PebblePad 2010 - Speakers

Lee Davies

Lee Davies is Deputy Chief Executive of the Institute for Learning (IfL), the professional body for teachers, tutors, trainers and others teaching or training in further education. Lee has been instrumental in the professionalisation reforms that have taken place in further education, most notably the introduction of Qualified Teacher Learning and Skills (QTLS) status and the model of professional practice introduced by IfL through which its members demonstrate they remain in good standing through continuing professional development. Lee is a strong advocate for the use of technology to support learning, both in terms of the strategies teachers and trainers adopt to harness the technologies learners own and the place of technology in individual professional learning.

Lee worked for 12 years at Highbury College in Portsmouth, starting out as a part-time plumbing lecturer in 1987. He progressed through a number of management and leadership roles at Highbury College before leaving to become District Secretary of the Thames and Solent District of the Workers’ Educational Association in 1999. Lee draws extensively on his experience of further education, adult & community learning, work-based learning and offender learning in his national leadership role at IfL, where he has worked since August 2005.

Keynote Abstract - Whose line learning is it anyway (or mock the weak)?

Darren Cambridge

Darren Cambridge is assistant professor in New Century College, which offers integrative studies, experiential learning, and first year experience programs as George Mason University in Fairfax, VA, USA. Previously, he was a director at the American Association for Higher Education and a fellow with the EDUCAUSE National Learning Infrastructure Initiative. Over the last ten years, he has worked with eportfolios as a student, teacher, researcher, software developer, and consultant. He co-leads the Inter/National Coalition for Electronic Portfolio Research, through which 48 teams at institutions of higher education in five countries are investigating the impact of eportfolio use on teaching, learning, and assessment.

‘Electronic Portfolios 2.0: Emergent Research on Implementation and Impact’, which he co-edited and was published by Stylus in 2009, presents results from the first four years of the Coalition′s work. He also heads the IMS Global Learning Consortium work on eportfolio technical standards and George Mason′s participation in the Association of American Colleges and Universities VALUE project. Darren is currently completing a book on eportfolios and lifelong learning that will be published by Jossey Bass in 2010.

Keynote Abstract - Deliberative Assessment for Integrative, Reflective, and Lifewide Learning

Julie Hughes

Julie Hughes is an inspiring teacher and a motivating force for the staff and students she works with. Julie will ‘story’ the ups and downs of being an eportfolio teacher working at the ‘bleeding edge’.

Julie Hughes is passionate about the transformative learning potential in new technologies and their attendant pedagogies. Julie has been working with PebblePad since 2004 in the School of Education at the University of Wolverhampton. Her research is keen to explore the user/learner/colleague experience of learning, teaching and assessment within a personal learning space such as PebblePad. Julie is also currently seconded to the Higher Education Academy subject centre – ESCalate. She was awarded an HEA National Teaching Fellowship in 2005 to develop and expand her early work in building online collaborative communities. She used these funds to grow her PebblePad family!

Keynote Abstract - Roots, (para)chutes and ladders: on growing and nurturing e-portfolio teachers and learners

Geoff Rebbeck

Geoff has been in Further Education for 15 years starting out as a lecturer in Health and Social Care, working before that as a hospital manager. He was an original ILT champion; falling into the role by accident rather than design, being an early pioneer of technology in his own teaching. Geoff now combines the role of e-learning co-ordinator with other aspects of working in the College Innovation and Improvements Team; observations, curriculum review and staff training and development. The College was a National finalist in AOC/NILTA Beacon College awards in 2008 for his work on e-portfolios in staff development.

Geoff works with the Institute for Learning in the use of e-portfolios for tutors as a tool for professional development. This has involved the use of Pebblepad to make radical changes in how all aspects of staff development are approached and completed. He won the 2008/9 LSIS National STAR Award for the Innovation category and was recently honoured at the 2008 BECTA Future Learning Awards. He is currently working with JISC RSC Southeast colleagues supporting work on e-portfolios, developing e-learning strategies and VLE design. Geoff is currently completing a 6 month secondment to BECTA working on FE Workforce development. He is a Fellow of the Institute for Learning and holds the Qualified Teacher, Learning and Skills status.

Keynote Abstract - Making waves: casting a pebble in the learning pond