2 - Finding a way through the fog

In this post, I will summarise the journey that preceded the current project.

Despite the early warning signs globally in regard to Covid-19, it still shook the education system across all levels when the UK went into national lockdown. These shocks soon turned to action planning from an operational point of view, especially once it became clear that this was not going to blow over in a few months working from home. The first priority that was to establish answers to the following questions:

1. How will delivering teaching, learning and assessment from home work for both staff and learners?
2. What will be our underlying digital system infrastructure to support point 1?

3. What are the accessibility concerns for both staff and learners?

A group with a fancy acronym was formed to answer these questions. Members of the group had a range of techniques associated with technology from across the organisation. This group was diverse in experience and background, and would enable the answers to be informed by many differing perspectives and considerations as possible. So, what were the concerns?

I will break these down in a different order to how they're listed above, as questions 2 and 3 really feed into those for question 1. 

2. What will be our underlying digital system infrastructure to support point 1?

In the educational field there were many early adopters of Google Classroom from primary and secondary school institutions when lockdown measures were introduced in March 2020 and the noise it was creating asked us to re-evaluate our use of Office365. 

 

Personally, I am a big fan Google products. Made from the ground up as collaborative tools, I find Google software/apps far easier to engage with and navigate, less likely to glitch and as an educator, I find learners who are not so tech savvy are less overwhelmed by the limited features, though this has its drawbacks once they want to try to be more elaborate - there is a limit to where you can go with Google Docs in comparison to Microsoft Word. In response to this, Microsoft have tried to evolve their products to grow into this market and compete with Google, and this transitional hybrid between a rigid, structure piece of software and fluid, collaborative but traditional functioning live document  doesn't have the same user experience as those built for this purpose from the ground up. The biggest irritation is most certainly the lag in my experience, though this has improved over time. 

 

In our organisation, there is most definitely a bias towards Office365. Any mention of Google by myself or colleagues in the past has resulted in an instant shut down by the IT infrastructure team, with the miss-guided assumption that we do not know what we are talking about by those who work and manage these systems day in day out. I feel that sometimes, this is a result of their experience and comfort, which itself has benefits for problem solving when issues occur, rather than being open from an outside/unbiased position to determine what would be best. Having not being privy to decision making its difficult to assert any clear information to support, but this is a point i will come back to shortly. 

 

My personal view is that any organisation should always be asking questions of the systems they utilise. The days of definitive operating system upgrades (e.g. Windows 7, Windows 8 etc) are over and have been replaced with constant updates that are more frequent and less dramatic. To extrapolate this I would say they are more responsive to user trends where adaptions or improvements can be made quickly and offer an evolution which isn't disruptive to a users sense location, where the sense of change isn't too overwhelming. These updates happen in the background where they go unnoticed. A consequence of this is the cease in stages of evolution. With no new operating system as such, decision makers are no longer forced to ask the question Do we stick with the old or purchase the new? 

 

Thankfully COVID put us into a position where we could ask this question. In one of our initial meeting I made the comment that this is something that should happen periodically (I doubt it will). So do we stick with Office365 or switch to Google Classroom? 

With the question posed, many of our team with the fancy acronym went away for the week to find an answer to this question - what can be done on Google Classroom that cannot be achieve in Office365? The answer to this question was tackled independently by each team member. When we returned to report our individual findings and judgement in our next meeting each team member came back with the same outcome but through different justification. 

 

It was agreed to stick with Office365. Essentially it came down to the following - cost & man hours vs value added from the new/alternative products. There were no overwhelming benefits to switching to Google. Sure, there were subtle differences in user experience, in additional apps*, in the ease at which the technology could be learned and its intuitive layout that wouldn't bias against Apple iOS when used (think of how poor MS word is on iOS those of you to have used it). But, these benefits didn't outweigh the cost, man-hours and retraining of staff across systems. Another point raised which may have answered my initial feelings in regard to why the IT infrastructure team dismiss Google so readily - we wouldn't own the data that is generated. Given the UK/EU law for GDPR this has the capacity to be a possible weakness in being GDPR compliant. This is understandable, education is underfunded and most notable as the level our organisation works and simply couldn't afford the fines. 

 

Interestingly this also highlights an important point in getting your workforce on side. Communicating decisions in a non-pragmatic manner, in simply being dismissive without justification or rationale will simply frustrate staff. It is difficult to get staff who are not tech savvy or have an intrinsic interest to engage with new apps and tech. Where staff are engaging and are being open to experimentation with new tools, it is vitally important to foster this in staff as it will enable them and students to develop skills they will need for the future - barriers without pragmatic explanation can do the opposite. When being told for instance you cannot use a specific app followed by questions as to why you are using it in an interrogative manner and the dialogue ends there, it is a demoralising experience. In order to get the buy-in, staff need to have the opportunity to understand decisions, not merely be told them. This was to be something I was to ensure happened moving forward in this process. 

