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Academic Writing has distinctive hallmarks that reflect the importance placed on critical thinking, argument and reflection. It's also tough to learn. Now AI can provide instant feedback — even on your 17th draft, at 3am... Those of you who follow CIC's work will know that over the last 5 years, we've been refining an automated feedback tool tuned for academic writing, called AcaWriter. We're delighted to say that we've recently announced its release to all UTS students! [retweet] While the pri...
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National bushfires. A global pandemic. Global social unrest. The disruption of higher education. And 2020 hasn't even reached half-time. When the only constant is change, we need a distinctive set of personal qualities to adapt and thrive. But how do we talk about those qualities? Can we meaningfully assess them? And what does it look like when leadership values these qualities? A long-standing stream of research has studied the dispositions, or 'habits of mind', that equip us with an openness t...
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Research is fuelled by academics connecting through high quality, peer reviewed conferences — all of which had to shift online this year due to the pandemic. CIC was out in force, albeit into the small hours on some occasions!... For CIC, the International Conference on Learning Analytics is a primary venue — and notably, No.6 and the only conference in Google Scholar's impact rankings for Educational Technology. As usual, CIC had a strong presence with our academics and students contributing pa...
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CIC Doctoral Researcher Sophie Abel specialises in academic writing, and has just published a free course on UTS Open, entitled "Writing an Abstract". Writing an Abstract is about an hour’s tutorial introducing the hallmarks of a good abstract, including a wide range of engaging interactive exercises. The course is based on Sophie’s PhD who brings her expertise in Academic Language & Learning to the challenge of designing automated feedback on writing. The course concepts are carried through...
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We're delighted to announce that Vanessa Echeverria has graduated from our Learning Analytics Doctoral Program! She submitted a thesis that required just a few typographical fixes, earning the praise of her international examiners. Co-supervised by Roberto Martinez-Maldonado and Simon Buckingham Shum, and working closely with UTS Faculty of Health academics, her research broke new ground with the development of multimodal analytics to provide visual feedback to teams of nurses in the simulation ...
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Learning Analytics and AI: Politics, Pedagogy and Practices This was the editorial by CIC's Director Simon Buckingham Shum and UCL Knowledge Lab Professor Rose Luckin, to the final issue of the 50th Anniversary of the British Journal of Educational Technology. We've just heard that of all papers 2018-19, this is one of the top 10% downloaded articles in the year following online publication. Buckingham Shum, S. & Luckin, R. (2019), Learning Analytics and AI: Politics, Pedagogy and Practice...
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Sharing honest written reflections can make the writer vulnerable, as they reflect on their uncertainties, failings, and how they are changing as a learner. CIC is bringing together the leaders in Reflective Writing Analytics, providing instant feedback on such writing. Reflective writing is quite different from the more widely used forms of academic writing (e.g.  a literature review, persuasive essay, or research paper). However, this form of writing is growing in importance as we seek to plac...
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Have you made a serious investment in developing an analytics tool, but nobody's actually using it? And if they are, it's painful? Human-Centred Design makes the key difference. As anyone in the field of human factors knows, this goes way beyond nice screen layouts and colours. The usability and utility of a tool goes all the way back to what tasks (somebody) thought you need to do, and how you should do them — and who gets to define that? All too often, the key stakeholders — the staff who are ...
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A new UTS2027 strategic project, TRACK, is using data, analytics and artificial intelligence to help students make more informed course choices to land their dream job. It’s also helping UTS design courses that anticipate the skills required in the workplace of the future.  Tailored Recruitment Analytics and Curriculum Knowledge (TRACK) is a UTS2027 strategic project, building student and staff facing tools that use Skills Analytics. Working in close collaboration with the Careers team, IT Divi...
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