DISCIPLINE
Information Technology/Information Systems

DURATION
Over a 15 week semester

ICT USED
The software used to support the simulation is Lotus Notes, which is a groupware application that enables students to access subject materials and create and access the simulated workplace by using a web browser connected to the internet. Lotus Notes client software is required for students to initially create their workspaces.

Lotus Notes has computer-mediated communication and information management tools that allow students to interact with each other asynchronously and manage their work. Other groupware platforms can be used if they allow students to create and manage their own workspaces.

DELIVERY CONTEXT
Mixed-mode: face-to-face and online delivery.

Scheduled "class-time" is face-to-face:

• There is a two-hour face-to-face session each week. In this time students meet (in role, that is, as employees of the Cultural Hertiage Authority (CHA)) in an on-campus facility known as the "Simulation Suite" which has four "office" rooms, a networked PC in each room and an observation area from which tutors can check progress and offer assistance.
• There is a two-hour face-to-face lecture/briefing/debriefing session each week.

All other student activity (as members of the virtual organisation) is done online or in face-to-face meetings outside of formal contact time. This allows for some flexibility in attendance of students and this matches their general work and life commitments.

TARGET AUDIENCE
Students are enrolled in the Graduate Diploma in Information Systems, the Graduate Diploma in Computing or occasionally an MBA (IS specialisation). Their background is varied as it depends on their first degree. About 40% of the students are from overseas. This percentage varies and is increasing.

There is a mixture of full time and part time students.

The varied backgrounds are important because students bring different skills and perspectives to Information Systems design and are interested in a variety of roles that will develop new skills or use and extend current ones in a non-threatening environment (before they work in a possibly more threatening environment in which "experimentation" is more risky - their paid workplace).

COHORT
20+

We typically have about 100 students in the subject and this makes 3 groups of 30-35.

One group = one instance of the CHA (Cultural Heritage Authority which is the virtual organisation).

BROADER CONTEXT
This behavioural simulation is the second in a two-subject sequence. In the first, students learn how to participate in and design Computer Supported Collaborative Work (CSCW) workspaces to support team work. This really replaces the rather obsolete idea of teaching word processing and similar skills in an introductory subject. This introductory subject teaches "systems analysis and design" and introduces CSCW as an enabling technology. The following resource is useful for this.

http://simnotes.canberra.edu.au/cscwcse.nsf?OpenDatabase
(URL available to anyone as of 12 Nov 2002).

Having learnt some core skills in CSCW, students can enrol in the subject offering the behavioural simulation. However, they are required to have passed three semester-1 level subjects because the simulation is a capstone subject.

This is an intentional design of a study program for our graduate students who then have access to this technology and way of work in their other subjects. It also ensures that students have experience with at least one commercial IT software environment during their course.

The subject materials are offered to support the creation of a virtual organisation with the aim to engage students in a low risk/high value form of experiential learning that will enable students to develop a rich understanding of processes and concepts about the following:

• The design of IT-based systems in an organisational context.
• Strategic planning of IT systems.
• Quality management of the development of information systems.
• Information management.

In a more general sense, students have the opportunity to develop:

• The ability to think creatively through group work.
• An understanding of the importance and process of group work.
• An understanding of collaborative work and learning processes.
• An understanding of how IT can be designed and used to support collaborative processes.
• The ability to reflect on processes with the assistance of debriefing activities.
• The ability to deal with uncertainty.

Students will also develop some generic skills that are important for IT specialists:

• Team building.
• Group work.
• Computer-mediated communication.
• Computer Supported Cooperative Work.
• The ability to reflect on practice.
• Organisational and team learning processes.

IMPLEMENTATION OF ASSESSMENT STRATEGIES
In this subject assessment is a complex matter because it should not influence the way the virtual organisation is created and developed. We do not want assessment to drive the way the game works. However, students want all the work they do for the virtual organisation to be part of their personal assessment portfolio.

Our assessment approach has evolved and now it focuses on organisational, team and individual learning in the context of the virtual organisation.

We assess a lot of the online work spaces that are created by the virtual organisation as a way of assessing team and organisational learning.

Each virtual organisation gives a final presentation to their "Board" and this is one way of assessing organisational learning (or the effect thereof).

Students create a portfolio in which they say what they did in the virtual organisation and point to electronic workspaces that show their work. In this portfolio they also reflect on their own work and place it in a broader context of IT design.

There is no examination (mainly because it seems disjoint with the nature of the simulation and most students have created such interesting work that further assessment seems unnecessary and distracting).

We assess each student's portfolio at two stages: once at the end of the first stage (when they change roles) and again at the end of the game.

We assess each item of work against an agreed way of working. For example, if a student has developed a prototype interface then they must show how, and they must provide evidence that their method yielded acceptable results (for example, through a usability test). Similarly, if they produce a quality management system or an IT strategic plan this must be grounded in the literature for such systems. If the work was done in a group (this is usually the case) then there must be evidence of group work and group quality-management techniques (often through links to online workspaces and processes).

Below is an excerpt from the Subject Outline to illustrate how the assessment details are explained to the students:

Assessment Timetable:
"The assessment schedule is designed to ensure that the learning outcomes of the unit have been achieved by all participants. These outcomes relate to group and organisational activities and to your understanding of them. Hence you will be assessed on work that you and your group(s), your division and your organisation perform and on your reflections about this work. You will also be assessed on your understanding of key systems analysis and design issues addressed in this unit and as collaboratively discussed by a learning group to which you will belong during the unit. A further activity on which you will be assessed involves your participation in the evaluation of your web site and the web site of an external group as part of a quality assurance process. You are required to participate in the game (and this includes all debriefing sessions). You do not get marks for participation but will not be able to pass this unit if your participation is judged to be unsatisfactory by the game coordinator and lecturer. As stated in the University Handbook, it is a requirement of the unit that you participate in the game and there is no substitute for this process. You must perform satisfactorily in all items of assessment in order to gain a pass grade in the unit".

Assessment Items:

1. Portfolio of work done in the CHA (50%) (Due Weeks 8 and 14).
2. Work on the CHA special event to be detailed, for example, usability testing (10%) (Due Weeks 8 or 14 or both as appropriate, as part of your portfolio).
3. Reflections (40%) (Due Weeks 12 and 15).

IMPORTANCE OF ASSESSMENT STRATEGIES USED
The assessment strategy allows students to focus on the task of creating and working in and designing IT support for a virtual organisation without directing the way the organisation will work.

Students get "rewards" for the work done. Importantly, the work done is of their own devising, both individually and in negotiation with their peers. The method of assessment evolved to this point by negotiation with the students each semester.

THE LEARNING PROBLEM
How to learn interface design and more generally, suitable design processes for information systems - and to see how this relates to an organisation's needs and environment.

HOW ICT USE HELPS

• Sharing of information in an efficient manner; visibility of work done; this makes project and quality management more effective and efficient.
• The ICT used also means that participants can contribute to the group/organisation from places and at times that suit them. This accommodates the work and travel requirements/responsibilities that students have (both locally and overseas).
• The ICT used also accommodates some students with a disability in a very effective manner as their disability can disappear when they work online.
• Students also learn about the processes of CSCW through this environment. They cannot do this in any other way without the use of IT.

MOST IMPORTANT ICT CONTRIBUTION TO LEARNING DESIGN
Students learn about IT through their direct use of it. This is critical for students of computing: they will be the designers of such systems in the future.