 

*but sure enough, Office also has a suite of apps that until this process began had been under utilised in the organisation - not that the technology support team had pushed this out in a meaningful or notable way previously.

3. What are the accessibility concerns for both staff and learners?

This was a challenging question and one that I will split starting with learners and then with staff. 

In relation to learners, the following concerns were raised: 

a. How will learners with digital poverty be able to access lessons remotely? (digital poverty includes access to the internet itself and access to hardware necessary to access the internet).  

b.  How will learners access specialist digital software to engage with their courses? 

c. How will learners with special educational needs be able to access support? 

d. How will learners be expected to evidence any outstanding coursework or tests? (at this point decisions from the Government and Awarding Bodies had not been decided) 

e. What software will be used to communicate with learners, run lessons and what training will they need to use them? 

The government removed early pressure by signalling that exams would not take place, with evidence being captured in a variety of models. With this in place for the remaining academic year, the initial pressure of having to run full lessons remotely, with the pressure of impact on grades was thankfully removed. This meant the time could being given to devising a model of teaching that could work remotely against our expected institutional TLA model. It would also give our learning technology support staff time to generate required resources for training and supporting learners with any new apps/tools they were required to use. 

Just as Google Classroom was taking advantage of good publicity in a national crisis, as was Zoom. Our organisation moved early to acquire Microsoft Teams, but the question was still asked which should we use for lessons. The answer to this came down to two aspects - 1. ability to use breakout rooms and being able to see a large number of people simultaneously and 2. additional cost and integration with current systems and processes. The fact Teams was already integrated with Office365, and the the fact that the decision was to move forward with this, it was logical to keep with Teams. Breakout rooms can be achieved in Teams but it is not a simple process. Microsofts roadmap for Teams during this time made a lot of promises, such as breakout rooms or 49 visible screens at once, many of which to date have not been delivered. The rollout for features also comes to different machines at different times, making instructional content very difficult to produce due to small differences in format/layout functionality and becomes out of date very quickly - an issue that we were only aware of following the decision to move forward with it. 

Communicating this to learners would then be the next challenge. Due to lockdown and GDPR regulations, communicating with learners became extremely difficult. How would they know to download Teams? How can they then be guided through any issues? Fortunately for me, my learners were engaging with emails for updates regarding their qualification and word had spread. There was no agreed standardised strategy for this - sometimes not everything needs to be standardised. There is a big fear of failure in our institution, some of this quite justified where issues have occurred in the past but a reactive rather than pro-active ecology doesn't foster confidence or inspire staff innovate or to try new things to lead to success. Paradoxically we used to run a group whose aim was to experiment and innovate at the same time extra rigorous standardisation measures and processes were being implemented that resisted difference. As a result, a conflicting message was conveyed in regard to standardisation, and a dichotomy in the way this is perceived was developed - on one side staff are considered to be going rogue and compromising standards and potential outcomes; on the other, they are experimenting, learning and innovating. The latter is only perceived when it is successful* This is something that I realised needs to be communicated clearly - expectations for what is mandatory and what is open for interpretation and adaption in regards to operating lessons via Teams. 

*this is not meant to say nothing should be standardised but it is where the fear leads standardisation into new remits that hinders rather than enables success. 

Supporting learners via teams was the responsibility of the technology support team and they were quick to explore Teams capabilities and devise introductory supporting content. This quickly followed by dedicated sections on the organisations websites, a method that had been used for many years. In essence, our current learners would work it out if they needed it, and support was in place for those having difficulties. 

With difficulties being the running theme, digital poverty can be a political and socially hot subject. There are those that do not want the government to subsidise access to the internet for poorer people, but as our society utilises and makes use of technology in all aspects of life, those without access are certainly going to be disadvantaged. To illustrate this point, I will provide some contrasting experiences across three generations: When I was a teenager, the advice I received towards getting a job was to get out there and ask, as it had been for my parents in their day. My one parent hadn't been able to work due to disability, the other had worked in the same factory for 2 decades - in short, their advice was impractical, ineffective and did not reflect the reality of employment processes that I was walking into fresh out of school (and with what was a complete disengagement with education at the time). The process I was left with was to submit CVs, fill out complex/excessive application forms, visit the job centre, look out for signs in shop windows and look at job listings in the local paper. When was the last time you seen a job advert in a newspaper? more to the point, when was the last time you looked at any of the above? Even that process has now expired. The chances are you use internet related tools to search out job openings. Now consider how a young person, already in a difficult or impossible situation and without access to the internet, is expected to seek employment? 

