JOINT PROGRAMME MEETING

July 7th 2004

The Northern Ireland Integrated Managed Learning Environment

Greg McClure &

Sinead Higgins

The NIIMLE Project

• Funded by the JISC ‘MLEs for Lifelong Learning’ programme

• Collaborative enterprise between FE and HE

• Building an MLE to provide a set of focused services to third level students in the region

• A personalised student portal

• Delivered securely via the Internet

Aims

• To encourage collaboration within a region

• To enhance student retention and progression

• To encourage students to take a more holistic view of tertiary education

• To focus on the needs of the lifelong learner

• To contribute to widening participation

I am a student at North Down & Ards Institute studying a BTEC National Diploma in Multimedia.

I need to start thinking about what I want to do after this as my personal tutor is always asking me about my goals and plans! I can’t decide whether to look for a job or continue studying.

what & where next?

There is an exciting new website where I can find out all about multimedia courses in FE and HE in Northern Ireland.

The NIIMLE portal gives me information about where the course is, the level, the duration, mode of attendance and much much more.

If I need general information about the college or university I can click on the name and go to their website.

And if I still haven’t got enough information I can use the NIIMLE mentoring service. I don’t even have to go into the college or telephone to ‘talk to’ an academic on the course I am interested in. How cool!

I need to see my current results to make a decision & sure enough the NIIMLE portal shows me my NDAI records. If I move to a new college or university my new results will be added to this record and will always be available via the portal.

That’s great because I won’t have to go looking in umpteen places next time I need this information.

There will a personal section on the portal available to me lifelong where I can record all my education, career and personal development thoughts and plans.

I can record whatever I want here, even things like the skills I have acquired and how I can demonstrate that I have these. This is going to save me heaps of time when I have to fill in application forms or prepare a CV.