Fit for Purpose: placing the PLE at the centre of marketing education

Lisa Harris and Paul HarriganUniversity of Southampton

Presentation for 2nd International PLE Conference, Southampton, July 2011

Author InformationPaul Harrigan @drpaulharrigan Lisa Harris @lisaharris• Lecturer in Marketing

• Programme Director for the BSc in International Marketing

• Research on impact of technology on marketing curriculum

• Current research project investigating use of Web 2.0 (e.g. social networks, blogs, web analytics) technologies on customer relationships in marketing

• Teaches Digital Marketing at the University of Southampton

• Programme Director for the MSc in Digital Marketing.

• Qualified e-tutor for the University of Liverpool online MBA.

• Currently developing workshops encouraging the growth of digital presence for career or business development.

Background

• At Southampton our research focuses on: – how developments in technology are driving new

marketing theory and practice– how marketing education should respond to these

changes• This paper evaluates how marketing education

should develop both appropriate curriculum content and the supportive personal learning environments (PLEs) made possible by developments in technology.

21st Century Careers (JISC, 2009)• Competition for employment in a global knowledge economy

• Increased levels of self-employment and portfolio working

• Growth of multi-disciplinary teams focused on specific tasks whose members might be physically located anywhere in the world

• Life within a networked society

• Blurring of boundaries between ‘real’ and ‘virtual’, public and private

• Increasingly ubiquitous use of digital technologies.

The big picture

• the digital sector directly employs 2.5 million people in the UK

• the vast majority of graduate jobs require effective use of ICT as an integral aspect of professionalism and performance.

• The UK Government has indicated that student satisfaction will be taken as a critical measure of how higher education is performing.

• learners have high expectations and their experiences of technology-supported learning are largely determined by the level of staff e-learning skills.

Digital Literacy• “Digital literacy is the ability to locate, organise, understand,

evaluate, and analyse information using digital technology. It involves a working knowledge of current tools and an understanding of how they can be used”

• “The active management of online activities such as collaboration, networking , reviewing, content creation and curation in order to “stand out from the crowd” in today’s job market”

• “an ability to respond positively to change”

www.lisaharrismarketing.com

www.delicious.com/lisaharris1

www.twitter.com/lisaharris

www.slideshare.net/lisaharris

www.uk.linkedin.com/in/lisajaneharris

“Life

-wid

e” a

nd “

life-

long

” le

arni

ng

Contacts

Experts

Teachers

Classmates Friends

Family

Coworkers

Synchronous Communication

Mobile Texting

Video Conferencing

Microbloging

Instant Messaging

RSS

Wikis

Blogs

Subscriptions readers

Podcasts

Social Bookmarking

Social Networks

Information ManagementLibrary/

Texts

Open CourseWare

Evaluating Resources

Scholarly Works

Locating Experts

Wendy Drexler (2008)

The PLE Spectrum

• PLEs can be conceptualised in terms of: 1) the technology choices available to individuals to help them manage their learning 2) the features of the study programme which help to formalise this approach3) the technological infrastructure provided by the university as a whole (ie providing adequate wifi, secure web access etc) 4) the culture changes that are required for staff to operate effectively within this environment

Potential scope of the PLETopic Current popular tools Comments

Accessing and cataloguing information

Google, Google Scholar, Delicious, Netvibes

Demonstrate how to source, rate and store relevant information

Collaboration and networking

LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter How to build a network, online and offline

Commentary (ratings and reviews, feedback)

Forums The work of others that they will evaluate and which showcases your knowledge

Content creation YouTube, Flickr, Slideshare, Wordpress

Demonstrate creativity, writing and presentation skills

Managing online identities

LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube

Combine all of the above to develop digital presence/personal brand

Southampton PLE Initiatives• Undergraduate Digital Marketing module – development of online

communities by student groups using blogs, Twitter, YouTube and Facebook (from 2008, assessed by oral presentation)

• Digital Presence Workshops for staff and students from 2009

• Student blogs to support personal tutor/tutee relationship from 2009

• Integration of PLE into Introduction to Marketing and Digital Marketing Communications modules from Sept 2010– Blog, Delicious, Netvibes

The PLE for marketing students

• Assessed blog posts: reflections on the learning process, reinforced with face to face meetings

• Continual assessment and feedback throughout module (online and offline)

• Students encouraged to find relevant online materials and report back to the group

• Live tweeting in class, with remote participants • Encouragement to use online bookmarking and

sharing tools

Challenges

• *Very* variable levels of digital skills amongst students

• Variable levels of staff ‘buy in’• Entrenched expectations of a ‘traditional’ learning

experience. They were not used to:– reading or critiquing each others’ work– making their work publically available online– ‘thinking across’ modules– building up assignment work from the start of a module

rather than at last minute.com

PLE Success stories

• Some students volunteered to present their work to the whole group

• For examples of students who have really embraced the approach, see Natasha’s blog and Maria’s blog.

• Summary video of student experiences through the whole programme: Http://www.tinyurl.com/mastervideo2

Thank you for participating!

Any questions, comments, suggestions???