Destinations The UL Experience Installing and amending Destinations

Destinations ® : The UL Experience Installing and amending Destinations ® Mary Sweeney Dr. Colm Cunniffe Cooperative Education & Careers Division University of Limerick August 2008

Overview • • • CCMS Partner Fellowship UL Project Details Project Schedule Project Team What have we done Work in Progress Reflections IT implications Q&A August 2008

CCMS Partner Fellowship • Aug 07 - CCMS Partner Fellowship • Contract between UL and Reading – Installation of Destinations ® – Training & IT support – Community of Practice – 5 partners – Adaptation and deployment – Evaluation – Dissemination August 2008

UL Project Details • Customise website for Irish students – Identify Irish links and resources • Pilot Destinations® with career module – Business, Public Admin, Language, Music, HPSS • • Develop as resource for work placements Promote through careers website Provide student feedback Disseminate outcomes to GCI colleagues August 2008

Project Schedule • • • Sep 07: Oct 07: Nov-Dec: Jan-April: Upload website & training UL references; video clips Review contents Customise text, amend resources, pilot with students March-May: Edit and upload video clips June-Sept: Create new videos, upload on VLE Aug 08: Upload new release Sept ->: Customise new release Sept ->: Use resource with class groups August 2008

Project Team • Cross Functional Project Team – 2 Careers Advisors, Coop Ed Manager, Placement Officer, IT Coordinator, UL Web Editor, 2 Academics, Teaching & Learning representative, Student • Monthly meetings • Allocated tasks to small working groups • Familiarisation, consultation, identification of changes August 2008

UL Version • Minimalist approach to text changes – Amend, correct, or add value – Reviewed contents, identified need for amendments • Units requiring significant amendments – – – Careers & Employers Postgraduate Study Work Experience Links and resources throughout Disability information Promoted Gradireland throughout • Video Clips: Editing and transcripts August 2008

What have we done? • Installed on server and linked to website • Filmed video clips of Irish employers – 7 employers, 38 video clips • Added, deleted, amended text – 1229 files of a total 4055 files – 90 new links created • Amended teaching resources • Customised graphics • Designed posters & flyers August 2008

What else have we done? • Promoted to students – emails, workshops, fairs, publications, posters • Piloted with Humanities class groups • Monitored student usage – 600 pages, 4400 hits per month • Commissioned usability studies • Surveyed students – Early reactions – Reading online survey August 2008

The Greening of Destinations® • Video Clips – Cross section of employers • Ericsson, Google, Kerry Group, Kingspan, PWC, Stryker, Ulster Bank – Primary focus on selection process: • Applications, CVs, Interviews, Assessment Centres, Skills, Personality, Work Experience, Careers & Employers • Text – Irish statistics, publications, CVs, Postgrad funding, Graduate Placement schemes, Employment legislation, Work Experience, Resources August 2008

Work in Progress • New and more professional video clips – Work Experience & Postgraduate study – Include Irish interview • Customise new releases • Use with new class groups – Business Studies & Postgrads • Use on VLE – SAKAI • Evaluation activities – Interview students – Focus groups of academics and careers advisors • Share output with GCI community August 2008

What do we think? • Reflections on our experience – – – Think, plan, act, review Importance of positive & versatile group IT expertise invaluable Customising requires time commitment Overlap between Destinations ® and own website • Assessment of Destinations ® – – Great careers resource, developed by experts Flexible, versatile, accessible, relevant Excellent teaching resources Low cost – high benefit: win-win solution August 2008

August 2008

August 2008

IT Implications • Installing Destinations ® • Upload Destinations ® folder to server using FTP or SFTP • Where? – In the case of UL – http: //www. ul. ie/careers/destinations • Time Required – About 30 min – 1 hour August 2008

IT Implications • UL Webserver – Linux webserver – Apache 2. 0 – LDAP support (for authentication) – If using apache there is more sophisticated LDAP authentication in Apache 2. 2 • Securing Destinations ® – UL uses Active Directory – Two domains: - student and staff – Authenticated using. htaccess file and LDAP protocol August 2008

IT Implications • Important points for your IT admin – Set up server to process SSI (server side includes), this will be default on most servers – In our case we replaced <!-- #include file' with '<!--#include virtual – Server must be set up to recognize FLV file types – Secure using LDAP and Active Directory • Amending Destinations ® – A good start is the technical documentation. – Editing using Crimson/text editor – All edits were done manually in order to adhere to the structure of the Destinations files. – Topic-breakdown, video log and download logs were amended with edits – Menus were updated as new sections were added August 2008

Home Page August 2008