Optimal professional development ICT training initiatives at flagship universities

Across all these universities’ PDCs, the main purpose of using technology is to enhance teaching and learning. Therefore, technology is often seen as the thing that can help to transform teaching practices. Most of the participants responded that using technology in their centers focuses on how to fulfill good educational principles. They used different technologies, instead of merely providing instruction about how to use a specific technology. As the PDC Director from Carnegie Mellon University responded:

What we are always trying to do is find opportunities where technology can help solve a teaching or learning problem, or where technology can open a new opportunity to improve something that might not already be going on. So, we really look for technology not just for technology sake, but really…in order to improve teaching and learning. And we really focus on the learning side, and thinking about that very deliberately. (ICT02–09)

The Imperial College London Director also addressed how technology is used in his center:

We offer some support in terms of the pedagogy of using e-learning and learning technology, and tools and technologies of that type related to learning. We don’t train each staff or students in the mechanics of using functions provided by our IT Center, who do the training on technology. We just support the pedagogy. (ICT10–06)

This training purpose is also addressed by the University of Pennsylvania Executive Director, as he described:

The clear strength I think is that we are very good about thinking about the use of technology for the teaching end, and not getting caught up by thinking technology is an end to itself. I think that is a real positive. So we are able to help faculty and graduate students really think about what they are trying to accomplish in their teaching and then how to use technology to do that rather than start with what technology is out there and what you might use it for. (ICT07–06)

The basis for this transforming purpose of using technology is that many PDC leaders have realized that technology is just a learning tool. Thus, only teaching with new technologies is less meaningful to faculty members. Technology cannot be put before teaching and learning. Central PDCs should not only help faculty to integrate technologies; it is more important to inspire faculty members to think about ways to integrate technologies. To many PDC leaders, thinking about what learning objectives need to be achieved is more important than training faculty members in the use of new technologies. Therefore, technology is a tool that can enhance the teaching and learning experience. A prioritization of pedagogy serves the function of putting all these things together.

Because the main purpose of using technology in these institutions is improve education and engage students, technology training typically addresses pedagogical issues. Usually the centers’ staff will offer consultations; listening to the faculty’s specific needs, and then advising on the incorporation of certain kinds of technologies to meet their students’ learning needs. Consultants ensure that faculty know how to apply technologies that are best connected with the educational conceptual perspectives. For example, as the Executive Director at the University of Pennsylvania explained: “We don’t tell people the ways or the technical aspects of how to use a particular technology, but we will lead a discussion on how they might use it, not the technical side, but the pedagogical side of it” (ICT07–06).

A more specific example given by the Director of the Center for Teaching Excellence at Cornell University in terms of how to provide technology support:

We are talking about teaching with technology, we are not talking about, like, how do I set up a blackboard account…what we are talking about is how to actually use that tool to perhaps help your students to succeed or overcome some of the challenges you might be facing in your teaching, for example, you are interested in making sure all the students are able to get the materials for class, perhaps, you may use blackboard… you might decide you want to have the opportunity to do the discussion outside the class, perhaps you will use piazza or the discussion boards that are in blackboard. You are teaching the large class, you want to have the opportunity to interact with your students, maybe use I-Clickers or Poll Everywhere, or Twitter. (ICT09–05)

This current trend is, further, in line with the previous literature on the transforming purpose of using ICT in education (Prestridge 2010a, b; Wang et al. 2014; Albion et al. 2015). Almost all the PDC leaders commented that their current use of technology is to integrate technology in creating a learning environment that enhances students’ critical thinking and cognitive learning.

Current technology training within the professional development faculty center happens in a variety of formats in terms of its organizational structure, training forms, and training content. Some centers have their own technical support group and provide centralized technology support to the whole university, while others may need to cooperate with a distinct group of people, who provide the mechanics of using technology. As the center leader in the Technical University of Munich responded:

We cooperated strongly with the media center that is called, at TUM it is the Center for Modern Media. They only look into the technological side of it. They don’t look into the didactics and pedagogy behind it; that is our job... Fortunately, we don’t need to worry about the technical side and all that support stuff. And we just offer the pedagogical knowledge behind it. (ICT14–06)

However, most of the center leaders responded that instructional technology is an integral part of the professional development activities provided by their centers. They support both faculty and students on how to use specific technologies and software in order to enhance teaching and learning.