The scale of this is bigger than you'd assume. Learner access to the internet is one thing, learner access to hardware capable in any meaningful capacity is another. For example, many learners have a smart phone or tablet, and in years gone by, where the cost of travelling to our institution to use the PCs in the resource centre is too high, learners have had to attempt to complete work via their phones or tablets (which more often than not, are not poor quality phones rather than the latest iPhone as is so often assumed in the media). This is okay where written only tasks are needed; but most courses now make use of industry specialist software, that is essential in knowing to be able to apply for a job in the field being studied. This led to a cost being totalled to be able to supply every learner with a laptop and possibly a dongle where needed. The cost far exceeded any budget capabilities making it unrealistic with current spending commitments. Though I was not in a position to have much input for this section, the institution has committed to supplying those learners without access a laptop and dongle where required. The machines come with all software needed on them and in my subject area, they have provided every learner with a subscription to use the software at home on their home machines. This has put a little pride in me towards my institution, knowing that when it really counts, they will act. 

The last point to be covered from above is for those learners with special educational needs or disabilities. This is a far more complex issue given the scope of how the circumstances affect each person differently. From a technology point of view, considerations had to be made - how would a staff member sign for those with hearing impairments? even technology advancements which were promises had their limitations; Teams captioning is successful for the most part, but doesn't seem to work well with British regional accents or talking at a fast pace. Another solution was to show the learner how to pin the video screen of the signer to their Teams display. As soon as one solution would be found, another issue or barrier would arise. Fortunately, we had a largely dedicated team of student support staff that were up for the challenge and it was clear that bespoke training would be required for each of them and the learners they would be supporting. A bonus was that with UK accessibility laws extending to the digital landscape in 2018 (this date may be incorrect), it meant demand for features to support with accessibility, such as windows immersive reader, had already been implemented. Another unanticipated benefit of sticking with Office. There are third party apps for chrome that do similar services, but these are not trusted from a GDPR point of view.  

In relation to staff, the following concerns were raised: 

a. Where were staff really in their digital skills and capabilities? 

b. How can their anxieties over changes and uncertainty be overcame to feel confident in adopting to delivery online? 

c. What training will have to be implemented to support staff? 

The true scale of this would reveal itself over time. As a big advocate of the action research model, we would have to get through cycles of this very quickly. 

In the years that preceded the pandemic, leaders had been made aware of the need and urgency for staff to be given time to develop their digital skills. The UK government made digital skills essential in 2016 through one of their papers. For whatever reason we shall never know, it was not acted upon. One of the key thoughts in the back of my mind was at how many digital systems we use in the organisation, with all their small differences and behaviours, they definitely needed their own group profile to learn how to engage effectively with all of them. When I started here I had around 14 different username log-ins and passwords and only recently was this amended to have the same credentials for all systems. In such a world, surely staff would have been forced to upskill? 

I was tasked with preparing the CPD to rolled out for all staff in relation to Teams. It was made clear to me that it shouldn't just be instructional, it had to refer to pedagogy. So the approach i adopted was simple - work through the pipeline in what needs to be completed to get to the point of running a lesson, how a lesson would be run in practice and how assessment can take place. In essence, the narrative we go through for every lesson, every day, every year. Firstly, we needed to build a picture, what do staff already know and what do they want to know. I've learned from previous CPD that part of the reason staff do not engage, aside from the fact there are other pressing items on the to-do lists, is that they are not being shown anything they want to know. Many of the same principles that apply in the classroom, apply to staff - this would become all the more clearer much later too, when the true scale of gaps between digital skills became properly exposed. Early on I devised a survey, which received over 400 responses. The content for the CPD would focus on what staff wanted to know/learn. I went through all 1300+ comments, and added them to the narrative that was established - this was no short task. I then banded comments together in sub-section themes and these were then attributed each section of the pipeline - preparing for learning, running a lesson, using resources online and assessing learning remotely (these weren't the official titles, but close and the themes accurate). There was a 5th planned session for support staff. Any question that couldn't fit into the narrative were put onto a general FAQ sheet and this was to be emailed out to all staff - this was not sent and led to other issues later on. Finally, any staff asking for specific help were added to a general document that myself and the technology support team worked through, contacting staff and offering 1:1 support with their queries. Many were very thankful. In summary, we had four lines of support: 

1. an initial FAQ sheet answering concerns that were pressing. 

2. CPD of 4 hour long sessions that all staff must attend. 

3. 1:1 support for specific and non-generic support needs. 

