Lischer-Katz, Z., & Clark, J. (2021).
Institutional Factors Shaping XR Technology Accessibility Policy & Practice in Academic Libraries. Survey. The EDUCAUSE XR (Extended Reality) Community Group Listserv <XR@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU>.
https://uarizona.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Ya9id4uCXoktLv
participate in a survey is being sent out to those responsible for managing and providing XR technologies in academic libraries. This survey is part of a study titled “Institutional Factors Shaping XR Technology Accessibility Policy & Practice in Academic Libraries.” The principal investigator (PI) is Dr. Zack Lischer-Katz, PhD (Assistant Professor, School of Information, University of Arizona) and the co-principal investigator (Co-PI) is Jasmine Clark (Digital Scholarship Librarian, Temple University).
An Institutional Review Board (IRB) responsible for human subjects research at The University of Arizona reviewed this research project and found it to be acceptable, according to applicable state and federal regulations and University policies designed to protect the rights and welfare of participants in research
Please feel free to share this survey widely with colleagues.
Introduction
Over the past five years, many academic libraries have begun systematically integrating innovative technologies, including virtual reality (VR) and other “XR” technologies, into their spaces and services. Even though schools, libraries, and the library profession all stress equitable access to information and technology for all community members, accessibility – understood in terms of the design of spaces, services, and technologies to support users with disabilities – is rarely given sufficient consideration when it comes to the design, implementation, and administration of XR technology programs. Because XR technologies engage the body and multiple senses they show great potential for providing enhanced means for disabled users to access information resources; however, without accessibility policies in place, the embodied aspects of XR technologies can create new barriers (e.g., chairs and other furniture that cannot be adapted, controllers that cannot be adjusted for different degrees of dexterity, etc.)
Purpose of the study
The purpose of this study is to develop new understanding about the current landscape of accessibility policies and practices for XRtechnology programs and to understand the barriers to adoption of XR accessibility policies and practices.
The main research objective is to understand what policies and practices are currently in place in academic libraries and their level of development, the existing beliefs and knowledge of library staff and administrators involved with XR technology programs and spaces, and the institutional factors that shape the adoption of accessibility policies for XR technology programs.
The survey will be open from February 1, 2021 to April 30, 2021. More information regarding confidentiality and consent can be found at the beginning of the survey.
Please access the survey here:
https://uarizona.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1Ya9id4uCXoktLv
Thank you in advance for your interest and participation,
Sincerely,
Zack Lischer-Katz, PhD, Assistant Professor, School of Information, University of Arizona; email: zlkatz@email.arizona.edu
Jasmine Clark, Digital Scholarship Librarian, Temple University; email: jasmine.l.clark@temple.edu
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more on XR in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=extended+reality
more on XR in libraries in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=extended+reality+libraries
https://www.dailyemerald.com/news/students-cheat-with-online-learning-service-professors-hope-to-identify-users/article_552d56f4-5a31-11eb-98ae-879264ec0299.html
Services like Chegg have become more accessible to students during unproctored exams in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, causing what UO chemistry professor Shannon Boettcher believes is a “huge problem with academic dishonesty across the nation in the light of remote learning and COVID-19.”
he Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s notice and takedown process requires that service providers remove material that a copyright owner identifies on their website through a valid notice of copyright infringement or become subject to potential secondary liability for assisting with copyright infringement, according to Copyright Alliance.
Chegg Inc. has been sued twice in federal court for claims of copyright infringement, denying allegations in both instances.
Apart from its subscription services, Chegg rents and sells textbooks. The publishing company John Wiley & Sons Inc. filed a lawsuit against Chegg on Dec. 18, 2018, in Manhattan U.S. District Court, alleging that Chegg sold counterfeit versions of its textbooks.
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This $12 Billion Company Is Getting Rich Off Students Cheating Their Way Through Covid
https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2021/01/28/this-12-billion-company-is-getting-rich-off-students-cheating-their-way-through-covid
Chegg is based in Santa Clara, California, but the heart of its operation is in India, where it employs more than 70,000 experts with advanced math, science, technology and engineering degrees. The experts, who work freelance, are online 24/7, supplying step-by-step answers to questions posted by subscribers (sometimes answered in less than 15 minutes).
Chegg CEO Dan Rosensweig has profited handsomely. His holdings in Chegg plus after-tax proceeds from stock sales add up to $300 million. Rosensweig, who declined to speak to Forbes, has said that Chegg Study was “not built” for cheating. He describes it instead as the equivalent of an asynchronous, always-on tutor, ready to help students with detailed answers to problems. In a 2019 interview, he said higher education needs to adjust to the on-demand economy, the way Uber or Amazon have.
