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The Potential Use of Social Software in Rural Irish Schools
This presentation will describe the work being undertaken in the SoRuraLL Project, a 2 year European Commission supported Lifelong Learning Project that began in January 2009. The objective of SoRuraLL is to investigate how schools and other educational bodies in rural parts of Europe can use simple social networking tools to break down barriers and access educational opportunities. SoRuraLL involves partners in Greece, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Bulgaria and Poland as well as Ireland.
8 Primary and 2 Secondary schools in Co. Clare are taking part in this project and are using a mix of user generated web sites and blogs to publish information about their school including sports results, project work and other news from the school. Several are also using Skype to support collaborative projects with other schools.
Training and monitoring is provided by the project support team and carried out with the support of Clare Education Centre.
This presentation will report on the work undertaken thus far and the challenges and opportunities such initiatives bring. It will also provide an opportunity to network with other practitioners engaged in similar activities in other parts of Ireland. The presentation is aimed at those interested in the practicalities of setting up similar projects and who wish to share experience and best practice.
An Irish citizen, Sally has been involved for many years in the field of technology enhanced learning and worked for University College Dublin, the European Association of Distance Teaching Universities in Heerlen, EuroPACE 2000 and the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. Her work during this time was largely related to the management of European projects including R&D projects funded under the Framework Programmes as well those funded by the EC's Education and Culture Directorate General and the European Space Agency. In 1999, she set up the independent company ATiT, where she is now joint Managing Director. Sally leads several projects for ATiT in the area of audio-visual production, research and project management as well as training and consultancy services which are aimed at clients including the European Commission, the European Space Agency, the World Bank and several corporate clients. Sally has designed and led a training initiatives and is an experienced workshop facilitator in the area of technology enhanced learning including media selection, video production, use of videoconferencing, streaming, costing multimedia production and managing collaborative spaces. She has managed cross-border pilot projects in the area of technology enhanced learning in the school, higher education and in-company training sectors and is an experienced evaluator and researcher. She also works as an evaluator for the European Commission and has evaluated and reviewed projects in FP5, FP6 and FP7. Jim is an experienced professional with history of achievement in management, engineering, consultancy and IT Training. He is director of O Sullivan Software Solutions and for the last number of years he has been working both as an ICT teacher when he ran the FUTUREKIDS(Computer Learning centre for children between the ages of four and twelve) franchise in Ennis, Co Clare and as a Microsoft Certified Professional. He has extensive experience in working with Schools to develop their ICT infrastructure and has maintenance contracts with numerous schools to maintain their ICT equipment.
Jim has plenty of experience in the training area and has worked with many state and semi state organisations over the last few years. He has worked in Bank of Ireland, RTE, FAS and Bord Gais. Jim is currently working on building up his contract maintenance base and is actively involved with many schools and companies providing preventative maintenance and break fix solutions to all involved.