4. Post training resources (video tutorials) to support those that needed refreshing. (Some staff also complained at this - not being able to use videos, something i have never understood given the absolute clarity of a visual demonstration in comparison to misinterpreted or vague written instructions - so I produced written step by step instructions for all the training that had been delivered. Again, no short task. 

The FAQ sheet that was to be sent out prior to the CPD had not been sent. I am not in an authorised position to send out communications to all staff. I did not ask why it was never sent, but it should have. There was a significant distance between the lockdown and the implementation of CPD (several months). The FAQ sheet was designed to show staff that we were on it, and their concerns had been taken on-board - they were going to get to learn the content that had been asked for. They were getting some initial soft answer to general queries to give them a feel for the direction we were heading. I believe, and I may be wrong, that this missing communication allowed staff anxieties to continue to build. Myself and my colleagues who had invested a lot of time learning the systems, processes and functions, produced resources and support materials ultimately bore the brunt of the frustrations. The CPD, delivered remotely as we were still in lockdown, training staff on how to deliver through teams, despite some of them downloading it the day before, was the first time in lockdown staff had congregated in an open forum with what many felt were the decision makers. Some staff let their frustrations known and this disrupted the CPD for others. The narrative theme of CPD was useful for those with decent digital technology skills who were very positive and complimentary in feedback, leaving reassured, but for those on the bottom end, who have not developed baseline skills in technology & software, the experience was completely overwhelming. I personally never anticipated the amount of sub-levels or nuances there were to the low-level skills hierarchy. The CPD was not differentiated appropriately. Rounding off at the point I made earlier that what applies in a classroom applies in staff training. 

Myself and my colleagues learned an awful lot from that first CPD training. In the next lot of training that was delivered outside of the 'introduction to pedagogical operation through teams' as I now like to call it, was a nicely crafted tiered system from a colleague. This was crafted through the Microsoft Education centre and we adapted content that included specific pedagogy. We allowed staff to pick a level (beginner, intermediate or advanced), assigned staff from our team to deliver it in relation to their digital tech experience. It was a big success, with a 98% positive return on feedback from 300+ staff. 

We used Microsoft Bookings for the first round of CPD and there were many issues that arose from using this. Primarily, whenever anybody booked onto a session, it would cancel the previous booking and send notifications to outlook. This created a lot of confusion for staff and probably fed into the negativity that erupted in those first sessions. I recall having to delete some 600+ emails from this alone. Our next solution was to use Microsoft Forms. We would have to manage and track numbers independently, but this gave our staff less confusion and disruption. Again, feeding into the positive experience second time around. 

1. How will delivering teaching, learning and assessment (herein TLA) from home work for both staff and learners? 

To summarise what has been covered above, it was clear that in a full lockdown scenario, Teams was to be our digital institution, with the individual teams being classes and scheduled meetings operating as lessons/classrooms. To make the tracking of learner work possible, learners created and shared folders for their work with tutors via OneDrive which would allow them to access their files and provide feedback within a lesson. This would work in partnership with moodle, our VLE for many years, where it is already standard practice for courses to have all resources and materials such as assignment briefs, submission boxes etc hosted. We didn't want to migrate this aspect to Teams because we do not know its lifecycle. Once a vaccine is found, and the risk of lockdown removed, will we need to continue to invest in Teams to the same degree we currently are? It would create a lot of upheaval to transfer content back across to a system already accustomed to using. 

An under used feature across the organisation was Office365. Many learners classes still used the software installed on the machines rather than the web based versions. One big positive of this has been the uptake in learner using the flexibility of the Word app on their phones. The use of OneDrive has decreased the amount learners have commented that they have lost their files. The automatic saving feature has positively contributed towards this too. 

The challenges we are facing now is in learning ways in which we can track learner participation in online lessons and developing strategies where this isn't happening. We anticipated this in the initial training through the creation of our online expectations. Enforcing this is challenging in some areas more than others, with a mixture of different reactions from staff - your Laidback Larry's not challenging or attempting to manage it at all through to the opposite end where the the conflict creates too much tension and becomes ineffective. There is also another way forward, which I will outline below. 

In moving forward, another thing that became clear is that despite the minimal nature of what had been shown to staff, they still felt overwhelmed by everything. This on reflection makes sense, especially for those who do not engage in digital landscapes on a day-to-day basis. The landscape is huge, and what is effective use of digital tech in on subject area might not work in another. This is where that question of standardisations appears again - is standardisation in a large scale and diverse landscape as ours in-practical when introducing staff to digital tech? Are there too many solutions, too much choice and too little knowledge and experience to make decisions? This is where I am leading this blog into. I am researching into Ed Tech to explore the nuances of its use in sub-departments and the differences, to see if there are any trends that will allow us to create bespoke training materials in supporting staff embracing digital technology moving forward.