1. EDEN 2005 Annual Conference, 20.-23.6.2005, Helsinki, Finland Insights into electronic portfolio interoperability Simon Grant Independent consultant Information Strategists

2. Interoperability If e-portfolio systems are to be used for lifelong learning, they should interoperate Several specifications have been suggested How can an e-portfolio system be built or made to be interoperable?

3. Outline agenda menu Do the definitions make sense? Do we share understanding of the items? What is interoperability? How items are represented by specs Europass instruments E-portfolio systems architecture Interoperable skills and competences

4. E-portfolio items (1) Achievements qualifications; certificates; awards; prizes; etc. Products works; things created, tended, managed Competencies (by whatever name) knowledge; skills; attitudes achievements/products can be evidence

5. E-portfolio items (2) Goals a sense of direction as in action planning Activities past: as record to present and reflect on future planned: as part of action planning Evaluations (formal) of activities or products

6. E-portfolio items (3) Interests what personally motivates, including values Assertions by self or others, testimonials, free format evaluation by others Reflections as part of PDP; self-evaluation

7. E-portfolio items (4) Organisations (reference) point of reference for several things Affiliations details of relationship with organisations Other people of significance (reference) mentors; friends; people that wrote assertions

8. E-portfolio items (5) Identification names, addresses, photos, date of birth… Relationships many highly significant between items metadata not an item in itself, but a record of: rights over any item; dates of creation, revision

9. E-portfolio items review Is there anything that doesn’t fit in those? Do those categories distinguish properly? between things of different form/structure How do these relate to lifelong learning?

10. What is interoperability? Portability of e-portfolio records; OR Different systems concurrently offering and using related services To be useful, interoperability specifications must be based on real practice What are your scenarios? What services are implied?

11. Semantic interoperability Can the item of information in one context be meaningfully interpreted in another? think of particular PDP scenarios… Role of type vocabularies to distinguish semantically different things with the same or similar structure Could items with types form a sufficient basis for making useful distinctions?

12. Current specifications IMS LIP 2001: large and complex UKLeaP (BS 8788) 2004/5 attempting to make LIP usable IMS ePortfolio draft 2004, final 2005 HR-XML

13. What do we want of a standard? Various trade-offs Simple – complex XML – RDF well-defined – flexible monolithic – segmented (“speclets”) early (untested) – late (tested) Development / revision: easy or hard?

14. Europass instruments http://europass.cedefop.eu.int/ Europass CV Europass Diploma Supplement (Certificate Supplement is not personal) Europass Language Passport Europass Mobility

15. Europass issues Europass representation challenges Who is working with Europass instruments? How and why? May there be a future need to generate the Europass instruments from an e-portfolio system?

16. E-portfolio systems architecture Distributed nature of item storage items held by originating institutions? Need for aggregation/distribution future concept “PIADS”: personal information aggregation and distribution service See WS4RL http://www.elframework.org/projects/ws4rl

17. WS4RL diagram Personal Information Aggregation & Distribution Service Personal Learning Environment Personal Development Planning Web Service Learning design & materials repository service 1 234567 8 9 database Learner Key: WS call WS return other (may be WS) Educator

18. Skills interoperability What happens when institutions describe skills in different ways? evidence here does not connect over there But uniform standards not feasible Need a “meta-framework” for skills enable relationships across frameworks http://www.elframework.org/projects/spws

19. SPWS diagram Medium- or low-level shared skill concepts (“C”) i vii v iii iv ii vi higher-level concept 1 for body 1 (“C”) higher-level concept 1 for body 2 (“C”) skill iv as assessed etc. in body 1 (“EO”) skill iv as assessed etc. in body 2 (“EO”) Operationalises Is Part Of

20. Concluding comments? Is interoperability feasible now, or when? Transfer or concurrent use? What stands in its way? Is the fundamental approach sound? Or is there a better way? Can you take this forward?