Download - 10 07-08 fy network presentation ff
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The trials and tribulationsof setting up
a student pre-arrival portal
Florencia FranceschinaManchester Metropolitan University
FY Network Annual Conference,8-9 July 2010, University of Southampton
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How the idea was born
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And so a journey began …
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The trials started soon after
• Where do we set up the portal?
Some options:– University web page
(but which specific area?)– University VLE area
(password needed!)– Independent web site
(not corporate or authoritative, but may be simplerto set up)
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The trials started soon after
• Does the portal need to be interactive? If so,how do we do this?
Some options:– Social networking sites (Ning, Facebook, etc.)– Web form through which students can send us
questions– FAQ list in response to email enquiries
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The trials started soon after
• Who do we need to ask whether the idea ofthe pre-arrival portal is going to be acceptableand viable?
– Staff directly involved with the FYP– HoD– Recruitment / admissions team?– Marketing / web development team?– International Office?– Linked degree departments?– Previous/current students?
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The trials started soon after
• How much technical expertise isneeded to set this up?
• Do we need any special software orequipment?
• Who can give us editing rights to thewebsite?
• Who can give us technical support withthe website?
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The trials started soon after
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Then things began to look up
• Colleagues sent in good suggestions(interesting links for website, pre-arrival taskslinked to the FYP units, ideas for how to makethe portal interesting and appealing tostudents, etc.)
• Some of the previous questions gotanswered.
• Feeling that some progress was being made.
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Then things began to look up
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But the excitement was short-lived
• Most things got delayed:
– Equipment that needed to be purchased had to beauthorised, etc.
– IT staff took their time installing needed softwareand they needed to pay us more than one visit tosort everything out.
– Web officer was not overtly enthusiastic to take onour project.
– Web officer needed to wait for central policydecisions about pre-arrival portals.
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But the excitement was short-lived
• Most things got delayed:
– Recruitment & Admissions suddenly took aninterest in our project and meeting had to be setup, etc.
– Students who promised to help with videos didn’tturn up.
– Exam boards and other work got in the way.– …
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But the excitement was short-lived
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Slowly things started to get done
• We got some access to web space to startdrafting portal.
• We got a student volunteer to help withvideos for portal.
• The software and hardware (BB Flashback,Dreamweaver, podcast server, webcam)worked well and allowed us to start toproduce the needed materials.
• Feeling of progress returned.
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Slowly things started to get done
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More difficulties emerged
• Design/marketing expert was notimpressed by initial efforts (e.g., somefeatures looked home-made and mightdo more harm than good).
• We felt somewhat constrained by thecorporate template.
• We found other university portalslooked much nicer than ours.
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More difficulties emerged
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More difficulties emerged
• We started to worry about getting everythingdone in time for launch of site (planned for 1stAug).
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More difficulties emerged
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But we’re optimistic!
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What we have learned so far
• Plan with plenty of lead time.• Don’t be too ambitious the first year you
run a pre-arrival portal.• Seek feedback from different members
of staff and students.
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Some remaining questions
• Have we left any important stake-holders out of the developmentprocess?
• What’s the best time to launch pre-arrival portals? Is August too late?
• Is it better to have open or pass-wordedportals?
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All comments and suggestions welcome!
Thank you