Spectrum Training is the Registered Training Organisation business unit of the Spectrum Organization, which is a non-profit, benevolent association. Spectrum’s aim is to break down barriers for people with disabilities so they can live fully integrated lives in their own communities. They are a self-funded community-based organisation which operates various businesses to support their aims, including a counselling service, a training organisation specialising in work and life skills, a gymnasium and fitness centre open to the general public, and an employment service specifically for people with disabilities.
The RTO is a strategic business unit of the Spectrum Organization Association Incorporated that delivers training in Nationally Recognised Qualifications in the fields of business, community services, disability, mental health, mentoring, fitness and learning and development. Learners are distributed widely around metropolitan, regional and remote Queensland and include indigenous learners in remote parts of Western Cairns, existing workers from corporate organisations and people with disabilities who are already in work or looking for work. Training modes are blended and customised according to learner needs and location.
The RTO began experimenting with BYOD as part of a pilot project as part of the National VET E-learning Strategy’s E-learning for Participation and Skills business activity, which completed in 2013. The project, Collecting Audio on BYO Devices aimed to investigate assessment methods and ways for collection of audio assessment evidence using smartphones. The project benchmarked mobile technologies in the collection of audio evidence and identified ways to store and retrieve with consideration to prescribed standards. Audio evidence collection was identified as a potential means for assessing learners with either physical disabilities or LLN difficulties that prevented them from being able to record their thoughts accurately using text. There is no limitation placed on the amount of recording that learners with special access needs can take to provide for assessment and it is frequently used for formative assessment such as journaling activities.
Since then, Spectrum has moved to a fully-integrated online learning model, where all of systems can be accessed via a web browser and learners may only need specialised software for certain units. They have built all of their systems and all of our learning programs to be accessible entirely via a web browser. Prior to launching their new Learning Management System, all learning and assessment instruments were tested on Windows, Mac, Linux, Free BSD, Android, OS X, Windows Phone and Blackberry running a variety of browsers including Google Chrome, Chromium, Firefox, Opera, Safari, Internet Explorer, Android Browser, Evolution and Dolphin. BYOD is used at different times to gather evidence of assessment using video and audio recordings and they are replacing their online learning resources in Moodle that use Flash players with those that use templates that can run on any device.
“People have got phones that have a range of features on them, but they still use them to make phone calls and to send SMS. Just because it's got a fancy feature on there doesn't mean that somebody knows how to use it.”
Simon Ives, Training Manager, The Specrum Organization
Initially, Spectrum experienced difficulties in obtaining the audio recordings from learners, due to a low level of digital literacy in the learner and staff group. This was addressed in two ways:
- Initially, the Training Manager, who has a high degree of digital literacy, brought his own laptop to each learner in turn and assisted each person to transfer the audio files to his computer. He then transferred the audio files to the RTO server for storage.
- User guides were then created, with instructions for transferring files from the most commonly-owned mobile phones and tablets created for students and staff to access.
Apple devices continue to present problems with transferring large audio and video files from learners’ “i-devices” to the RTO digital storage by connecting to RTO desktop computers by USB cable, due to iTunes accounts being “locked” to particular devices.
Spectrum expected that learners of lower socio-economic status would have less access to mobile devices, and less ability to use them than their corporate clients. This turned out to be incorrect, with indigenous learners from very remote communities experiencing unemployment largely owning smartphones and having excellent knowledge of their functions. Conversely, Spectrum’s corporate clients had similar levels of ownership but largely had limited knowledge of their devices’ functions beyond making phone calls and sending text messages. This has been addressed through ensuring that instruction for performing necessary functions is built to the session planning for any sessions that will use mobile devices for specific tasks, such as capturing audio.
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