July 10th 2003

Helmut Fritsch

Interim evaluation of the Minerva project

"student support services in e-learning"

A. Evaluation as project control

In the project description it is said; "The Board of Management will have control of the project administration and monitoring. Specifically, it will:

* set workloads and deadlines for each of the partners

* establish quality control measurements for all products and processes

* monitor budget expenditure against targets

* approve interim and final products for transmission to the funding authorities, or return them to the partner responsible for further work and improvement."

The board has been set up and is in full control of the project.

workloads are clearly stated and the outputs until now arrived in time. The quality control and measures heavily rely on the interaction of the partners, giving comment and suggestions to every product disseminated among them during regular one hour audioconferences, of which the minutes arrive within a week after the conference.

Budget monitoring is done with the help of an excel sheet distributed.

The next step will be the approval of the interim report.

The website is functioning, the papers are open for the public and growing step by step. The six-chapter "Product 1" is published there „Analysis of e-learning“

http://learning.ericsson.net/socrates/products.shtml

and the next product „Product 2“: „Analysis of existing systems“ a survey of of support services in elearning today, is available together with the interim report. The third product „Analysis of major systems“ also is available in early July 2003.

Thus this interim evaluation, of the formative kind (it is done during the lifetime of the project and aims at changing the projects goal or measures taken) must rely on the project description and the questions raised therein, towards which some simple questions may be formulated and answered.

1. Does the project do what it promises and what are deviations?

2. Is there any deviation which should be taken into account in order to match the promised outcomes?

3. Is the project "alive"?

4. Does the project have a communication strategy?

5. Is there a workload representing the setup of the projects finances?

It seems, at this stage of the project, clear that

1. there are no deviations from the project plan

2. it seems that the promised outcomes will be reached

3. the project is alive and healthy

4. the project partners, as could be expected and all have agreed upon, will put in more workload into the project than the financial revenue would indicate.

Evaluation of this kind is used to clarify deviations from the expected. If there are no deviations it is all the better and the funding agency could turn to the next project to evaluate.

But there is more to project work which normally will not be told in the framework of a promised evaluation. There is the glue which makes the project group stick together, the trust with which members of the project group can ask for help, the understanding of the field where all members of the project group may find their position, the expertise with which developments in the „market“ can be spotted, the caring for the individual situations of the members of the group, the knowledge about the personal life situations of each other and the openness in talking about difficulties encountered during the time when the project seems to become a valuable part of the scientific and personal biographies of ist members.

In this project, which is the fourth or sixth one of a similar structure co-funded by either Leonardo or Sokrates funds, an existing partnership among the main players is the basis. It is a friendship lasting for years now. Open for new members and still based on a firm understanding of mutual agreement.

B.1. one hour regular audio-conferences:

It is said in the literature that audio, or telephone-conferences constitute a form of synchronous communication which speeds up the process of project negotiations quite a bit. But audio-conferences are not really synchronous.

Members of such an audio-conference heavily rely on their notes what has to be cleared in these hours. Although the topics are put in order by a scheme sent out to all partners ahead of the conference, the outcome of the conference is not open bacause everyone has an additional defined list of items to be negotiated.

The discipline to listen carefully and take notes is appreciated by all members of the audio-conference. It would be for sociologists a fruitful undertaking to analyse the typical structure of such an audio conference.

Effficiency of such conferences is high, especially when the minutes are sent around a couple of days afterwards.

But the evaluation question which must be addressed here is: would it be a viable instrument for all project work, also with other groups?

This question is of importance for European project work because audio-conferences are not very expensive. In analyzing the typical structure of such a conference there are many elements which are necessary in order to turn a technical audio-conference into a good practice instrument for project work:

- Have a set date to meet agreed upon early enough so that all members can partcipate and respect the different working-hours habits and local times of the partners.

- There will be technical difficulties as some partners not always can rely on the same technical basis in that telephone lines in some instances are not open for international calls for members of staff of universities in all countries, so it might become necessary to have an operator open up a line for such members.

- The one who sets up the technical dial-in conference should have a second telephone available preferably a direct number of a cellular phone in order to make sure whether it is o.k. to wait for a couple of minutes until a call is placed into the conference.

- Be sure to prepare the conference not only with the exact details how to dial in (each time) but also about an agenda to be agreed upon- and ask in the beginning whether someone has to leave the conference early.

- It is allright also to talk about technical issues (loud breathing or voices in the background)

- Always introduce yourself not only by your voice (which soon can be recognized after knowing each other) but also by name and where you come from: it makes note-taking easier.

