LIB 4900 – Social Informatics – Fall 2015

Values:

• Security
• Privacy
• Accessibility
• Control
• Intuitiveness
• Support
• Transparency

Norms:

• You should not leave yourself logged into the portal on school computers — click log out at the end of a session.
• You ought to read the Chancellor’s Report.
• You ought to stay connected with what’s going on within CUNY in regards to events.
• You should keep track of the operations level stuff within your account — financial aid and the like.
• Don’t share your login.
• Don’t hack or compromise the site.

Title: A Study of the Effectiveness of Blackboard Collaborate for conducting synchronous Courses at Multiple Locations
MLA Citation: Tonsmann, Guillermo. “A Study of the Effectiveness of Blackboard Collaborate for Conducting Synchronous Courses at Multiple Locations.” Insight: A Journal of Scholarly Teaching 9 (2014): 54-63. Web. 21 Oct. 2015.
Research Question: How effective is the videoconferencing software Blackboard Collaborate for carrying out instructions at college level to students attending classes synchronously at multiple locations.
Methodology: The paper reviews and analyzes the author’s experience in teaching the college course “Discrete Mathematics’ using a tool called Blackboard collaborate (a videoconferencing software). This tool allows students to take part in live regular class sessions from different places in the United States. The method entailed the author directing class sessions from his office in Park university Campus in Austin Texas, while the students attended sessions from various locations; Austin, Texas, Minot, North Dakota and Charleston South Carolina. Every participant had full duplex audio and video communications and the course was an 8 week term between October and December, with 2 classes per week. All class sessions were recorded by the Blackboard Collaborate system and all students had access afterwards. There were power point lessons and final exams were held on site. Most importantly, “Students were polled at various stages of the presentation to gauge the level of understanding and engagement with the class”.
Extent of Social Informatics Approach to the Research Study: The author Guillermo had a very scientific/empirical approach to his research question because he followed the general layout and stepped out the process of the experiment, as well as look at the motivation and analyzed the data. In the end he even allowed for student feedback and a page for recommendations to what he found most useful after his experiment style question was answered. He also chose a big subject and narrowed down his results and created a solid question with answer, pertaining to one particular feature of a course management tool (Blackboard).

Dale Spencer

Title

The Student Experience of a Collaborative E-Learning University Module

APA Citation

Biasutti, Michele. (2011). The Student Experience of a Collaborative E-Learning University Module. Computers & Education, 57(3), 1865-1875.

 Research Question

What are student’s perceptions, problems and expectations from e-learning modules in the educational system?

Methodology

An online learning module on music education was presented to 92 students in a university in North Italy. Students were divided into four groups each group was assigned a single tutor. The structure of the module included various activities, such as reading tasks, group discussions, processes of peer feedback and other collaborative group tasks. Participants were asked to read a paper pertaining to music education and discuss it through online forums. Participants were also tasked with the job of designing a learning unit using the virtual environment. After completion of their tasks, students were given an anonymous questionnaire (consisting of both qualitative and quantitative questions) regarding their overall views and their experiences with the online module. The researchers used the results of this questionnaire to draw their conclusions.

Extent to which this article takes a social informatics approach to the research study

Social informatics is the study of information and communication tools in cultural or institutional concepts. This encompasses exactly what my journal article was about. In an effort to test student’s perceptions and experiences with online learning modules, the researchers conducted an experiment that produced firsthand results.

MLA Citation:

Ouyang, John Ronghua, and Nile Stanley. “Theories And Research In Educational Technology And Distance Learning Instruction Through Blackboard.”
Universal Journal Of Educational Research 2.2 (2014): 161-172. ERIC. Web. 15 Oct. 2015.

Research Question:
This presentation is reviewing various
educational technology related theories, exploring and
discussing up-to-date theoretical research and applications.

Methodology used:
A review and discussion of various theories in education. This paper reviews educational technology related theories. Learning theories discussed in the research and later applied to an evaluation of Blackboard’s distance learning environment platform. Theories discussed are: Constructivist theory, a brief description of the multiple intelligence theory, anchored instruction theory, cognitive flexibility theory, theory of diffusion of innovations, distribution cognition theory, dual-coding theory, experiential learning theory, script theory, situated cognition theory, and symbol system theory. At the end of the article Blackboard is discussed in the context of the stated theories.

Extent of social informatics approach to the research study:
According to the Berkshire Encyclopedia of Human-Computer Interaction “Social informatics (SI) is a theoretical and empirical approach to the study of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in society.” The authors Ouyang John Ronghua, and Nile Stanley explore the popular theories of education and then review the Blackboard platform in the context of those theories. This paper definitely applies to social informatics methods of studying ICT systems.

Just a reminder that you have until 6 pm tonight to complete your first blog post for the assignment where you talk about a peer-reviewed journal article. Any late posts will have 1 point taken off for each day they are late.

Here’s the assignment description from the course website:

Find 3 peer-reviewed journal articles that discuss the results of a research study of an ICT that you are studying. Write a separate blog post for each article. Each post should have:

• Proper APA or MLA style citation for the article
• Description of the research question
• Description of the methodology used
• The extent to which this article takes a social informatics approach to the research study

Due:

• First blog post: October 22
• Second blog post: November 5
• Third blog post: November 12

Points: up to 10 points per blog post (30 total)

Here are some resources that shed light on values and norms here at Baruch.

• Student conduct
• Academic honesty
• CUNY Policy on Acceptable Use of Computer Resources (pdf)
• Maintenance of Public Order
• Combating Sexual Assault and Other Unwelcome Sexual Behavior
• CUNY Bylaws that relate to student behavior
• Baruch Student Handbook (pdf) go to page 62
• Baruch Faculty Handbook

In addition, see some of the resources (such as the strategic plan and the self study) listed in yesterday’s blog post, “Sources of Info about the College and Our Students.”

