Archive for the ‘Wales Wide Web’ Category

Introducing CiCi

January 29th, 2021 by Graham Attwell

Some of you will know I have been working with a small team on developing a chatbot to support career education and development. The project is one of the twenty finalists in the UK Nesta supported CareerTech Challenge competition. I another post I will provide more detailed report on the work we have done. But first, as part of the final report on the project, we had to submit a three minute video. We had a lot  of  fun with this – here is our entry.

What is Machine Learning

January 20th, 2021 by Graham Attwell

What is machine learning header

I am copying this from Stephen Downes’ ever informative OLDaily newsletter digest. It features an article entitled What is machine learning? – A beginner’s guide posted on the FutureLearn website.

This is quite a good introduction to machine learning. If you don’t know what it is and would like a quick no-nonsense introduction, this is it. Machine learning is depicted “as the science of getting computers to learn automatically.” It’s a type of artificial intelligence, which means essentially that they are software systems that “operate in an intentional, intelligent, and adaptive manner.” The third point is the most important, because it means they can change their programming based on experience and changing circumstances. The article talks about some types of machine learning systems and outlines some application in the field. It’s FutureLearn, so at the end it recommends some course tracks for people interested in making this a career, and just to dangle a carrot, the web page lets you know the median base salary and number of job opening for the program in question.

Subscriptions to streaming learning provision

January 19th, 2021 by Graham Attwell

Soon after MOOCs had burst onto the scene, I was talking to a senior manager at a UK university. He was charged with leading their development of MOOCs. But despite his enthusiasm,he thought he would only be given two or three years to get things right. And the big thing he had to get right was making money.

And so it has been for the last ten years. There have been a whole number of attempts to make money out of MOOCs. One popular measure has been to charge for certification. The problem with that is that many who enroll on a MOOC really are not that concerned about the certificate. And others may wonder just how much traction a MOOC certificate has on the labour market, even if from a renowned university or university alliance. Another way of raising funds is to allow access to a MOOC for a period after it has finished for a fee. Of course the early MOOC providers generally just turned themselves into commercial online course providers, with a pivot towards continuing professional development,especially towards technical knowledge and skills.

Europe’s largest MOOC provider FutureLearn, an alliance of organisations led by the UK open University,has tried quite a few of these ideas. And now they are enhancing their paid for provision, albeit with an interesting spin.

“You’ve probably heard of music, TV, fitness, and even snack subscriptions,” they say, “but what about a subscription to learning?”

Whilst the world was already well on its way to being filled with subscription-loving societies, the COVID-19 pandemic has supercharged our desire for easy, affordable access to the things we love without setting foot outside the front door.

Our way of achieving this at FutureLearn is by offering flexible, career-focused, and fun learning experiences online.

Our brand-new learning subscription model,, offers you the chance to build expert knowledge and workplace skills entirely on your own terms.

In an explanation of Learning Subscriptions which they, describe as “the learning of 2020, they say:

Learning on demand refers to the kind of learning where you have access to educational content at any time or in any place. The learner, therefore, has control over their learning and gets to plan and create their own educational journey. A model like this differs from a typical in-person learning model due to its flexibility and because it requires less of a financial and personal commitment.

So is this really something new and does it require less commitment?

ExpertTracks -the FutureLearn implementation of Learning Subscriptions

are carefully curated series of online courses that focus on specific areas of learning. They’re designed to help you fast-track your studies across various topics, subject areas, and industries.

You’ll find ExpertTracks on a diverse range of topics, including ones such as blended learning, getting started with SEO, and fintech innovations. From the basics of psychology to the teaching of practical science, you can develop your skills to match your career aspirations. …..

with each ExpertTrack, you’ll complete at least 20 hours of learning time, often from a top educational or business institution.

The ExpertTracks look to me like a series of repackaged MOOCs, designed for continuing professional development. But of course one of the things about MOOCs is they were free and have played a big role in opening up education. The cost per month per ExpertTrack is 36 British pounds.

