The Learner conference - July

It is not too late to register and present at the Learner conference that will take place from 19 to 21 July at the University of Hawaii at Manoa in Honolulu: Register and pay before 19 June. Returning members also get discount to this Common Ground conference. 

The special focus of the conference is: New media for new learning and there are ten conference themes to choose from. They are: Pedagogy and curriculum, Assessment and evaluation, Educational organization and leadership, Early childhood learning, Learning in Higher Education, Adult, Community and Professional learning, Learner diversities and identities, Technologies in learning, Literacy in learning, and Science, maths and technology learning. Keynote speakers include Bill Cope, Mary Kalantzis, Dan Hoffman, Fuxing Liu, Arianna Eichelberger and Patricio Henriquez Ritchie.  

This is a very large conference and therefore an excellent opportunity to broaden networks. The conference tour will be the 3 hour moderate Diamond head walking tour on 18 July and pre-registration will also take place in the lobby of the Hilton Double Tree hotel on Waikiki beach (the conference hotel) on the 18th of July. The conference dinner will be on 20 July and is promising to be a great event: 'The Starlight Luau is a unique feast of music, colour, food, and dance at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki Beach Resort. The Luau features extravagant Lei greetings, Hula kahiko performers, acrobatic fire dancers, and authentic Hawaiian dining.' 

I recently stayed at a few Double Tree hotels in the USA and enjoyed the large rooms, friendly service and beautiful bathrooms. And yes, the cookie is the cherry on top (in Seattle we arrived at 12:34 at night after a disastrous flight and the warm cookies were so comforting and nice).  

Cruise conferences should increase

The conference facilities on board the Emerald Princess

Why don't conference organizers use cruise ships? When asked, one said it is too expensive. Yes it is, but remember you include transport, transfers and full accommodation with all the extras into one and every time I did the maths, the cost factor was not that important. And you do not have to pack and unpack each day.

We just returned from a trip to Alaska on board a huge passenger liner equipped with full and awesome conferencing facilities. The conferences are scheduled for sea days or early evenings just after leaving port for the next stop, which means that there is a good chance of having all delegates present in the conference.  Shore days are used to network with other delegates. Normally, delegates are handled as a group with nice extras, special offers and cabins near the conference facilities.

We as South Africans, often think that is only Africa that have issues with connectivity, expensive internet and lack of technology but this is not true. We were totally cut off from the rest of the world for days because of  a lack of mobile phone signals and very expensive internet that we could not afford. I planned to post blogs on Mondays while we were traveling, but this could not happen and I just have to give up.

Not that the lack of connectivity was a total negative experience. How awesome to have a meal without a single sms alert and enjoying a shore excursion without missing a photo opportunity because you were checking e mails. So nice not to be constantly reminded about the work piling up in the inbox and being able to focus on the people around you and the places you visit. And as for emergencies, the ship were still connected to shore and did relay important information to those who needed it. So we were able to really relax and enjoy time together.

Hopefully we will be able to enjoy cruise conferences more often in future, even along the South African coast.
 

Online, Open and Flexible Higher Education Conference in October 2017, UK

On our way to England for a conference

The Online, Open and Flexible Higher Education Conference (OOFHEC) of 2017 will take place at the Open University in Milton Keynes (UK) from 25 to 27 October 2017. This is just a week after the ICDE conference in Canada and could easily be linked up with that conference by those whose travel plans are not already fixed.

Key note speakers include Anja Oskamp, Catherine Mongenet, Kathleen Schlusmans, Peter Harrocks, George Androulakis and Eileen Scanlon.  

The last date for submission of abstracts is 1 June. Workshops will be allocated a timeslot of 60 minutes and papers 15 to 20 minutes.

