ALT Scotland 24th April Catch Up - Meeting Summary

Here is a quick summary of what the Scottish ALT Special Interest Group Discussed on 24th of April 2025.

It's the curse of living in interesting times across the tertiary education sector. So many opportunities yet so much threatened. Our conversation covered a mix of personal updates, reflections on education, and ongoing challenges. 

But mainly some really useful insights from folks working across the Education sector with focus on learning technology. 

Much excitement that ALT Conference coming to Glasgow in October 2025. 

In all  a rich mix of policy concerns, educational debates, and technology insights

Padlet below here has relevant links we discussed and I highlight some of our discussion below. 

• Key discussion points:
  • Our key themes are reflected in the embedded padlet. We discussed in the round  and I'll single some specific things out here
  • Policy background of cuts across sector and reforms to Education Scotland, HMIE, SQA , SFC but clearer guidance from QAA etc and routes to improved learning and teaching. By a  range of definitions we are all working towards blended learning through learning design but all feeling pinch of less funding and less staff. 
  • Concerns about new UKVI regulations causing confusion. There is a useful summary from WONKE included in the padlet - this is impacting on blend of learning and more fundamentally viability and access of international students to UK HE.
  • The conversation around learning design and the tendency for it to be more intuitive rather than methodically pedagogically planned. Staff are still reluctant to embrace digital skills and or accept new approaches to delivery.  Some useful past work from QAA on multi modality was highlighted - see padlet.
  • The rapidly changing trends in AI, Including its use in digital art and Facebook-based AI-generated content and on going sustainability and  intellectual property right issues. Specifically large-scale AI-trained book databases and impact on copyright. 
  • Challenges of open and AI - is this simply eshittification ? is it inevitable that our content will be exploited ?. We are assuming that AI is always the answer. We need to challenge this. Individuals and institutions need to make more informed decisions. Will using these tools really lead to personalisation or to a dull  homogenous approach to learning and teaching ?. There is a lot to question. 
  • ALT are about to revisit their ethical framework and hopefully some of these concerns will be addressed in latest review. 
  • There is a lot happening in space from AI Alliance and others in Scotland but does not appear to be strong connection with Education.  Highlighted recent AI playbook with number of commercial and or public sector examples of AI in action but none at moment from Education. 
  • On open education specifically - more threatened by institutional systems which favour closed rather than open and in a competitive environment fears and concerns around sharing are amplified. The latest concern that AI could eat our content is simply the latest barrier to supporting open practice. Focus tends to be on commercialisation rather than collaboration and sharing,  Telling that even with learning technology few Scottish institutions are sharing their training offers across the sector. Though all run online webinars etc for their own staff. 
  • There is  also a trend to move staff support guides from the open web onto closed SharePoint etc 
  • Roll out of AI tools at institutional level  Lack of clarity around even simple things like what bits of co-pilot are switched on or off at institutional level and how under 18s are managed in terms of access. ( my interpretation I think this is ok and part of an institutions Acceptable Use Policy) . Issues here around how IT and LT teams and wider organisation navigate things like local agents and Co-Pilot studio ( what are GDPR risks , hidden costs ) This moved to a discussion on productivity as a concept, with noted tensions and frictions.
  •  VLE etc  Jisc are offering VLE reviews to help institutions and staff make most of their virtual learning environments. Increasingly VLE offers come with embedded AI capabilities.  Main challenge though still around learning design and making effective sensible use of the VLE for learners.  
  • Staff Digital Skills It is an old chestnut. We talked around use and or lack of use of excellent surveys from Jisc.  The College sector (CDN)  has started a bit of work to find out what real barriers are to using these excellent benchmarking tools. This both for Digital Capabilities and Digital Insights Surveys. CDN and Jisc Scotland are going to bring back Virtual Bridge Sessions as Inside Sessions to support innovative practice in College sector.  There is a list of useful training sites on Padlet. 
  • Scottish AI Alliance is worth reaching out to with suggestions to raise educational pointers for their playbook.
  • AR and VR noted this still has a way to go to make real learner impact. VR content is still very expensive both to create and to access. AR is probably way forward.  Centres still generally reluctant to procure class head sets and still slow to make their own AR content even for use on flat screens. Still a  big fan of ThingLink in this space. 
  
  
  
  And some final ALT related plugs
  
  ALT Scotland SIG
  Save the date: Monday, June 16th, 10 AM - 3 PM
  Face-to-face event at Jisc's interactive classroom, University of Stirling.
  Booking arrangements and agenda to follow
  
  
  New online community for ALT Scotland
  Jisc is supporting a Microsoft Team to sit alongside the Jiscmail list please sign up here.
  ALT Scotland Community Teams site registration request
  
  We will also retire the Alt Scotland twitter account and a new BlueSky account and LinkedIn presence will appear in due course.
  
  #OER25
  Share your ideas on "Speaking Truth to Power: Open Education and AI in the Age of Populism" at #OER25 in London, 23-24 June. Spread the word to inspire more voices to join this critical conversation and or simply get along. Learn more: #altc #openscot
  
  #ALT-C Glasgow October 2025
  ALT-C is coming to Glasgow please reach out to all those who work in learning technology across institutions and into the public and private sectors. Collaboration is key.