Certificate

24 09 2009

I have received in the post today a certificate recognizing me as a Fellow if the Higher Education Academy as evidence of my “expertise and commitment to enhancing and supporting the student learning experience”.

This certificate is linked to a post-graduate course I have taken last year focusing on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. The course gave me a more methodological approach to the teaching process which I have applied when upgrading the design of the new media course I teach in Belgium at Katho.





Live Video Guest Lecture – Florida Southern College

17 09 2009

Florida Southern - Getting Ready

I had a video guest lecture to Florida Southern College, to the class of Dr Chris Fenner. I talked about the Olympic Movement and new media from a historical perspective. Questions about the impact of emerging technologies on society in general and the Olympic experience in particular were asked.

Unlike my previous guest lectures, given to the University of Missouri-Columbia or the University of Kansas, that were done via Skype, we used a browser-based solution: TokBox. Some technical difficulties made things more challenging but the sound and video quality when the internet connection functioned at full speed were very good. The platform also enabled embedding a Slideshare presentation reducing thus the hassle of figuring out how to present additional material while keeping the video on screen.

The presentation is below:

I believe the class was a novelty for the students as well as for the college as a whole. Students engaged with me both by answering and asking questions and they seemed to genuinely enjoy the lecture. This shows that there is some great potential in integrating live video into traditional in-class, on-campus lectures.

Many thanks to Chris Fenner and James Lynch for making this possible.





New publication

3 09 2009

Back in May when in Lausanne, Switzerland I blogged and tweeted live from  IOC’s first ever International Forum on Sport, Peace and Development (IFSPD).  Just recently my review of the same event has been published in Culture @ the Olympics.





Visualisation tools – update

20 05 2009

Some weeks ago I wrote a post about vizualization tools focusing on what could be useful for quantitative and qualitative researchers alike. I have mentioned then that my favorite was IMB’s ManyEyes platform. An update to that post is needed but this time I’ll be focusing on chart and diagram making applications. Below is a chart of all the sites I have found. It is an easy way to compare their offer. I will make some additional comments about the quality of the images they produce.

Picture 4

Picture 1

Creately and Gliffy have the most varied offer followed closely by LovelyCharts. Design-wise, my favorite is LovelyCharts but for paying 29 Euros/year for the premium version I would like to have the opportunity to exclude their logo. Apple does it on all their products, so why shouldn’t they? Also, for a premium version I would like to see the audio recording option that Flowcharts and iCharts are both offering. 

Essentially, all these online platforms offer an interpretation for software and programs that already exist be they licensed by Microsoft, Apple or be they OpenSource. It is nice though to have some design alternatives. It is even nicer to be offered the opportunity to collaborate on documents and share them later either by embedding them on third-party websites on by emailing them to people. This is where the advantage of these platforms is. 

Happy diagraming!

Just to make sure, here are the links to all platforms I mentioned:

Creately.com, Chartle.net, lovelycharts.com, chartgizmo.com, archimy.com, gliffy.com, icharts.com, flowchart.com, drawanywhere.com, orgplus.com





IOCFSPD – report of rapporteurs and closing session

8 05 2009

 

Picture 1The report is based on the presentations, speeches and keynote addresses given yesterday and today. Lord Colin Moynihan is now reading some ideas from Jacques Rogge’s, IOC President, address from yesterday and it looks like he’ll continue to summarize the presentations of yesterday, or at lest that he was made responsible to report on. He is reviewing also the questions posed during the sessions. 

Patrick Bauman, from Switzerland, is now giving his review, starting with Frankie Fredericks presentation from yesterday. 

It is often stressed, as in the days and hours before, the positive example that sport provides and the dangers of inactive youth highlighted by reminding some of the alarming data from the WHO presentation. Dr Talbot’s presentation is again addressed, after Lord Moynihan just mentioned through a joke that he didn’t agree with it, making me think that the issue of gender and sex stereotyping in the world of sports although told me dealt with without discrimination is still rather a taboo. 

Lord Moynihan now started to speak again reviewing the morning talks. Mr Verbruggen’s keynote is mentioned for its ideas on legacy and the IOCs need to engage and collaborate with political bodies and figures to help IOCs mission but no word is said about Verburggen’s mention that certain NGO, pushing their agenda, tried to make the IOC accountable for human rights issues around the world. 

Picture 5Erica Terpstra, chair of this morning’s session on legacy and education, is speaking now about the other great speakers from her panel: Mario Pescante, Ser Miang Ng and Markus Pilgrim concluding that the meetings these days were a call to action.

Mr Bauman now continues summarizing the last session, the one I missed due to another commitment, that was about capitalizing on partnerships and networking.Political nationalism may sometime be excessive but unavoidable in the Olympic Games, according to Yasushi Akashi, former UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator and now Chairman of the Japan Centre for Conflict Prevention. Other presentations focused o the aid for development through sport, two speakers bring relatively different views – Dr Pal Schmidt, IOC Vice-President and EU Parliament member bringing the Eu view while Mr Subramonia Anathakrishnan, Chief of Partners and Youth Branch of UN-Habitat bringing the UN-habitat view. The last presentation of the last session was given by Christopher Lamb, Special Adviser, International Relations, International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. He advised checking the content and motivation of the partners and not be content only with the memos and partnerships signed. 

Many examples from and related to African countries were given throughout the days making me think that Africa as a general topic is increasingly important for the IOC and probably becoming as much of a focus as the dramatic decrease of involvement in physical activities by youths. 

The recommendations, some of them, presented by Lord Moyniham, are therefore as follows: Picture 6

1. stress the importance of the first ever holding of this forum – emphasize that sport has the power to enhance peace building 

2. the Olympic Movement (OM) and its partners cooperate whenever possible to use sport to overcome increasing problems of this world 

4. the OM will use its influence to political influence to promote peace 

5. OM supports dialogue between nations and individuals and strive to achieve dignity for all individual and people

6. seek  to promote equal opportunities for women as a fundamental human right

7. the OM should strive to achieve peace through the works of the Olympic Truce 

12. this first forum, should be the first step towards future addition of other such meetings not further than two years apart

These, and the other recommendations, were approved by applause by those in the room.