Think of an idea

by Paul English - IDeA

Learning pool

Our experiences at IDeA with the Learning pool project over the last 12 months have given us cause for significant optimism. The IDeA was established in 1999, to support local councils in navigating the challenges of the fast-changing environment. E-learning was regarded as a key enabler of change, and the IDeA began developing the Learning pool service with Epic in early 2001.

The Learning pool is a peer-to-peer e-learning initiative that brings councils together to create, access and share targeted e-learning for local government. In piloting the service last year with over 80 councils, we have engaged with hundreds of e-learning champions who are hungry for more information and support to help accelerate the adoption in their organisation. Momentum is certainly building. E-learning is beginning to pop up on strategic agendas, roles are being adapted to take on e-learning responsibilities, the level of integration of e-learning with other initiatives is growing, and pilot projects are proliferating.

'Nobody is as smart as everybody'

Learning pool is built on the principle that 'nobody is as smart as everybody' (from The New Pioneers, Tom Petzinger). With so many councils facing similar challenges with respect to e-learning and the learning agenda more broadly, the compelling need was for councils to network and learn from each other more effectively. Each time a new learning requirement emerges, a good proportion of the 400+ local councils will develop their own programmes and materials in response, resulting in a huge duplication of effort. This occurs not just between councils but also within councils across different service areas.

Also, with such a high proportion of councils being at the same stage with e-learning (scoping, planning, piloting), there is a huge amount of experience and insight that could be shared. Online technologies provide an unprecedented ability to connect people to people and people to resources, and it was this connectivity that Learning pool required.

The IDeA along with Epic jointly invested in the development of technologies to facilitate file-sharing, community and authoring. Using these technologies, councils in the Learning pool community will support the growth of e-learning content, skills and capacity in the local government sector.

DIY e-learning

Learning pool provides councils with a simple-to-use authoring tool that enables non-technical users to build e-learning using a system of templates, such as text and graphics, multiple choice tests and drag and drop exercises.

"We have already used the authoring tool to produce some basic programmes including time management, absence reporting and induction," said Ken Roxborough, one of the early adopters from South Derbyshire District Council.

Leeds City Council is developing a comprehensive approach to e-learning using a blended model. Pat McConnell, IT Training Manager outlined their approach. "We're developing e-learning for recruitment and selection, corporate induction and equal opportunities using the IdeA authoring tool and Macromedia tools. The plan is to reduce the number of days in the classroom for many courses, in some instances from two days to one. E-learning can be a good way of delivering theory or background information before people come to the classroom."

During the trial, the Learning pool team ran a number of two-day training workshops focusing on instructional design and authoring. As more people are trained and they cascade this knowledge in their organisation, there is real potential to have a large number of in-house authors, developing and sharing material across the sector.

Emma Goss, a Principal Consultant on the Learning Pool team leads on instructional design and she has been extremely encouraged by the energy shown by councils to date. "Councils are very keen to author their own e-learning, seeing this as a low cost, quick solution to their training needs. Some are fortunate enough to have people, time and resources dedicated to this task, whilst others are fitting it in to their existing workloads. We estimate that around 200 people will have attended the Instructional Design Workshops by the end of 2003."

Going forward particular communities may develop around specific services or issues, and the IDeA will encourage and in some instances fund particular groups who intend to develop and share e-learning to address a common need. Tina Purdy from East Riding of Yorkshire Council has been very progressive in trying to develop such a group for the General Equalities Standard: "It is really useful bringing the experience from different councils together. With a shared effort it frees us up to get on with other things. We've each taken different sections away to work up further within a framework we agreed."

Peer-to-peer network

Learning pool was designed as a peer-to-peer network, a decentralised model for the distribution of content. The peer-to-peer network returns to the original vision of the internet where everyone creates and uploads content as well as just downloading it.

Using peer-to-peer file sharing technologies, members of the Learning pool community will be able to connect directly with each other to share resources. Anything can be shared from Word documents and presentations to e-learning modules or even a single image file. The Learning pool website provides a searchable directory that lists all the files that have been made available by councils across the network. When a user makes a request for a particular file, Learning pool facilitates its transfer from one peer's PC to another peer's PC.

By having access to resources that exist in the Learning pool, councils may be able to avoid duplication. Resources can be easily tailored to meet local needs, whilst retaining a large proportion of the original content, saving time and money.

Simon Green of Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council agrees. "It links in with time management. We have shared our training and development policy and strategy in Learning pool, and about 20 other people have downloaded it so far. If another authority can re-use this it frees up time for them and avoids re-inventing the wheel. With these time-savings, they have more time available for other activities such as authoring."

The sharing of files and resources is a core characteristic of Learning pool, but bringing people together is essential to making this work. Learning pool will support a number of learning communities, where users with shared interests and common needs can come together to exchange ideas, support and resources.

Content needs

The local government sector has specific learning requirements and these are not always reflected in the off-the-shelf e-learning materials that are available...

The IDeA is supporting Learning pool by sharing an initial 15 hours of targeted e-learning, which will be added to year on year. There are over 30 titles ranging from Internet and e-mail training to project management and an Introduction to E-Government. Brokering other e-learning materials (e.g. ECDL) from vendors is also being planned to take advantage of economies of scale, and these will also be available through Learning pool.

Challenges

The Learning pool project has brought into sharp focus the many barriers councils face in implementing e-learning. There is a limited understanding of the potential benefits of e-learning amongst senior management and councillors, and e-learning must compete for attention with many other initiatives. To compound this, early e-learning pilots have often lacked the strategic focus that can help to generate profile and avoid it being marginalised as 'some new training thing'. From this lack of senior buy-in follows a whole set of predictable problems around project status and resource allocation.

IT involvement and support is very variable, largely as a result of other priorities, and negotiating IT policies and IT infrastructure requirements can be very tough and de-motivating for the average e-learning champion. Alan Hopcroft, Technical Consultant on the Learning pool project, outlines a common position, "Local Councils represent the classic public sector dilemma in e-learning implementation. A decreasing training resource is matched by an equal lack of IT infrastructure development. Hence the opportunities to really exploit e-learning are severely limited so councils have been forced to use what they have in smarter ways."

The ownership of e-learning is frequently unclear and corporate centres can struggle to co-ordinate initiatives with individual service areas. Many councils are finding benefits in aligning e-learning with the bigger e-government agenda for reasons of integration, funding and profile. In many other councils e-learning and e-government rarely appear on the same agenda. Many individuals we have spoken to have been allocated the e-learning agenda and feel they have neither the experience nor time to get it off the ground in the way they would like. This is particularly apparent with small district councils with limited capacity.

At the learner level, e-learning can be a tough sell, particularly in a classroom training culture. Individual 'champions' have to invest a lot of time and effort trying to educate other parties engaged.

Going forward

Susan Biddle, Assistant Director at the IDeA, was instrumental in taking Learning pool from an exciting concept to a real service. Susan sees a bright future for the project that went live in November 2002.

"From out early experience we are confident that we have in Learning pool a service that offers local councils the chance to get involved in e-learning and use it to their advantage at low cost and risk. Our vision over the next couple of years is to support the growth in the richness of content and expertise of authors and to help develop and informed sector that is able to exploit e-learning to the full and engage with all providers with confidence.""

www.idea.gov.uk/elearning/

Paul English is a Principal Consultant on the IDeA Learning pool team.

Donald Clark, Epic, has written a white paper on the peer-to-peer file-sharing technology that underpins Learning pool, entitled The Napsterisation of Learning (P2P). For a summary, click here.