Talk:International Collaborative Student Project 2010

Welcome to the Talk page for the International Collaborative Undergraduate Student Project that we are hoping to run in 2010.  The aim of this project is to be a totally collaborative one so please feel free to add any ideas or comments in relation to this project on this page.  You can also express your interest in joining this (or subsequent) international collaborative projects on this page.  We look forward to your comments! Rachael Lowe 10:57, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Minor point about "undergrad"

Most of the students in the US who are in PT programs are graduate students. 

 -  Good point, we are in actual fact hoping to involve any physiotherapy or physical therapy student.  I will amend the project title with regard to this Rachael Lowe 10:07, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

- This is an important point.  We just did a survey comparing the use of social software between our students and a department at Missouri University, and we had to change questionnaires etc to make sure that the terms were appropriate  Michael Rowe

Survey

I was wondering about using Google Forms (part of Docs) as a possible means of conducting the survey at the conclusion of the project. I've set up an example of what's possible and shared it with you. Let me know what you think. Michael Rowe 08:00, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

 -  That's definately a possibility.  Otherwise we could use Survey Monkey.  Rachael Lowe 10:21, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

- My only issue with Survey monkey is that there's a limitation on the number of participants you can invite, unless you pay for more.  I think there's also a limitation on the number of questions you can ask.  With Forms, there's no limits  Michael Rowe

- We were considering purchasing extended use of survey monkey for our e-learning work, but are just discovering Forms and may prefer to use this.  Either way there will be no cost involved for this project and we could use either. Rachael Lowe 12:36, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Student selection

How are we going to select students? Will we just put the question to the class? What if everyone wants to participate? What if no-one does? What are the incentives to participate, considering they will receive no academic credit. Can we offer them the possibility of a student publication of the results? Michael Rowe 08:00, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

 -  The original idea is that entire classes would participate in this project as part of their education.  The project would try to tie in with work that they are doing in the semester that the project takes place and the students may or may not be assessed on the work that they complete as part of this project.  This is how the previous student projects in Physiopedia have taken place.  If it is not possible to organise the project in this way then it may be the case that we alter the project to use volunteer students, however I do feel that by doing this the value of the project may be reduced. Rachael Lowe 10:21, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

- I agree that it would be great if the entire class participated.  However, my concern about integrating it into the curriculum is that we have issues with access to the internet over here.  While every student has access on campus, only the first and second years are on campus throughout the year.  Third years are only on campus intermittently and fourth years spend most of the year on clinical placements.  One option would be to structure the project so that it takes place over a period of time when students are on campus, which means only the middle of January to middle of February for fourth years.  I'm not sure if third year students are adequately prepared for this type of project, in terms of their academic writing ability and technological sophistication.  My gut feeling is to have fourth year students participate as part of their curriculum, but I would need for the project to run over an extended period so as not to disadvantage students who don't have internet access at home.Michael Rowe

- OK, we can organise a project to suit these arrangements.  I will try to find another set of students to match your forth years.  Any idea which topics they will be studying at this time or what topics you would like the project to be on? How many weeks would you like the project to run?  The RCSI project ran for 12 weeks! Rachael Lowe 12:41, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

- They will be covering most of their theory in the beginning of the year, but then will have other lectures scheduled for brief periods throughout the rest of the 2 semesters. We haven't finalised our timetable for next year yet, so I'm not sure what subjects the fourth years will be covering. I believe that the only subject I'll be taking them for that early in the year will be "Professional Ethics", although I could be wrong about that. I think we'll have to make participation on a voluntary basis, as I don't see how we can incorporate it into the curriculum. Maybe once we flesh out some of the details of the project, we can get a better idea of how we can make it work. Michael Rowe

 

Communication

Can I suggest making use of multiple channels of communication that others who are involved in the project can track without having to visit the wiki? Example, if I blog about something I contributed to the project, I can tag my blog post with "isp1". Similarly, I can add the hashtag #isp1 to my Twitter feed if I tweet anything relevant to the project e.g. a resource that might be useful to participants.  People can then track anything related to the project by using Google Alerts (or something similar), without keeping all the content in the wiki. I'm a big fan of aggregating diverse content from multiple sources in a time and place that suits me, so I'd like to suggest this method of communication, in addition to the Talk pages of the wiki. Michael Rowe 08:00, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

 -  Good idea. Lets all use the ISP1 tag in whereever we may make comment about this project. Rachael Lowe 10:21, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

Confidentiality

I had a concern about the anonymity / confidentiality of students who may wish to remain anonymous?  This was mainly in response to questions about similar projects with American students.  Apparently they have some very strict regulations with regards their students participating in projects outside of the curriculum.  There have been some questions about intellectual property, which only come into play if this project is a part of their curriculum.  You could run it with volunteers, but if our students are anything to go by, they'll be unlikely to participate, especially if it doesn't carry credit for the course.  You'd like to think that students would take credit for their work, but when we did a group project on OpenPhysio this year, most students only wanted to be identified by their student numbers (I needed some way to grade their contributions). Michael Rowe

- I haven't come across this before, is it likely to be an issue? I would hope that all students involved would be open to adding their profile so that they can share it with the other students and tutors involved. Obviously they will need to have a username that their tutor can follow for assessment purposes. I suppose it is possible for those wanting anonymity to have an alternative name but I think this would detract from the openness of the project (which is what PP is based on) and may create problems within groups where some of the group are not using their real name.

- I agree with all that is said in the above statement.  For the purposes of international and inter-institutional projects in PP I think it is important that students are willing to share their profiles with other students and tutors that they will be working with.  In any case the terms and conditions of registering with PP state that registered users must give their real name and license/registration number (or tutor) to have an account approved.  I they are not willing to do this it would be possible to set up single institution projects under one login (that would only be accessible for the length of the project).  In this way students could remain anonymous but this doesn't really reflect the open nature of the PP philosophy and what we are trying to achieve.Rachael Lowe 12:53, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Working with data generated

How the final data will be used, and who will have access to that data (raw data from the wiki, as well as the survey)? Michael Rowe
- I'm assuming that by the 'raw data from the wiki' you are referring to the content that the students add to their pages - as an open resource this data this will remain in Physiopedia for all to view and will be credited to the students that worked on it. The data from the survey will be made available to myself and the tutors to interpret and use in their work/presentations/publications etc. Rachael Lowe

- By raw data I was actually meaning the breakdown of data that the wiki captures automatically i.e. who made which edits, when, what was edited, etc. Michael Rowe

- Any registered user has access to this information. Rachael Lowe 13:04, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Will the survey be created by all tutors, or just the project lead? Michael Rowe
The survey will be a joint effort by all tutors and the project lead. Rachael Lowe

Contracts around authorship of the final publication?  Michael Rowe
In terms as a publication to result from this project I am very open minded about this. I anticipated that the tutors involved and myself would jointly author one main publication following the project to be published somewhere. I think it would also be great if those involved (myself, tutors, students) took the opportunity to present aspects of this project within their own nation (they should acknowledge others involved if they do this). Did you have anything else in mind?Rachael Lowe

What will students gain from participating (besides learning new skills, etc.) e.g. can we consider a joint student publication, where they could create their own questionnaire and survey each other?Michael Rowe
- This is a GREAT idea!Rachael Lowe