Throughout the pandemic, schools have spent millions on remote proctoring, a controversial practice in which colleges pay private companies like Honorlock and Examity to surveil students while they take tests.
Chegg Study was enjoying steady growth and little competition. Its only serious rival, privately held Course Hero, is a much smaller operation, valued at $1.1 billion, that generates most of its answers from students.
My note:
such proliferation would not have been possible, if the middle and upper administration has been more supportive of faculty when misconduct is detected. If the administration turns blind eye due to “enrollment” and “retention” priorities and curbs faculty reports regarding academic dishonesty, the industry naturally fills out the gap between a mere syllabus statement and inability to act upon it.
There is plenty of lipservice regarding “personalized learning,” but the reality is overworked faculty, who do not have the opportunity to spend sufficient time with students, less to educate them about plagiarism, cheating and similar “auxiliary” trends besides the content of the course.
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more on cheating in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=cheating
Can’t get enough Bernie memes? Have your students create their own.
Posted by ISTE on Friday, January 29, 2021
https://www.iste.org/explore/classroom/5-ways-use-memes-students
Meme-creation apps are easy to find for laptops, tablets or smartphones. Search “meme-creation program” in the Apple App Store, Google Play or on your laptop, and many options will come up, including
Meme Creator, https://imgflip.com/memegenerator
Meme Generator: https://imgflip.com/memegenerator
Quick Meme: http://www.quickmeme.com/
Here are some ways you can use memes in your classroom.
Create class rules.
Make a meme for each rule and post them in the classroom. As an alternative ice-breaking activity on the first day of school, ask students to create their own memes based on the rules and share the best ones with the class or post on the bulletin board.
Learn new vocabulary.
Students can create memes to define or use new vocabulary. Display the word at the top, and place the definition or a sentence using the word below.
Identify the novel.
Students can use memes to dramatize a point from a novel or short story they are studying. Teachers can break the class into groups and have each group create a meme from assigned chapters in a class novel.
Emphasize a historical event.
Teachers and/or students can import an image into a meme-creation program and make their own meme with a witty subtitle.
Use as a device to check for understanding.
Students can also create memes as a way to review the material or to explain math formulas or science concepts.
‘Price gouging from Covid’: student ebooks costing up to 500% more than in print from r/books
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2021/jan/29/price-gouging-from-covid-student-ebooks-costing-up-to-500-more-than-in-print
Nearly 3,000 librarians, academics and students have now signed an open letter calling for a public investigation into the “unaffordable, unsustainable and inaccessible” academic ebook market.
Johanna Anderson, subject librarian at the University of Gloucestershire and one of the authors of the letter, says: “Publishers are manipulating the market and price gouging from Covid. We are trying to support students during an unprecedented public health crisis and they are making it so much harder. It is a scandal.”
Caroline Ball, subject librarian at the University of Derby, says one reason librarians are angry is that academic publishing is one of the most lucrative industries in the world, with unusually high profit margins, estimated at around 40%.
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more on ebook prices in the SCSU OER blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/oer/2021/01/17/ebook-prices/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/onlinelearningcollective/permalink/746716582625709/
a discussion from the Higher Ed Learning Collective:
In my teaching career I worked at two colleges in Wisconsin. One public and one private. Both have Learning outcomes for each course, program/major outcomes for each major, and Institutional outcomes for the college (aka Employable skills, Career essentials, or Abilities).
Recently a friend of mine started teaching an online class at the University in a different state, and she kept asking them to give her learning outcomes for the course. After some back and forth emails it turned out that this other state university doesn’t have them.
It blew my mind
, how do they know what the scope and depth of teaching should be in that course? How do they get their accreditation?
I am curious to know if it is just in Wisconsin or selected states/countries that it is a common practice to have outcomes? Also how do you teach without them?
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We have LOs over here in MN.
My guess is that they’re buried deep in some filing cabinet in your friend’s university and most folks just ignore them.
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Usually the instructor is required to create the outcomes for the class, but they are usually based on meta-outcomes from the department. That’s how it has been at all institutions I have worked at. With that said, I have worked with colleagues, full professors with Ph.D.s that didn’t understand the principle of learning outcomes, and unless forced to put them in the syllabus, they either would not do it on their own or when having them, would not follow them. And forgot about triangulation of LO to activities and assessments.
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Accreditors look for program LOs but not at course level. (We learned this after a faculty member was fired for pushing back on LOs on the syllabus, and when the Uni said “SACS requirements”, SACS responded w/“um no, not really…”) Since then, we’ve collected data as part of our assessment plan & can say w/confidence that students don’t read them…
