Web2.0: turning universities inside out

I went to one of the Educational Technology research seminars last week where there were a couple of speakers. Helen Partridge Queensland University of Technology talking about her fellowship into looking what skills are required by library and information professionals in the age of web 2.0. And Fred Garnett, London Knowledge Lab, talking about a newly launched project MOSI ALONG in conjunction with Manchester's Museam of Science and Industry, looking at doing work in ambient learning. I'd like to reflect one of the set readings in his description of ambient learning city's (that's his vision for Manchester), unleashing information and learning beyond bricks and mortar into the wild, turning the University inside out (I think that's how he put it.)

This is to do with social networks (I'm a week behind), mixed in with what we've been talking about in terms of VLE/PLE. I liked Selwyn's Face Working - I thought I wouldn't get very much from these recounts of Facebook interactions however it painted an interesting picture through the selections of discourse as seen through a UK network on Facebook presumably connected to a discipline area (it's UK based). The main point was that students were using Facebook for University stuff but that it tended to be self-intiated, unorganised passing along of information between students.

It presents interesting questions for us when we are looking to use official sources to release important information, that the information is likely to be passed on by word of mouth through networks such as Facebook. Often this has the effect of Chinese Whispers, but we must assume that not everyone reads information directly, there is a certain filtering taking place between social structures. When we design information dissemination points perhaps we need to bare this in mind. As my last post detailed, having too many sources of information can create confusion for students. But when we set out our Blackboard units or Course Handbooks with information that we expect students to keep up to date with and to have digested the information, are we not just covering our own backs? If the information is really vital should we not learn to start to use these new channels?

One point was that often the information is obtained in passing from tutors. there is often a sense of responsibility by students to pass on any bespoke information they obtain to the wider community. I guess that I have done this in the past; by being campus based we get to quiz more easily the tutors on how assessments work and I will have passed this onto team mates who are distance learners.

Some of the discussion of Facebook tends to be self depricating, maybe building social networks between learners where they are able to be frank with each other. I would imagine that these types of interactions just wouldn't happen in Blackboard - that's the tutor's space, where everything is officially visible. But I think the social building aspect is very useful for learners, a construct of Huberman's 'hidden networks'.

The author found that Facebook was used to record accounts of sightings of lecturers outside campus. Recently I was talking to a lecturer who had been dragged out to hip Manchester nightclub by his PHD students, and found that he was surrounded by his 1st years wanting to get pictures taken with him. The information was instantly on Facebook. Is this what it means to turn the University inside out? What is it that students find so fascinating about seeing lecturers ourdoors? I think it might be something to do with the persona adopted in lectures that seems totally incompatible to life.

A point at the end is that this type of use of Facebook is no different from back row murmours, only that now exchanges are open to all and recorded.