Cambridge Advance Online Annual Review - 2021

CAMBRIDGE ADVANCE ONLINE Annual review

Annual review

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OPENING REMARKS OPENING REMARKS

Professor Richard Prager FREng Senior Advisor to the Vice-Chancellor on Online Education

Education is central to the way Cambridge works. It enables us to create a vibrant, diverse collegiate community that supports our research and delivers unparalleled opportunities to generation after generation of students. Cambridge Advance Online (CAO) is a new educational initiative designed to complement our in-person courses. It forms part of the 2020 Vice-Chancellor's Priorities Framework. Its principal aims are to broaden access to a University of Cambridge educational opportunity, to enhance our competency in online course design and delivery, and to operate in a financially viable way.

Ultimately online education is not just about distance learning on a commercial scale. The use of technology to support learning has broad relevance. It will benefit people before they come to Cambridge, while they are here, and after they have left. It will provide us with tools to deliver access initiatives at increased scale as well as lifelong learning for professional development and personal growth. Similar tools and skills will also contribute to blended techniques that will enhance our residential courses.

Annual review

The online education space is already a busy one.

Some parts of the University of Cambridge are already strongly engaged and successful in it. Cambridge Advance Online will need to generate momentum quickly in order to flourish. Fortunately, we have the great benefit of our partnership with Cambridge University Press & Assessment. We are the only place in the world where a top university owns both a major publisher and an internationally respected exam board.

Others have two out of these three elements, but we have everything under one roof. This close linkage of academic and commercial expertise will enable us to drive the initiative forward with greater speed. It also gives us the correct structure to resource and scale the project efficiently.

The university is currently facing financial challenges and it is therefore appropriate that we begin our work in online education with a commercially sound initiative like Cambridge Advance Online. But this is only the tip of a much bigger and more exciting iceberg that will broaden our educational audience and enrich many dimensions of our educational activity. Cambridge is only Cambridge because of the talented people that choose to come here. In the future, people will judge us by everything that they see us offering to the world.

One dimension of this will be our contribution to global educational. If this is impressive and inspiring it will draw more and more brilliant people to Cambridge.

If it is lacklustre people will go elsewhere. Online education is thus an important ingredient in our future.

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INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION

Anna Wood Managing Director of Cambridge Online Education, Cambridge University Press & Assessment

It has been a whirlwind year for Cambridge University Press & Assessment as we launch a new online education capability for the University. The Cambridge Online Education team has transformed from what was once a handful of learning designers and developers to a full-scale unit encompassing digital marketing and recruitment, media production and course operations.

The investment in this capability has enabled the Academic University to innovate and to expand on its range of online courses. It has allowed us to make Cambridge education accessible to eager learners at all corners of the world and to address important skills gaps for today’s professionals.

Cambridge Advance Online is our first programme of activity and we sincerely hope that this is the first step in becoming a more substantial and consistent provider of high quality online and blended education.

SENIOR ADVISOR TO THE VICE-CHANCELLOR ON ONLINE EDUCATION APPOINTED AUGUST 2020

Annual review

ACADEMIC RECRUITMENT BEGINS AUGUST 2020

UNIVERSITY OPERATIONS APPOINTMENT SEPTEMBER 2020

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THE PARTNERSHIP Annual review

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THE PARTNERSHIP THE PARTNERSHIP

Cambridge Advance Online brings together expertise in online course development, delivery, assessment and marketing at Cambridge University Press & Cambridge Assessment combined with the pedagogical excellence of our academic community. A major component of this project is to rapidly and significantly increase the capabilities and capacity in course design, development and delivery for online courses. The ambition is to create a world class programme and capability that will set Cambridge apart in its online offering and capitalise on the strengths of the Academic University, Press and Assessment and in a way that will be commercially successful.

Cambridge Advance Online complements the other online programmes already offered at Cambridge including entities like the Judge Business School, the Institute for Sustainability Leadership and the Institute of Continuing Education and provides students with logical, easy to navigate routes to courses across the institution. Cambridge University Press & Assessment will do this by developing a new gateway to engage a refreshed global market of students and ensuring existing provision is well sign-posted.

Why do this?

Appetite for online learning, especially for graduate professionals, has greatly increased in recent years with little sign of abating. While our competitors in the sector have a head start there is an opportunity to distinguish ourselves within the sector where we can provide an engine for innovation, growth, impact, knowledge exchange and profitability.

We are in the unique position, because of the market expertise of Cambridge University Press & Assessment and the academic university.

We are able to review an existing market and make informed decisions, creating agility and opportunity to enter this arena with the benefit of hindsight from others. The collective strength of the newly announced merger of Cambridge University Press and Cambridge Assessment make this an ideal time to venture into this sphere of activity and capitalise on a proven history of collaboration - between the two organisations and our academic community.

