Profile
The e-learning unit, formed in 1999, provides support services in the form of in-house developed, maintained and hosted Managed Learning Environments and a broad and extensive range of electronic tools, services and resources underpinning teaching, learning, assessment and administration. The unit currently has a core developer team of 10 who collectively have a broad range of learning technology skills including educational and research database design and development, media rich learning object creation, Virtual Learning Environment design and development, system integration and interoperability. The majority of the applications that LTS build and support are hosted and maintained on our own dedicated twin-site server suite with shadow backups of all data taken daily.
In addition to the core services provided locally, the e-learning Unit undertakes a number of high profile external projects. At present the team develops, hosts and supports a portfolio of 20+ online environments, applications and resources. These include: study environments for online postgraduate courses (e.g. MSc Surgical Sciences (a joint course with the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh); MSc Clinical Education; LLM (law)); support environments for projects which require a subset of tools; research database development; virtual patient case authoring and delivery systems; Online learning resources for health professionals (e.g. STARS stroke training and awareness modules in core and advancing competencies, thrombolysis and carer support) and media rich online content (educational resources/learning objects). It has earned an international reputation for the quality of its work, the innovative approaches taken to developing projects, and the strong collaborative bond formed with stakeholders and clients. The excellence of their work was recognised with a Queenâs Anniversary Award for Higher and Further Education in 2005 for âThe Virtual Hospital Online â transforming medical and veterinary educationâ.
The work of the Learning Technology Section is underpinned with a current and active research programme including significant grant funding, PhD studentships, peer-reviewed publications and presentations in such diverse areas as; e-learning provision patterns, Virtual Learning Environments as communities of practice, reuse and repurposing of learning objects, game informed learning, online assessment theory and modelling.
Michael Begg
The e-learning Manager, Michael Begg, is an internationally acknowledged subject expert in the fields of e-learning, simulation and game informed learning, and is a Subject Specialist Advisor to the Higher Education Academyâs (HEA) subject centre for Medicine, Dentistry and Veterinary Medicine (MEDEV).
A4 printable version of the e-learning profile (PDF 446 KB)
Services
In addition to the core services provided locally, the e-learning Unit undertakes a number of high profile external projects. At present the team develops, hosts and supports a portfolio of 20+ online environments, applications and resources. These include: study environments for online postgraduate courses (e.g. MSc Surgical Sciences (a joint course with the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh); MSc Clinical Education; LLM (law)); support environments for projects which require a subset of tools; research database development; virtual patient case authoring and delivery systems; Online learning resources for health professionals (e.g. STARS stroke training and awareness modules in core and advancing competencies, thrombolysis and carer support ) and media rich online content (educational resources/learning objects). It has earned an international reputation for the quality of its work, the innovative approaches taken to developing projects, and the strong collaborative bond formed with stakeholders and clients. The excellence of their work was recognised with a Queenâs Anniversary Award for Higher and Further Education in 2005 for âThe Virtual Hospital Online â transforming medical and veterinary educationâ.
