Anne and I have just returned from attending a national APEL event at York St John. Presentations such as one on the strategic benefits of APEL in difficult times and group discussions on innovative practices were very useful. One issue is still recurring and that is the terminology and our understanding of it. Overall, lots of good contacts were made and York was lovely!
Yesterday the University held a showcase of TEL activities that are going on at the institution. As part of an exhibition of JISC funded projects at Plymouth, the Pineapple Project disseminated information and talked to lots of delegates. The team were wearing a variety of hats and also took the opportunity to promote the Uplace Repository project and the Uspace Web 2.0 project. A busy but enjoyable day with great cream cakes.
The team attended the Sustaining Innovation via Organisational Development Workshop on Monday June 7th at Staffordshire University. There were plenty of interesting debates during the workshops that were held throughout the day and we contributed a session on APEL and the Pineapple tool.
The UsPaCe project is complete but there is still a lot of interest. Today we gave a 3 hour workshop on the project and the tools that we used but we took the opportunity to mention Pineapple and not surprisingly the discussion turned to APEL. It seems that everyone has some experience of thinking about or doing APEL even if they do not realised that is what it is called. We were able to give some advice and gather more information from the learner’s perspective.
Yesterday I was at the (University of Plymouth Colleges) UPC summer conference titled ‘A whole new CETL of Fish’ which took place on campus. The Pineapple Project had a display at the event and it received quite a lot of interest. I attended a workshop on the growing importance of APEL and updated delegates on the Pineapple Project.
The team recently met up with the University of Plymouth registry to discuss the finer detail of their APEL regulations.
Yesterday Myself, Harriet and Claire Ellison of UPC Faculty visited HMS Drake naval base in Plymouth.
Ian Austen was kind enough to show us around and tell about their experiences with APEL. Ian presented to the group details about the Flag Officer Sea Training Hydrography, Meteorology and Oceanography (FOST HM).
We discovered some really good practice with regards to APEL which we will be writing up and discussing further in the coming months so watch this space.
In London fo the JISC annual confe
rence, some of the pineapple team took the opportunity to visit its namesake the Pineapple Dance Studio. No sign of Louie though!
An APEL seminar held last week at the University of Plymouth provided another ideal opportunity for us to learn more about practice across the partnership. Neil Witt’s presentation about the Pineapple Project triggered a lot of questions about how the Pineapple tool will be used by staff. New and useful contacts were also made - we will be calling upon you to help us collate case studies and pilot the tool!
Thanks to everyone who helped make the afternoon a success.
Members of the Pineapple team have just attended an APEL tea party organised by the Faculty of Health at the University of Plymouth.
As well as enjoying some great homemade cake, Rob, Sophie, Harriet and Mark found the event extremely useful. Firstly, it was important to learn more about the APEL processes employed by Health. Secondly, it was a rare opportunity to hear about the way that other faculties operate in relation to APEL and the different barriers that need addressing. Fantastic stuff!
