Could UWE's prize-winning e-tool spell the end for the CV?
Issue date: 11/09/2006
Electronic portfolios of students' work are increasingly popular with employers, according to a team from the University of the West of England who have just won a national prize for their web-based tool 'Profile'.
Profile provides students with a personal and secure electronic portfolio (e-portfolio) and enables academics to track and guide student learning remotely. Profile has won the first prize in the 'e-Tool of the Year' competition sponsored by the Higher Education Academy and Toshiba computers. The prize was awarded at a ceremony in Edinburgh on 6 September 2006.
Profile has been taken up in 22 universities across the UK, and can be used in a wide range of applications such as PDP (Personal development and planning), skills and employability audit, and electronic versions of portfolios of Professional bodies.
Dr Stephen Gomez, who led the team which developed Profile with funding from the Higher Education Funding Council (HEFCE), says, “Employers now frequently ask for e-portfolios of students' work and we think this is because they appreciate the strengths this system has to offer over an old-style CV.
“At UWE we have used Profile for a number of years to track students' progress when they are on work placements which usually last a year. When a student starts a placement a secure web-based portfolio is set up for them. A range of on-line forms enable students to record new skills, challenges completed, or areas of new knowledge. Profile has a unique feature which enables different sections of the forms to be completed by different users - the student, the tutor and the work placement supervisor. Thus creating a validated and secure record of achievement.
“In the past a student would have produced a piece of work at the end of a work placement for which he would then receive an overall mark. However Profile enables the student to receive feedback on the work they are doing on an ongoing basis, and the system enables us to influence the process of learning not just the outcome. Profile has enabled the creation of a novel work-based, credit-bearing module entitled, 'Professional Practice in Applied Sciences' (PPM), which contributes towards our science Sandwich degrees.
“The system is very popular with students, who say they feel fully supported by their tutor even though they are on work placement away from the University. The system has a built in communication tool and the advantage for tutors is that it enables them to regularly monitor their students' progress. For employers e-portfolios could be the 'Eldorado' of the future – providing a detailed and securely validated record of achievement.”
Mitesh Patel, a student who used Profile on his placement said, “Using Profile is great. I prefer using computers to writing on paper and though my placement was in Sweden, I was always in contact with my tutors in the UK where they guided my learning.”
There are many applications of Profile and any task that can be managed through forms can be emulated on profile. Profile Version 4 is due to be launched in the autumn. For full details of the Profile system see: http://www.profile.ac.uk
-ENDS-
Editors notes:
Testimonial from Reading University which has adopted the scheme (other testimonials available):
Gillian Fraser – Reading University
“We initially began using Profile to track our industrial training students. As we learned more about its capabilities, however, we were amazed by its flexibility and ease of use and subsequently began integrating its use into our current projects. We are now using Profile to host a 'Skills Audit Tool' that will shortly become available to all members of staff within the University and are hoping to use it for undergraduate PDP. I firmly believe that the key to the success of the skills tool is its association with Profile - lecturers can 'log on' to the system at their convenience to fill out the form and course directors can collate the required information quickly and easily. The support received from the Profile team has been first class and any queries have been answered quickly and effectively. I would thoroughly recommend the use of Profile and look forward to using it to enhance some of my up-coming projects.”
The Profile team consists of:
Dr David Lush (Development Director); Dr Stephen Gomez (Project Director), Jaya Mistry (Profile Administrator), Holger Andersson (Web-form Developer), Karen Croker (Manager), Sue Linsley (Placements Coordinator).
Faculty of Applied Sciences, University of the West of England (UWE), Frenchay Campus, Coldharbour Lane, Bristol BS16 1QY.
Photo available of Stephen Gomez, David Lush and Mitesh Patel.
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Electronic portfolios of students' work are increasingly popular with employers, according to a team from the University of the West of England who have just won a national prize for their web-based tool 'Profile'.