ACADEMIC UNIVERSITY

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

CAMBRIDGE ASSESSMENT

Inspiration for academic content

Digital products and platform

Assessment capabilities

Course leaders

Instructional design

Remote proctoring expertise

Course tutors

Editorial development

Awarding for both high and low stakes assessment

Commercial delivery

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STAFF Annual review

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STAFF STAFF

“Cambridge Advance Online is committed not just to encouraging the creation of commercial courses but to the people who will deliver them. We expect to draw our tutors from the next generation of academic leaders; graduate students, postdocs and early career fellows. It is therefore imperative that we ensure they have top shelf training in all aspects of online delivery, appropriate mentorship and access to accreditation as and when appropriate. This project has committed to ensuring appropriate support is in place for training and development and aligns with the launch of the University’s new Academic (Teaching and Scholarship) Career Pathway.”

Mrs Karina Prasad, FRSA Head of the Postdoc Academy and Head of University Operations for Cambridge Advance Online

Our commitment The programme will contribute to the development of skills by ensuring that those who deliver on courses have relevant training. These include access to teaching accreditation programmes and bespoke mentoring in order to succeed in this novel space. Teacher training will cover the new technology, drawing on expertise from Cambridge University Press & Assessment, and a number of other teaching development areas such as principles of learning and teaching online, online vs face to face, what makes a good online learning space, building a cohort, and feedback and assessment.

With the launch of the new Academic (Teaching and Scholarship) Career Pathway these additional teaching opportunities, alongside training and accreditation, will be a valuable asset to our colleagues who wish to pursue a more formal teaching route and support our next generation of lecturers.

GENERAL BOARD APPROVED DECEMBER 2020

Annual review

PLANNING AND RESOURCE COMMITTEE APPROVED DECEMBER 2020

BUSINESS CASE RECOVERY PROJECT APPROVED DECEMBER 2020

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FUTURE THINKING Annual review

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FUTURE THINKING FUTURE THINKING

The use of online teaching has greatly accelerated over the past year, as has the vast expansion in the use of recorded video in delivering our undergraduate teaching, distance learning, and even our residential education and commercial offerings. This development is likely to continue but there are limiting factors including time, support and resource. As we develop and expand online offerings it will be imperative that we find more efficient ways of doing this work and acknowledge the commitment.

Many colleagues are building up expertise and starting to innovate in online education. They are spread across the full academic spectrum of Cambridge. We need to provide support so that more of our talented colleagues can participate. Fostering the development of this field is not primarily about producing slick videos. The intellectual content is the most important dimension and relies on full engagement from subject experts as well as colleagues with educational skills. Finding ways to deliver each type of material in an engaging manner will form a key part of our next phase of work.

We can see an opportunity to use online education to support people at many stages of their life. As part of widening participation, in professional life and into retirement, plus opportunities to engage our alumni beyond the college social. We will explore and review potential scope and competition in order to fully understand how we can provide and support high quality online education in diverse markets, age groups and contexts. This will enable us to understand how we can successfully engage with the new technology and what the future of online learning really means in the Cambridge context.

MANAGING DIRECTOR APPOINTMENT JANUARY 2021

Annual review

CAMBRIDGE ADVANCE ONLINE WEBSITE LAUNCHED MAY 2021

FIRST ROUND OF COURSES SEPTEMBER 2021

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COURSES Annual review

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COURSES

INAUGURAL LAUNCH SEPTEMBER 2021

Research Commercialisation and Technology Transfer

Bionanotechnology from Theory to Practice

Product-Technology Roadmapping

2022 COURSES IN DEVELOPMENT Course

Academic lead

First enrolments

Control Engineering

Jan Maciejowski

Jan-22

Creative Problem-Solving and Design Thinking

Nathan Crilly

Jan-22

Intercultural Business Communication and VUCA

Katarzyna Lanucha

Jan-22

Functional Neuroanatomy

Sue Jones

Apr-22

Data-driven decision-making

Russell Hunter

Apr-22

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COURSES

COURSE THEMES IN DEVELOPMENT Business and Leadership

Climate Science, Sustainability and Conservation

Corporate and international partnerships

Entrepreneurship and Intrapreneurship

Technology and Engineering

The Future of work

Translational Science

Please note this is not a definitive list of all Cambridge Advance Online course themes. If you would like further information on Cambridge Advance Online or would be interested in creating a course with us, please contact Karina Prasad: Karina.Prasad@admin.cam.ac.uk

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advanceonline.cam.ac.uk Annual review

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