- Most partners in such a conference will have a graphical display of the partners involved in the meeting and take notes there of what is being said or have space for open questions still to be adressed - I use a circle of names with space for notes on one sheet of paper)

- formal structure will be to address everybody, to give a chance for everyone to speak up, so there should be one person ( mostly project leader or the one who set up the conference) „in charge“.

The communicative structure of such conferences is a kind of round table which gives opportunity to everyone. So the outcome of the conference depends on statements made. Conference structure like an audio-conference is sometimes felt to be short of direct communication: it is! You would be unpolite to interrupt at the spot where you feel your partner might be interrupted in a face to face situation since there are all the other partners involved. So although technically such a conference takes place at the same time, I would not call the communicative structure of such a conference „synchronous“.

Synchronicity in e-learning has been a topic for communication as such.

Chat rooms e.g. are defined by many authors being synchronous communication: Neither chat-rooms nor audio-conferences are, because of the either technical impediments ( your text goes online at the end of typing, when you hit “Return“) or norms agreed upon but never written down: You do not interrupt. That is the reason for non-synchronicity.

For many protagonists of e-Learning synchronicity seems to be „the better way“, when they deplore the asynchronous nature of e.g. newsgroups.

The question which has to be solved in this short paragraph is the dialogue- structure of project meetings and project communication at large.

In our culture there is a norm that in dialogue you do not interrupt. On the contrary, the best dialogical meaures stem from humanistic psychology approaches (like Carl Rogers) where you deliberately slow down communication into a framework which allows you to reassure your own understanding by „mirroring“ the statement just heard in your own words asking for reassurance that you understood correctly and then comment on it. This intermediate mirroring often in normal communication is left away for speeds sake and then consequently opens the door to many a misunderstanding. So e.g. in marriage counselling it is essential to make sure one partner has understood what the other partner meant and has given opportunity to correct his understanding before the own answer is put into the conversation and so on.

So I propose to have a closer look at communicative structures in project work and not to praise a nonexisting synchronicity...

B.2 Project Meeting

A clearly defined location, an address easy to find, helpful hints for the description how to get to the meeting room, additional signs etc. all you would expect when you want to have the feeling the organizers of the project meeting cared that you find the place where the meeting will be. Most project meetings start at a fixed time; be sure that members who happen to come in late dont feel too much embarrased, and that they had a telephone number where to call. It certainly is easier for members who travel to have reserved rooms in a hotel where all the other project members are too.

Someone will chair the meeting, call it to order, ask for who is going to take notes and write the minutes, propose the language used in the meeting, etc.

Most project meetings are the real highlights for the project, it is there where measures are taken, plans acknowledged, reports presented and shortcomings discussed. Deviations of the work plan, checking the money already spent and discussing time schedules for the project.

There are some elements necessary for a good meeting: there should be a beamer for power point presentation, preferably with a direct computer line for online presentations. There should be also a blackboard for spontaneous notes, - these can be photographed and added to the minutes of the meeting.

It is advisable to have a laptop when you have to take the minutes so that at the end of the meeting you even would have a chance to go through the notes and find agreement about what had been decided.

And don't forget that there should be regular breaks of 10-15 minutes, don`t wait until the small number of smokers get nervous.

Coffee , soft drinks, water and crackers should be on the table.

Always think that project meetings are the most important events in the projects life. If members of the project group will not feel at home in this meeting, outcomes will be doubtful.

It is „professional“ behaviour to realize the importance of the project meeting: for many members indeed such meetings are very important highlights in their professional biography.

B.3. Project Dinner

Already during the project meeting, especially in the breaks for coffee or lunch there will develop personal communication in the sense „what else do you do in life?“ Therefore I would suggest that such breaks will not be used for busines talk between only two partners but that there should be a real break for many person to person encounters.

There is more than professional behaviour in the project: the project is constituted of human beings with specific biographies and the need to be respected as a person. This is the reason why project dinners have evolved and found very rewarding experiences. Sometimes it will be an invitation by the host institution sometimes you will have to pay for yourself from your daily subsistance. But in some longer running projects you will be invited to the hosts home and even meet the family.

It is good to bring something from your country- something personal, not so much from the airports gift shop. Anyway, if such a project dinner happens you are lucky to be a member of a good European project. And in some cases you realize afterwards that it has been a nice evening at the home of friends.

