed an enhanced version of the system, named the INSIGHT System, in collaboration with leading faculty members, with IITS lending support in the areas of IT infrastructure and systems integration. The role delineation in the EDGE collaboration model is graphically represented in Figure 1.
Figure 1: EDGE Collaboration Model