In addition, the training forms are diverse. The two most common forms of training are workshops and seminars. However, many centers also provide a blend of ways to best help their faculty and students, such as individual consultation, TA training programs, house calls, or even directly going to faculty members’ offices or classrooms to offer technical support. For example, the Director from the University of Pittsburgh’s University Center for Teaching and Learning described how if faculty members do not know how to use a technology feature in their teaching, they reach out to the University of Pittsburgh’s PDC for help:

If faculty members don’t know how to use the grades center, they can call us. We will come to their office, and help. Usually we just help people on the phone because it’s fast, quicker than email.… We also offer workshops all year round.… We will conduct one-on-one meetings, or we will hold [training] classes on how to use [various] kinds of technologies. (ICT01–06)

The Associate Dean at the University of Melbourne’s Center for the Study of Higher Education also addressed their center’s flexible way in providing technology training to their faculty members:

We have a number of scholars here who are working on e-learning, and using online technologies, and researching with online technologies. Our particular strength is around research in this area. What we are trying to use more of is to have [more of] an online presence for some of our professional development activities, so that people can access them if they are unable to actually attend a professional development training session. (ICT08–07)

Moreover, these faculty PDCs also provide various types and content of technology training. Some of the most commonly used technologies and software include: smartphones, tablets, laptops, Learning Management Systems, Clickers, MOOCs, MOODLE, Blackboard, Canvas, and so forth. These various technology training platforms ensure that both faculty members and students can receive the best training services available to enhance teaching and learning. This finding indicates what previous literature recommended: that since there is no single technology option to meet different needs of both faculty members and students, institutions should not only offer an online support mode, but should blend delivery formats of technology support (Jacob et al. 2015).

A lack of resources is the main factor that influences the implementation of technology within faculty PDCs. As the University of Pittsburgh Director mentioned in her interview, a lack of resources restricted the development of technology in her center. Their best solution was to “balance against the broader needs of the university” (ICT01–07). Also, the Director of the University of Tokyo mentioned that the problem of budgeting “limited” (ICT12–07) the development of the ICT program in her center.

Although financial and physical resources are important in the development of technology integration, human capital resources such as staff, faculties and experts are a key influential factor. Staff who master the use of technology, faculties’ initiatives for technology, and researchers and experts who can bring more technical expertise to training are regarded as the three main aspects of implementing technology integration in faculty PDCs. Skilled staff members who have a broad knowledge of technology integration can facilitate better services for the faculty, as the Director of University of Pittsburgh mentioned in her interview.

We have people who have a very broad knowledge of educational technology. So when you have staff and a place like this, you need to have people who are inquisitive and who have a certain level of intellectual curiosity and want to know…. I think we have people who have solid skills that translate into better service toward faculty. (ICT01–07)

The central focus of technology initiatives is to help meet the needs of faculty members and students. As the Director of the University of Pennsylvania said about the faculties’ initiative for using technology, the responsibility of faculty PDCs is to assist faculty to apply technology according to requirements in their classes, instead of teaching them how to use technology.

The clear strength I think is that we are very good about thinking about the use of technology for the teaching end. And not getting caught up in thinking about technology as an end unto itself. I think that is a real positive. So we are able to help faculty and graduate students really think about what are they trying to accomplish in their teaching and then how to use technology to do that, rather than start with what technology is out there and what you might use it for. So that is the strength. (ICT07–07)

Also, as the Director of Imperial College London said about the faculties’ initiative, the use of technology can be individuation, given that the nature of the technologies is diverse.

The strength is the dispersed nature of the technologies, given that they are allowed to develop in a very organic way in the faculties. … Faculties are allowed to develop their own use of technology in e-learning as required and it is supplemented by centrally provided support and equipment and approaches. (ICT10–07)

Experts and researchers are the third aspect of the implementation of ICT. However, as the Director of the University of Pennsylvania said, cooperation between experts and researchers can be a big problem when a lack of expertise exists in their center.