B.4. Project Conference

In a project conference – an international conference where many people "from the field" arrive, expect to be hosted or to have talks with fellows there must be time enough for breaks: many people come to conferences because of the breaks inbetween the presentations: presentations often are already documented in the internet and you can be sure that these have been read during the travel to the conference venue. The easiest conference is one you dont have to organize yourself. An evaluation of the conference will be done after the event.

B.5 Book of the Project

To already foresee a "book of the project" is difficult for many projects and will happen only if there is someone who is experienced in collecting all papers, editing them and having found a publisher; to plan such a publication guarantees the impact the project wants to have on scientific discussions. The European Union does not expect the publication of a book because all they want to receive is the final report. If the final report is of quality so that it can be of public interest, all the better: but it has to be something different from a published book which in practice means that the project is ready to undergo the work of "publishing" two separate items.

B.6. Websites

In the project under discussion we already find at the interim stage different websites for the project: There is a homepage of the project, open for the public.

The idea is that the public has a right to be informed because it is public money which makes the project possible.

So you will find certain elements in the homepage which have evolved to be useful .

Links to other programs, to literature and to the project working papers. Yet this does not mean that everything must become public which happens in the project, so the minutes of the audio-conferences and the official papers for the funding agency are password-protected.

One of the possibilities to trace the importance of such a homepage is provided by search machines, of which "google" seems to have become the most important one in Europe.

To get a quatitative idea of "importance" of a homepage you may trace the position where it first comes up in search machines. So the test on 10th July 2003 showed that the project to be evaluated here pops up as no. 1, 3 and 4-5

E( of 107.000 items foundrgebnisse 1 - 10 von ungefähr 107,000. Suchdauer: 0.41 Sekunden

( of 107.000 items found)

student support services in eLearning
... needs to be faced if eLearning is to ... of provision, as envisaged in e-Learning - designing
tomorrow's ... is the provision of student support services in eLearning ...
www.fernuni-hagen.de/ZIFF/sssel.htm - 8k - Im Cache - Ähnliche Seiten

E-learning@tmcc Student Support Services - [ Diese Seite übersetzen ]
Student Support Services. TMCC is dedicated to providing quality
online student services for our online students including: TMCC ...
www.tmcc.edu/e-learning/support.asp - 14k - Im Cache - Ähnliche Seiten

Ericsson Education Online - [ Diese Seite übersetzen ]
... Student Support Services in e-Learning. http://learning.ericsson.net/socrates/, ... Welcome
to Socrates Online This project contributes to the status of eLearning in ...
learning.ericsson.net/socrates/ - 12k - 9. Juli 2003 - Im Cache - Ähnliche Seiten

[DOC]Student support services in e-learning
Dateiformat: Microsoft Word 97 - HTML-Version
... Packages, was the provision of rich student support services. ... the salient characteristics
of e-learning systems: The use of elearning is generally unsupervised ...
learning.ericsson.net/socrates/doc/lmi2.doc - Ähnliche Seiten
[ Weitere Ergebnisse von learning.ericsson.net ]

Resources Section: Supporting e-learning - [ Diese Seite übersetzen ]
... they learn better." Susan Smith, Student Affairs On ... learned and guidance how to
create support services online. Implementing a support strategy for web-based ...
www.e-learningcentre.co.uk/eclipse/ Resources/supporting.htm - 34k - 9. Juli 2003 - Im Cache - Ähnliche Seiten

[PPT]University of St. Francis
Dateiformat: Microsoft Powerpoint 97 - HTML-Version
... Tools/Programs/. Services. E-Learning Goal. Attainment and. ... Faculty Support. Student
Support Services. Institutional and Program Assessment. ADMINISTRATIVE SUPPORT. ...
conference.wcet.info/2002/presentations/ files/Washburn.ppt - Ähnliche Seiten

Here are the results from YAHOO (July 10th 2003)

TOP 20 WEB RESULTS out of about 107,000

1. E-learning@tmcc Student Support Services
Student Support Services. TMCC is dedicated to providing quality online student services for our online students including: TMCC ...
www.tmcc.edu/e-learning/support.asp cached | more results from this site

2. Ericsson Education Online
... Student Support Services in e-Learning. http://learning.ericsson.net/socrates/, ... Welcome to Socrates Online This project contributes to the status of eLearning in ...
learning.ericsson.net/socrates/ cached | more results from this site

3. student support services in eLearning
... needs to be faced if eLearning is to ... of provision, as envisaged in e-Learning - designing tomorrow's ... is the provision of student support services in eLearning ...
www.fernuni-hagen.de/ZIFF/sssel.htm cached | more results from this site

The importance of the project can be proven with this simple technique to trace dissemination.