Events – Page 40 – Digital Learning Dispatches

Seamus Fox, Head of the Open Education Unit, officially retired at the end of January 2017. After almost 30 years service to DCU, with much of this time in leadership roles committed to the agenda of extending and widening access to higher education, Seamus will leave a large gap in our NIDL team.

maxresdefault-1

As a sign of Seamus’ significant contribution to the University over many years, both The President and Deputy President spoke at his retirement event, along with Jim Devine and Billy Kelly, DCU’s Dean of Teaching and Learning. A large crowd was in attendance. Amongst several items given to Seamus to acknowledge his retirement, a current playing member of the Bohemian soccer team (Seamus’ team!) presented him with the gift of a home jersey.

We wish Seamus all the best in his retirement and hopefully we will continue to see him on a regular basis.

maxresdefault

A highly successful Feedback Symposium was held at Maynooth University as the final deliverable of the Y1 Feedback project. The Symposium gave an opportunity for around 150 participants from across Irish higher education institutions to explore, discuss, and share approaches to enhancing feedback in first year. Each participant as part of their registration received a free copy of the literature review on contemporary feedback approaches published by the project team.

The programme included keynote presentations from a number of international experts on assessment and feedback, including Professor David Carless (video introduction), Professor Tansy Jessop, Professor David Nicol, and Dr. Naomi Winstone, author of a recently published Feedback Toolkit.

As part of the programme, and at the centre of the day, the Symposium also helped to showcase the range of technology-enabled feedback case studies developed by the Y1 Feedback project. Y1 Feedback case study participants collaborated across Maynooth University, Athlone IT, Dundalk IT, and Dublin City University. Several NIDL staff contributed presentations at the Symposium and case studies on topics ranging from learning analytics (Dr Mark Glynn), the use of Peer Wise (Dr Eamon Costello) and the adoption of programme-wide assessment and feedback strategy (led by Dr James Brunton.

The Y1 Feedback project team, led by Lisa O’Regan, and including Orna Farrell and Professor Mark Brown from the NIDL, is shown in the photo below. Congratulations to everyone involved in what was a very productive and rewarding professional collaboration.