But it also alludes to a weakness, which is that the technical expertise does not lie in our center, it lies elsewhere. So there are places where we might be more creative if we had greater technical expertise. But we don’t have it and that becomes a weakness. If I had my druthers, it would be great to hire somebody whose area of specialization was in instructional technology, who could really bring the technical expertise that we don’t have, but retain the pedagogical focus that we do have. (ICT07–07)

Under-skilled and underprepared human resources, as indicated by many directors of PDCs, is a main external barrier to implementation of ICT. Skilled staff, faculty members, and ICT experts who work closely together are among the most effective at the case study institutions. Faculty members from the teaching side generate the need for using technology and provide feedback about current needs to both staff and experts. Based on their feedback, staff could provide timely help or a long-term improvement workshop. Also, experts can use their knowledge and research to facilitate all the services from a PDC.

PDC leaders at several universities, including in the UK, believe that they need little technology to facilitate their teaching delivery due to 1) the single location of their campuses, 2) the size of their classes, and 3) their traditional styles of teaching. The Director of Oxford University mentioned that the class size in their university is much smaller than other universities and face-to-face teaching is very convenient, and technology integration seems not to be so important:

I would say that because of the residential nature of our educational environment that technology has not been as important as it would be in other settings. We also have, with regard to students, we have very small class sizes compared to most other universities. So we simply don’t have as much need for a lot of intervening technology. You will walk down the hall to go to lunch and you might bump into your students, it is a very much more personalized face-to-face teaching environment. Even a lecture might only have 20 students. So we have not relied that heavily on technology ... and we don’t do a great deal of IT training in our office. (ICT05–08)

The Director of the London School of Economics and Political Science said that their constraints are physical space limitations relative to their number of computer experts.

I would say if I was looking at weaknesses I guess because of the nature of the disciplines we teach, there is no inherent drive to keep at the forefront of technology. We don’t have computer scientists in the institution …We have to introduce the latest … and encourage people to think about how they may or may not improve the quality of their interaction with students. I mean my other comment is that technology, for all its benefits, still fails to keep up with the ingenuity of human beings and providing their learning processes. So I would say technology still is not necessarily there, but we do what we can with it. (ICT06–07)

An Associate Professor from the Centre for Innovation in Learning and Teaching (CILT) at the University of Cape Town described this barrier as “insufficient visibility”. He said,

The university associates the department more strongly with its technological expertise (a marketing and communication set of issues), but shortage of staff in particular areas (e.g. monitoring and evaluation, learning design, curation and IP). (ICT19–07)

The Director at the Technical University of Munich pointed out another essential barrier in terms of the time conflict between research and teaching, which is also addressed by some other center leaders. He noted that people tend, especially when they are building their career, like in their thirty and forty. They tend to, you know, not focus too much on the teaching, just make sure the teaching goes long somehow. But where the merit comes from, that always the research side. And so, we, as a department of higher education, struggle a lot in making people giving their time to put effort into teaching. Because they say it doesn’t count, in the end, it doesn’t count. I won’t get merit for it. I would get merit for another publication but not for in that teaching side. (ICT14–07).

As recognized by previous research, internal barriers mainly represent the internal necessities of faculty members and students. However, our research found that the traditions and inherent drive of institutions, which determine the policy and tendency toward implementation of technology is an important aspect of internal barriers.

In most cases, diversified ICT training and services have become an important part of centers’ standard operating procedures, as they seek to enhance teaching and learning. Their primary motivation for using technology is to integrating technology with pedagogy in order to enhance students’ learning experiences. Related best practices have been described as using various tools to transform ways of teaching. However, the main external barriers that prevent the successful implementation of technology in PDCs are largely related to human resource deficiencies, including sufficiently skilled staff, motivated faculty, and experts in ICT (Stensaker et al. 2007). The internal barriers are much more needs-based and context specific.