Beyond the Technology: The education 4.0 podcast

In October 2008 Harvard University in the US adopted an open access policy for all its research papers to be made available in their university repository, in an opt out basis. 12 months on, since the policy was adopted, Jisc's Rebecca O'Brien speaks with Professor Robert Darnton, Director of Harvard University Library and trustee of New York Public Library and the Oxford University Press (USA), about the cultural change that is taking place at Harvard and the background to why professors at the university decided to share their knowledge in this way.

Climate change and global warming are recognized as key areas of importance to the research community and the wider population. Jisc has opened up historical naval logbooks to enable researchers to use these resources for untapped data about historic weather, to help make predictions about the future of climate change. Among the 300 logbooks are those of HMS Victory, the Beagle and the Bounty, as countless historic moments of the 18th century are now preserved online. In this podcast Nicola Yeeles speaks to project leader Dr Dennis Wheeler about how Jisc is helping to set the course for climate change research.

From 18th century ships' logbooks, through modern contemporary design to an online Olympics 2012 archive, Jisc's latest online content programme is preserving the past, present and future for UK universities and colleges. These enriched resources for UK universities and colleges are the result of a £1.8m investment, so Nicola Yeeles spoke to Jisc programme officer Ben Showers to find out why this is taking place and discuss the programme highlights. How can enriching digital resources make life better for teachers, researchers and students?

Jisc and The Research Information Network (RIN) have been investigating how, why and what influences UK researchers in publishing and disseminating their findings. The report also looked at citation behaviour (how researchers reference other published work) and the perceived influence this has had on the research assessment and the future research excellence framework. Rebecca O'Brien from Jisc is joined by Michael Jubb (RIN Director) via Skype, and Neil Jacobs (Programme Manager for Information Environment at Jisc), to talk through why the research was undertaken and what the findings mean for researchers, policy makers and funders.

For a year, 26 e-coursetexts across four subject areas (Medicine, Business, Engineering and Media Studies) were made available to 127 UK universities who took part in a National E-books Observatory Project funded by Jisc and carried out by Jisc Collections. The largest study of its kind, it has seen the behaviours of over 50,000 participants and observed to see how they use a selection of academic electronic textbooks. In this podcast Rebecca O'Brien is joined by Caren Milloy, the project's manager at Jisc Collections, and her co-author of the National e-books Observatory Project report, Ian Rowlands from CIBER who carried out the study.

The internet has opened up the way people communicate, learn, teach and research. With the increase in social networking and collaboration over the internet, a unique production for BBC Two is underway which is looking at how the web is changing our lives. The documentary, with a working title of 'Digital Revolution', is starting with how the web started and is looking at its journey to the present day. As much of Jisc's work focuses on open source, collaboration and how digital technologies are used in teaching, learning and research Rebecca O'Brien from Jisc caught up with Dan Biddle and Dan Gluckman from BBC Two's production team to find out more about the project.

Mobile or handheld learning is already changing the way students learn, both in the classroom and on the move and Jisc is looking to guide future developments in this area. At a MIMAS organised conference Westminster University in July this year, delegated explored the topic 'Mobile Learning: Telling Tales' and Nicola Yeeles, Jisc's PR Officer, went along to the to find out more.

In a world where we are surrounded by technology, where boundaries between our personal and professional lives merge, Jisc's e-Learning team have been looking at how to support teachers, researchers and academics with best practice advice and guidance for working in a 'digital age'. In this podcast with Rebecca O'Brien, Sarah Knight, a Jisc e-Learning programme manager, shares the success of the team's Effective Best Practice guide series and launches a new publication 'Effective Practice in a Digital Age'. This new guide puts the teacher and learning at its centre and takes those new and experienced in using Web 2.0 technologies on a journey to enhance their practices and illustrates through case studies how practitioners are opening up their practice and enhancing the learner experience as well as their own.

At the launch event of the Edgeless University publication, a report produced by Demos and commissioned by Jisc, David Lammy Minister for Higher Education and IPR announced a new £20m open learning innovation fund for UK universities.

As Jisc launches a new suite of work in virtual research environments (VRE), Frederique Van Till programme manager in e-Research running Jisc's VRE3 programme, talks to Rebecca O'Brien about how these environments can not only bring people together within universities but how projects are connecting outside their institution, with industry and business too.

The Strategic Content Alliance (SCA) and The Collections Trust have produced a report called 'In from the Cold' which looks at the issues surrounding problematic usage of Orphaned Works. In this interview to discuss the report, Jisc Press & Public Relations Manager Rebecca O'Brien is joined via Skype by Naomi Korn, the SCA's Intellectual Property Rights consultant, who is the author of the report.

The Committee of Inquiry into the Changing Learner Experience report, 'HE in a Web 2.0 World', considers the impact that Web 2.0 and the collaborative, social web are having on higher education in the UK. In this podcast interview (recorded via Skype) Kerry O'Neill talks to Sir David Melville, Chair of Lifelong Learning UK and of the committee; Ellie Russell, committee member and a student at the University of Leeds; and Adrian Godfrey, Director, Internet Business Solutions Group, Cisco Systems Inc, to get their opinion on the report's findings.

In this podcast Kerry O'Neill talks, via Skype, to digital libraries and e-learning Programme Manager David Flanders who speaks about the benefits of Web 2.0 technologies, as well as the aspirations and outcomes of a Jisc-supported event for web developers called 'Developer Happiness Days'.

In this podcast Kerry O'Neill talks with e-learning Programme Manager David Kernohan about what Jisc is doing in the Open Educational Resources (OER) arena.

In this podcast Michelle Pauli speaks with Sarah Thomas (The Bodleian's Librarian and Director of Oxford University Library Services) & Professor Robert Darnton (Director of the Harvard University Library) about their views on the library of the future. Sarah and Robert are two of six panellists who took part in the 'What is the library of the future?' debate in Oxford during April.