The Joy of Learning Projects include all of the Office of Learning Technologies’ projects that are directly concerned with the engagement and satisfaction of the virtual campus users throughout their online experience at UOC.

Main objective:

• to identify the elements of engagement in a virtual campus environment, beyond the classroom, yet those that may intervene in their learning processes. By identifying them we hope to engage and empower students.

Overall objectives:

• To identify the right tools and initiatives that will allow e-learning institutions to engage the students into the learning process, allowing them to achieve both their academic/credit objectives, and their study-for-pleasure objectives.
• To identify the way in which the learning environment may need to interact with their personal and social environment, to facilitate the integration of the learning process into their daily lives.

Background:

As society continues to embrace the new technological advances, there is a clear increase on the use of technologies such as the web and email to access information and communicate to others. The Internet is everywhere in the world where there is power, and if there is Internet, there is information and people. This so-called digital revolution is at its very beginning yet it has already affected politics, industry, education and society at large.

This digital revolution is bringing a new discussion to the educational community: are colleges and universities the best way to learn something? What if someone finds both the information and the mentorship outside these educational institutions? How valid would this be? The networking and community building that a student goes through during his/her university years can now be done via online groups or web 2.0 applications such as facebook, where your friend’s network is also your network. When the objective is to receive a certification or degree the need for attending a certified institution is a requirement. But, when the objective is being led by an interest in learning a particular subject, then this need for attending a traditional certified institution may no longer be needed.

At Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), we want our students to come because we offer a rich and engaging environment in which to learn, share, and evolve, and not because a mere accreditation. At UOC, we want to guide students through the information overload Internet offers and through networks of networks in which the quantity of relationships rapidly increase exponentially. We want to assist their learning process in an exciting and motivating way, and regardless of their primary objectives (accreditation or pleasure), we want them to join us in their learning journey.

UOC was founded in 1994 and became one of the most innovative companies at the time; transforming the way teaching and learning had been for centuries. The UOC virtual campus was then born, Internet even personally installed in the students’ homes, and aside from providing the traditional benefits of education, it also became the learning solution for a large group of the population who could not have accessed education if it weren’t for the remote and asynchronous options that the university offered.

For the past years, Internet had greatly grown in Spain and other parts of the world, to the point that almost every educational institution offers learning via the Internet, at a distance, sometimes synchronous, some times asynchronous. For these past years, UOC has been a leader in designing a virtual campus centred in the students, an easy-to-use and simple campus so their learning objectives can be achieved. However, as our society has already adopted Internet into their lives, their needs, expectations and desires with an educational institution such as ours has shifted. What we have been offering no longer satisfies nor convinces our students.

We need to understand what these are and to ensure that we can participate in their learning process before they decide to tap into the unedited and gigantic galaxy of the World Wide Web. At UOC, we believe that in order to attract them to our institution is to find ways for engaging these students throughout their learning processes, and also throughout their lives.

For more information please contact Carles Fernandez, cfernandezba@uoc.edu or Eva de Lera, edelera@uoc.edu