Pro Vice Chancellor’s Portfolio Presentation to CODs PVC - Prof Narend Baijnath 18 February 2013

Background  Since the beginning of 2012 the PVC Office is responsible for cohering the following related capacities that need to be cohered, enhanced, and steered as we shape our pathway into the digital age:-  ICT  Open Distance and e-Learning  Procurement  Open Education Resources (OERs)  Academic Planning  Organizational Architecture. Office of the Pro Vice Chancellor

 Academic Planning  Accreditation  PQM  Community Engagement  ICT  Planning and Governance  ICT innovation and Business Support  Academic Systems  Professionals and Administration Systems  Infrastructure and Operations  Procurement  Demand and Acquisition  Inventory Management  Supplier and Contract Management  Travel and Accommodation Management

Projects in the Office of the PVC

Signature Courses

OPEN EDUCATION RESOURCES REUSE REPRODUCE REDUCE Visit Unisa Open Portal (

History of Unisa Project  The History of Unisa is a memory project which incorporates multi-media and both academic and popular writing components aimed at different audiences.

Futures Thinking Project

 Illuminated changes in higher education, technology, OERs and society that impel organisational, curricular and individual change  Student diversity and its implications  Changing demands in the workplace – implications for graduateness  The state of the art in technological change at Unisa and anticipated trajectory Our Organisational Architecture Journey Road show 2012

The Goals of the Organisational Architecture  Create an organization that provides ongoing value to students and stakeholders, and fulfills its social mandate.  Align all aspects of Unisa technology, systems, processes and capacities.  To mitigate complexity – make transparent how the organisation is working, and where it is not – reengineer the organisation in line with strategy.  To develop agility to deal with new challenges.  Optimize performance in all departments.

LOW ROAD  Legacy – low touch  Print / manual  Service delivery efficiency challenges  Monolithic  Slow and lumbering  Low satisfaction HIGH ROAD  Agility  Tech rich  Capability – efficiency  High touch  High satisfaction  High success, retention

Key Challenges to Dept. Management Teaching and Learning  Student diversity  Learning mediation  Assessment  PQM viability  Use of technology  New staff capacity  Digital literacy  Graduateness for the digital age  New degree structures  International benchmarking and accreditation Capacities for the Digital Age

Making the Digital Leap…into the future What makes the shift to digital possible?  Convergence of tech maturity, broadband access, maturity of software solutions,  Infrastructure capabilities within Unisa  A moment of possibility as the university contemplates the future.  Years of commitment to be an ODeL university – acceptance if not complete buy-in – impetus of mission  Rethinking graduateness  Positive reception of OA discussion document and VC’s roundtable on Business Model

Using ICT in Learning Environments 1. Learning about ICT - exploring what can be done with ICT. 2. Learning with ICT - using ICT to supplement normal processes or resources. 3. Learning through ICT - using ICT to support new ways of teaching and learning.

 PQM viability for online  What is the work of the ODeL practitioner?  New curriculum design - prototypes of online courses; the niche for OERS.  Implications for the teaching/learning/assessment nexus  Reviewing the roles of the ODeL practitioner, academic, e- tutor, teaching assistant, DCLD.  The special role of MOOCS

The Role of Colleges Content Management (education and resource) Student Relationship Management  The requirement to migrate to a new ops model will require:-intensive professional development to ensure academics acquire new skills to function effectively in the new era.  Accompanying a new matrix of systems and processes will be renewed staff capacity and a process of re-skilling via a change management strategy. Colleges

Professional Development  Skills training required for a digital future  Re-conceptualization of job functions  Realignment of recruitment and selection criteria  Equipping Staff and Students with Enabling Technologies

The Next Five Years: What African eLearning hopes to achieve  Increased mobility in education delivery  Enhanced formal and informal learning through mobile technologies.  Improved political will  Reap economic benefit from ICT Investment in Education  Increased access to ICT (Devices, Internet Connectivity and Content)  Increased local content  Improved learning and new pedagogies  Increase in self motivated learning

Reflections  Technological change vs institutional and individual change  Organisational culture and politics – insecurity, anxiety and resistance  Organisational transformation underway – leveraging investments and advances in technology; equipping students  Graduateness in the digital era  Capacity development on sufficient scale  Rethinking teaching, learning, assessment and administration in a paperless environment