I’ll be heading to Australia to help RMIT University with their Canvas LMS transition. Since I just finished supporting the University of Oklahoma’s year-long transition from D2L to Canvas, I’m looking forward to taking what I’ve learned over the last year and using it to help RMIT use Canvas to its full potential. My goal at OU has always been to increase the educational value of experiences for our students and I’m excited I’ll be able to continue this practice at RMIT.
This short-term opportunity was made possible by no less than three factors: coworkers making connections, productive video chats, and sharing my work through my domain. I want to spend most of my time writing about my domain in particular, so let me cover the first two factors briefly. A colleague knew the folks at RMIT and they reached out to my colleague for pointers about our successful Canvas transition (thanks for making this connection Angie!). This led to a video chat between RMIT and some folks from our Canvas transition team, including myself. Our video chat went very well and gave me the opportunity to connect and share my passion for increasing educational value with RMIT. Finally, this led to me utilizing my website to show RMIT my Canvas transition expertise.
Being able to share my major highlights and lessons learned from working with Canvas by simply sending a URL was critical. This allowed RMIT to quickly see what I had to offer in terms of design, support, and problem solving with Canvas. More than sharing information though, entire curriculums we used at OU to train instructors are published openly for anyone at any institution to pickup and use (as long as they abide by the open license of course). Offering resources to jumpstart other Canvas transitions at other institutions demonstrates my commitment to open scholarship and avoiding the rampant duplication of labor around the world. Not to mention it’s extremely fun to design, build, and share resources as well as flattering when others find them useful.
In this case, my domain may have served as portfolio/record of my work, but I like to think of my website as an invitation to others to engage in scholarship with me. As RMIT has invited me to join forces, you are more than welcome to collaborate with me in scholarship. Because at the end of the day, no matter where we’re located in the world, we can use our websites to collectively increase the educational value of student experiences. Whether that’s interacting directly with students or indirectly through other educators, this is important because this is how I want to help to improve the world, one open project at a time. You’re invited to domain* with me—I hope you’ll consider joining me.
*Yes I just used “domain” as a verb. And by “domain with me” I mean you’re invited to use your own space on the web to publish your work, archive how you’re making the world a better place, and collaborate with me. 🙂
The featured image is provided CC0 by rawpixel.com via Unsplash.
Can’t think of anyone more deserving of the opportunity. I was suggesting someone check out your work while at the NMC conference.
No question openly documenting my work has led to all sorts of wonderful people and collaborations.
Keep on rolling.
Thanks Tom!
I’ve had a family member or two heckle me (lovingly of course) for freely distributing materials. Where they see a missed opportunity to make money, I enjoy as a chance to engage in scholarship and collaborations. So, the gig in Australia was such a win for me because now I have a tangible example that satisfies both of us.
Looking forward to the adventure and excited for the opportunities this affords. 🙂