Although some of the focus points are aimed towards the European situation, there are several topics that are of interest for all focused on Higher Education in general. The following seven themes will be the focus points: 

1. Strategies for the future of continuous professional development

- National and institutional policies in the changing pedagogical landscape
- Flexible continuing education (incl.CPD) and new types of courses (short learning programmes) to accommodate 25+ students
- Modular education, short learning programmes
- University-business collaboration

2. Open education and widening participation 
- OERs and MOOCs
- Equal opportunities
- Adaptive learning

3. Research and innovation for new modes of teaching and learning
- Online and blended course design
- Learning analytics and learning technologies
- Assessment
- Virtual laboratories

4. Higher Education for a divers future
- Social inclusion
- Higher education for minorities (refugees, migrants)
- Multi-cultural education

5. Engaging students for learning at all stages of life
- Retention issues

6. Policies for change in Higher Education
- Empowering universities for excellence in higher education, improving the quality of higher education
- The modernisation agenda for European universities: education for innovation and entrepreneurship/intrapreneurship
- Internationalisation (Networked curricula and virtual mobility)

- Leadership in change

7. Quality assurance and accreditation of online and blended higher education

ICDE World Conference in Toronto: abstracts are still welcomed

Toronto; home of the Blue Jays and one of the best cities to host an international conference will be hosting ICDE 2017

Good news! Submission of abstracts to present at the 27^th  International Council of Distance Education (ICDE) World Conference in Toronto, Canada (October 16-19, 2017) is still open and will only close on 30 June. Although the main conference starts on 17 October, do not miss out on the pre-conference workshops scheduled for 16 October. The conference will be held in the Toronto Seraton Centre Hotel - so if you can, book you accommodation also in this hotel to make life easier in a foreign country. Bad news (for South Africans) is the stiff registration fee of $675.

This year, the theme is Teaching in a Digital Age – Re-Thinking Teaching & Learning and I cannot wait to be part of the re-thinking that is do desperately needed in higher education in order to stay relevant in our changing world. More than 275 presenters are already on the list and names like Alan Tait, Christian Stracke, Terry Anderson, Tony Bates, Cicio Frank, Paul Prinsloo and Norman Vaughan immediately caught my eye when paging through the list. The focus will be on forward-thinking and student-centered, novel ideas structured around five tracks:

• Emerging Pedagogies and Designs for Online Learning
• Expanding Access, Openness and Flexibility
• Changing Models of Assessment
• New Delivery Tools and Resources for Learning
• Re-designing Institutional Business Models

You will remember that the previous world conference was held at Sun City in South Africa in 2015 and it was one of the best conferences I ever attended. The presenters list is showing the names and faces of many colleagues and friends who attended the 2015 conference, which points to yet another extremely interesting and stimulating conference, not to be missed.

The provisional program includes interesting and exciting prospects to look forward to, but just the thought of being able to return to Toronto is enough to get me excited already. Toronto is one of the most beautiful cities I have visited. One of the nice things is that you can walk to all the wonderful places from your hotel. Hope to see you there!

Counting the days to the Global Education Conference in LA

Walking in the streets of Estonia, Tallinn

When we were children we used to count the days to the start of our vacations (to the sea or the mountains or even family visits) and put that amount of pebbles in a tin. Each morning would see a ritual as one pebble is discarded from the tin - one less day to wait. This is how I am feeling today - I want to gather some pebbles and put the tin on the windowsill, because middle May we will be on our way to the Spring Global Education Conference hosted by the University of Riverside in Los Angeles. Yes, if you want to, you can still send an abstract and join us!

From the web page, it seems that this is a small conference with about 30 participants? This could be because of the fact that there are several such conference during the year. You can already submit an abstract on any aspect of Education (hosted by the School of Education) for the upcoming conferences that will take place on August 16,17; November 15-16 and  1-2 February 2018. As previously mentioned on this blog, this is not the only conferences hosted by the University of Riverside. Most of their schools have several conferences each year (and normally linked to the seasons they take place in).

To be honest, it is not really the conference that has me looking for pebbles, it is the whole 'thing' of travelling. I love to travel. And I love all aspects of it, including wandering through airports, flying, the awe of seeing new places, hotel rooms, food that I did not prepare, and oh, do the things I cannot do when at home. These  normally include 1) watching the sun sets -at home this time is spend in the kitchen 2) walking  for miles and just enjoy what I see -  too dangerous in our neighborhood and country and 3) watching television shows such as Discovery and History channel before bedtime - at home I am behind my computer and do not watch television except for the Indian Premium League Cricket annually.

As from today, the 1st of May I will only post once a week on conference attendance. It would help to focus more attention on the more important conferences, I hope.