Comparative Analysis of Academic Web Sites

MLA Citation:

MECHITOV, A. I., MOSHKOVICH, H. M., TAYLOR, R. G., & UNDERWOOD, S. H. (2001). COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF ACADEMIC WEB SITES. Education, 121(4), 652. Retrieved from http://remote.baruch.cuny.edu/login?url=http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA78535651&v=2.1&u=cuny_baruch&it=r&p=AONE&sw=w&asid=2d6b0a271a79fb041e4ad03d574f0f70

According to Academic OneFile, Education is “a professional journal presenting studies and theoretical papers on all areas of teaching and learning in both school and university settings. Issues focus on school psychology, the prevention of delinquency through high school programs, curriculum, instructional procedures, and practices in education.”

One preliminary note on this particular study from me — though it seems to be geared more towards informational websites (baruch.cuny.edu) than web portals (cunyportal.cuny.edu), the web portal still emphasizes information content and overall design, though I don’t think entertainment value is as big a factor.

Research Question:

What characteristics should a university web site embody in order for it to be effective and useful for its student users?

Methodology:

The researchers designed a 27-question survey to evaluate the effectiveness of 13 Alabama public state universities. The participants were predominantly juniors and seniors taking a CIS course about Internet applications at the University of West Alabama. All in all, 31 students participated in the survey, which was presented to them as assignment for the course.

In terms of dependent variables, each student used MS Explorer 4.0 as the browser. The researchers chose schools from the same state in order to “have a representative pool of institutions which included universities of all sizes and levels, but also to control, as much as possible, for regional differences and other extraneous variables” (655).  The survey was conducted in the middle of the semester, ensuring as best as possible that all of the students had the same level of pre-established knowledge about Java, HTML and basic web design.

The questions were designed to gauge the students perception of each website’s information content, entertainment value and overall design. The researchers found that that the students favored entertainment value above all, then considered availability/accessibility of information and aesthetic value after that.

Extent to which this article takes a social informatics approach to the research study:

If social informatics is an interdisciplinary means of evaluating human-computer interaction, with an emphasis on institutional and cultural factors, then this study more or less fulfills that definition. Likewise, if social informatics believes that context key, then the design of the study embodies that concept. For example, the researchers specifically state that “[their] approach to reduces generalizability. However, given the aforementioned caveat that the perception of site effectiveness is likely to be very contextual, we believe that the present study provides an example of site evaluation and what such evaluations may yield, and not a conclusive set of standards” (655).

As you work on your research projects, you may find some of these reports helpful as background sources:

Baruch’s Strategic Plan (2013-2018)

• Main page on the college website
• Executive summary (pdf)
• Complete strategic plan (pdf)

Baruch’s 2010 institutional self-study report prepared for Middle States accreditation

• comprehensive self-study (pdf)

Data about Baruch

• Baruch at a glance
• Fact sheet
• Factbooks
• Factbook 2014 graphs (pdf)
• Common data set 2014-2015
• Student satisfaction inventory

Data about CUNY Colleges (with school-to-school comparisons)

• Factbooks and databooks
• 2014 student experience survey (pdf)
• Staff (and faculty) facts 2014 (pdf)

On the “Assignments” tab of the course website, I’ve added details to the critical literature review assignment. If you have any questions, feel free to post them here to the blog or ask me in class.

The Benefit of a Comprehensive, Integrated, and Granular Data System for Community and Technical College Institutional Research.

APA:

Schoenecker, C. (2010). The benefits of a comprehensive, integrated, and

granular data system for community and technical college institutional research. New Directions For Institutional Research, 2010(147), 81-108.

Research Question:

According to the peer-reviewed journal, It describes the Minnesota system’s organization and information infrastructure, IR office’s staffing and its role in developing and implementing an accountability framework for the system, how the unit has changes, and prospects for the future of IR system. How the unit’s role is affected by supporting both two-year colleges and universities (pg 81).

Methodology:

First of the methodology that I found in this journal is through survey. Schoenecker says that to find out system’s statistician, “third coordinates a survey of graduates and is a reporting expert “(pg 84).

Second methodology is also survey form but for different purpose. This survey to know the employment rate after the student graduate. Schoenecker says that, “each college and university is responsible for conducting an annual follow-up survey of its graduates regarding employment and continued education” (pg 91).

Thrid methodology is through oral histories and historical tracing. When IR staff communicates with the new staff, they using software and teach the new staff. For example, “Experienced IR staff frequently use the listerv to share their knowledge with newer staff” (pg 97).

A lot of the methodology in this journal that I found that is through quantitative method. IR staffs use the information and data in the system to analyze and produce different type of reports. For example, “The Research Unit consulted with the IR Group as it developed the measures and statistical analysis to identify acceptable level of improvement” (pg 88).

The extend to which this article takes a social informatics approach to the research study:

From the user aspect, the state system can be use by the students to register class, apply financial aid and etc. IR staff can also use the system to analyze and create different types of report such as system satisfaction or performance report of students or others.

Techonology aspect, the state system has categories into community college, technical college and state university, which total up is 36 colleges and 7 universities. All of the universities and colleges is using this state system to transfer students or do other admission documentary.

Information aspect, IR staff using the data in the system to analyze report and compare the target for every year. For example, “The Research Unit provides analysis, information, and consultation to community and technical college leaders and university and system leaders in support of the system’s performance improvement process” (pg 86).

Social and organization aspect, some of the reports from the state system also send to the federal state so that government has information to do update. Besides that, the state system also divided into two categories, one is for system staff and another is for campus staff. These two categories have different organizations to handle different role or function.