Learning Technology & Innovation
Thompson Rivers University’s LT&I Learning Technology team reports up to the Associate Vice President Academic, and complements CELT, Open Learning, and TRU ITS, supporting teaching and learning, as well as selected research, service and community initiatives. LT&I’s Director also has oversight of OL’s Production and Media teams.
Strategic Objective:
“Student success and research innovation through inclusive excellence in research faculty and staff recruitment.”
A core mission for LT&I is to extend the capacity of our faculty with the careful application of learning technology, and in the programming that we offer to our community. We also strive to reduce faculty workloads and stress levels with a constant focus on process improvement and highly responsive support. We extend this approach to our students as well.
Moodle Orientation / LT&I Toolkit / Learning Without Walls / Teaching Unbound / Lightboard!
open publishing and collaboration
LT&I’s support for our open publishing and collaboration platforms (WordPress, Pressbooks, Mattermost, MediaWiki) allows us to extend TRU research through knowledge mobilization and community engagement.
Podcasting
Podcasting is an area of particular strength. Dr. Brenna Clarke Gray is a co-investigator of the SSHRC-funded Amplify Podcast Network.
Strategic objective:
“Eliminate achievement gaps across different groups of learners, and honour, truth, reconciliation and rights.”
LT&I has been aligning its planning to the BC Ministry of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills Digital Learning Strategy, and in particular its resource development and workshop offerings. It is participating in the planning and implementation of the BCcampus Digital Literacy project, and contributing existing resources to its open content repository. LT&I is extending its commitment to accessible and inclusive practice with the development of an Inclusive Digital Design Course, in which “faculty will explore digital design strategies for removing barriers to learning and providing students with options to enhance the learning experience.” Such efforts will assist TRU not only in its objective of eliminating achievement gaps, but also to meet pending Accessible B.C. Regulation for organizations (phase 1 plans due September 1, 2023).
LT&I has collaborated with campus partners to show national leadership in academic integrity, and to promote accessible and inclusive practices for all of its digital learning activity.
LT&I’s platforms and skills have allowed us to extend our reach with open educational resources and open pedagogy.
Special emphasis has always been placed on working with students on developing their digital skills and literacies. LT&I has evolved a unique and effective technique for creating clone-able starter sites, which dramatically simplifies and reduces development time. It also provides far more welcoming on-ramps for students when they begin building their own websites. So many wonderful stories of students finding their voices and building their digital creation skills. We are especially grateful for the opportunity to work alongside indigenous scholars.
Knowledge Makers Program / Sandra Bandura / Johnny Bandura / Canadian Undergraduate Research Network / Engaging with Indigenous Research / TRU Makerspace
LT&I’s platforms provide ePortfolio starter templates which embed pedagogical prompts and technical instructions, while building student digital literacies and skills with the widely-used WordPress platform. Students can also use the platform to build their own project sites, or to support student life initiatives.
Strategic objective:
“To be recognized provincially, nationally, and internationally for our unique academic and trades programs that provide students with flexible learning pathways, experiential opportunities, and community research.”
There has been an expressed need for “an academic-led discussion on IT at our university”. LT&I has a strong record of leading these kinds of conversations at this university, and is proud of the trusting working relationships it has built with both ITS and faculty.
LT&I’s works with partners across the university to provide web publishing needs that cannot be accommodated within the existing institutional website.
LT&I is piloting extended platforms to support microcredentials, such as with the Public Safety Resilience Project, partnering with TRU’s Faculty of Science, and the just-launched Knowledge Makers online course.
Building Resilience in Public Safety / Knowledge Makers Workshops
LT&I is recognized as a leader in open educational technologies. This is embodied in the BCcampus-funded Open Ed Tech Collaborative (OpenETC). This leadership has resulted in participation in the Digital Learning Advisory Committee (convened by the Ministry of Advanced Education and Skills Training) in the drafting of its Digital Learning Strategy. We have been invited to participate in further discussions to plan the implementation of a number of its recommendations, including a proposed Open Source Project Office (OSPO).
The Open EdTech Collaborative (OpenETC) / 2021 OE Global Award for Excellence, Open Infrastructure