The following is a progress report received via email (17 November 2009) from Associate Professor Gillian Hallam on the Australian ePortfolio Project (AeP), and has been replicated here with Gillian’s permission:
Considerable progress has been made over the past few months in terms of the Australian ePortfolio Project – Stage 2 (AeP2), the national study of ePortfolio practice in higher education in Australia. The focus of the AeP2 project is to explore the current scope of national and international ePortfolio communities of practice in order to identify the factors that contribute to their success and sustainability. The findings from the research can then inform the strategies required to ensure the sustainability of ePortfolio communities in Australia. Warm thanks to all the people, both in Australia and overseas, who have contributed to the AeP project over the past couple of years through the symposia and the range of data collection activities.
AeP website
The AeP website is a key resource to access documents associated with the project: www.eportfoliopractice.qut.edu.au.
AeP2 Symposium papers
You may have attended the AeP2 Symposium in February 2009. Papers from the plenary sessions are available online as podcasts (visit the AeP website, link to the Symposium program at http://www.eportfoliopractice.qut.edu.au/symposium2/program.jsp).
A series of papers presented in the track sessions will appear shortly in the online journal, Learning Communities: International Journal of Learning in Social Contexts, edited by Ruth Wallace. The journal publishes peer reviewed articles reporting original research and other issues relating to the learning of individuals, groups, communities and organisations. The forthcoming issue of Learning Communities will include papers by Margaret Faulkner (UniSA) and Garry Allan (RMIT), Peter Rees Jones (JISC CETIS, UK), Beverley Oliver, Brian von Konsky, Sue Jones, Sonia Ferns and Beatrice Tucker (Curtin University), Gail Wilson and Rozz Albon (Bond University), Allison Miller (Australian Flexible Learning Framework) and Ruth Wallace (Charles Darwin University). The journal website is http://www.cdu.edu.au/ehs/lrg/journal.html
ePortfolio Practice group site on ALTC Exchange
As part of the AeP2 project, a group site has been established within the ALTC Exchange – the ePortfolio Practice group http://www.altcexchange.edu.au/ .
To access the group, you need to become a member of the ALTC Exchange and then subscribe to the group. Some guidance is provided on the AeP website on the page for the Australian ePortfolio community of practice, if you do need some help. Link to http://www.eportfoliopractice.qut.edu.au/information2/community_of_practice/index.jsp.
During the course of the project, the ALTC Exchange migrated to a new platform, which unfortunately caused a number of technical problems. We seem to have resolved all of these, and the group site is now up-to–date, with information on e-portfolio software, e-portfolio events, e-portfolio resources and e-portfolio connections (links to other eportfolio communities, blogs etc). The group site is designed to be a collaborative space, so you have the opportunity to add new resources or open the discussion on issues associated with ePortfolio practice.
There are a number of e-portfolio events listed under Upcoming Conferences and Seminars, which you may be interested in, from the event at RMIT on 4 December, and a range of seminars on many different aspects of e-portfolio practice in the UK, leading up to the EIfEL ePortfolio 2010 conference in London in July. Also in July 2010, the Association for Authentic, Experiential and Evidence-Based Learning (AAEEBL) will host its first annual conference in Boston, MA in the USA.
The Past Conferences and Seminars area of the site lists recent events, often with links to podcasts of the presentations, including the VET E-portfolios Showcase hosted by the Australian Flexible Learning Framework in Melbourne last month, and the UniSA 2009 ePortfolio forum held in September.
AeP2 Toolkit: ePortfolio Concept Guides
There has been considerable interest – locally and internationally – in the series of ePortfolio Concept Guides produced by the AeP2 team. The concept guides seek to address the needs of the different stakeholder groups involved in the ePortfolio process:
ePortfolio concepts for learners
ePortfolio concepts for academic staff
ePortfolio concepts for information technology & teaching and learning support staff
ePortfolio concepts for institutional managers
ePortfolio concepts for employers, professional bodies and careers services
Recently, a sixth concept guide has been added to the series:
ePortfolio concepts for staff/employees.
Copies of the concept guides can be requested from the AeP2 project team. There are also pdf files available to download from Australian ePortfolio Toolkit page of the AeP2 website at http://www.eportfoliopractice.qut.edu.au/information2/toolkit/.
The concept guides have been published under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike licence, which allows you to make use of the publications. The concept guides have been adapted for the VET sector by the Australian Flexible Learning Framework. Visit http://www.flexiblelearning.net.au/content/e-portfolios-resources to access these resources.
Looking into the future
The AeP2 project will conclude at the end of the year. The project team is gratefully acknowledges the funding provided by the Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC), which has supported the research and publication activities. Key events have been the AeP Symposia held in February 2008 and February 2009.
AeP2 Final Report
It is hoped that the final report for Stage 2 of the AeP project will be published in mid December. Watch out for announcements about the release date.
AeP3 in 2010?
We have already received a number of enquiries about the possibility of an AeP Symposium in 2010. The AeP symposia in 2008 and 2009 certainly raised a lot of interest in and engagement with ePortfolios, developing a sense of community amongst those involved in ePortfolio learning. However, the fact that the AeP activities have been supported by project funding means that a new model is required for future events.
Preliminary discussions have been held to scope a possible new model, with interest in continuing the relationship with ALTC and building the cross-sector interactions between higher education and vocational education and training (VET). Plans are being forged for an ePortfolio symposium to be held in November 2010, co-hosted under the auspices of the ALTC Teaching Fellowship scheme and the Australian Flexible Learning Framework, which will focus on the themes of graduate employability, employability skills, learner mobility and recognition of prior learning. More details will follow in the new year.
Please contact the AeP team if you have any queries about the project, by email at eportfoliopractice@qut.edu.au.
Kind regards
Gillian
Associate Professor Gillian Hallam | Project Leader | Australian ePortfolio Project | QUT | Victoria Park Road | Kelvin Grove Q. 4059
e: g.hallam@qut.edu.au | t: 07 3138 8067 | m: 0401 678 950 | w: www.eportfoliopractice.qut.edu.au | CRICOS No 00213J