I am sure many of these online courses (because that is what they are) will be very good. But all in all I can’t help thinking this is yet another go at marketising MOOCs. And I am not sure that people are going to ought up 36 pounds a month to Open Learn for professional development which if we are serious about promoting and supporting skills development should be for free.

 

AI and Edge computing

January 7th, 2021 by Graham Attwell
ball, abstract, pattern

geralt (CC0), Pixabay

A recent MIT Technology Review Insights reports on a survey of 301 business and technology leaders around their use and future planned us of Artificial Intelligence. The survey confirms that the deployment of AI is increasing, not only in large companies but also in SMEs. It also points to the emergence of what is known as edge  comput9ing, using a variety of devices closer to the applied use than cloud computing allows and capable of near real time processing.

38% report of those surveyed report their AI investment plans are unchanged as a result of the pandemic, and 32% indicate the crisis has accelerated their plans. The percentages of unchanged and revved-up AI plans are greater at organizations that had an AI strategy already in place.

AI is not a new addition to the corporate technology arsenal: 62% of survey respondents are using AI technologies. Respondents from larger organizations (those with more than $500 million in annual revenue) have, at nearly 80%, higher deployment rates. Small organizations (with less than $5 million in revenue) are at 58%, slightly below the average.

Cloud-based AI also allows organizations to operate in an ecosystem of collaborators that includes application developers, analytics companies, and customers themselves.

But while the cloud provides significant AI-fueled advantages for organizations, an increasing number of applications have to make use of the infrastructural capabilities of the “edge,” the intermediary computing layer between the cloud and the devices that need computational power.

Asked to rank the opportunities that AI provides them, respondents identify AI-enabled insight as the most important (see Figure 2). Real-time decision-making is the biggest opportunity, regardless of an organization’s size: AI’s use in fast, effective decision-making is the top-ranked priority for large and small organizations.

For small ones, though, it is tied to the need to use AI as a competitive differentiator.

Again, the need for real-time data or predictive tools is a requirement that could drive demand for edge-based AI resources.

Survey respondents indicate that AI is being used to enhance current and future performance and operational efficiencies: research and development is, by a large margin, the most common current use for AI, used by 53% of respondents, integrating AI-based analytics into their product and service development processes. Anomaly detection and cybersecurity are the next-most-deployed AI applications.

Large organizations have additional priorities: 54% report heavy use of robotic process automation to streamline business processes traditionally done by humans, and 41% use AI in sales and business forecasting. For organizations with AI strategies, 40% rely on robotic process automation, and 42% use AI to estimate future sales.

Word of the Day

January 7th, 2021 by Graham Attwell

Rather than comment on the goings on in America yesterday, I will leave it to Susie Dent and her extremely timely Word of the Day tweet.

Basic digital skills

January 5th, 2021 by Graham Attwell
student, typing, keyboard

StartupStockPhotos (CC0), Pixabay

Happy new year  to you all and the first post of the year comes from the Marchmont Employment and Skills Observatory monthly mailing.

A new survey has found that many people are still lacking basic digital skills during lockdown. Most people have had no recent help to improve their digital skills, despite the pandemic moving personal and professional life online. Some 83% of UK adults said they had not received any support to improve their tech skills over the last six months, the poll by BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT found.

Most offers of help with digital skills came from employers (57%), over a quarter (28%) from family and friends and 13% from organisations like government and training providers. Asked about specific software, nearly a third (31%) of people are not confident with basic data management using an Excel spreadsheet, the professional body for IT reported

. The research follows an issue with the NHS track and trace system where people testing positive for COVID-19 were not recorded once an Excel spreadsheet reached its maximum capacity.

 

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    Racial bias in algorithms

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    This week, Twitter apologised for racial bias within its image-cropping algorithm. The feature is designed to automatically crop images to highlight focal points – including faces. But, Twitter users discovered that, in practice, white faces were focused on, and black faces were cropped out. And, Twitter isn’t the only platform struggling with its algorithm – YouTube has also announced plans to bring back higher levels of human moderation for removing content, after its AI-centred approach resulted in over-censorship, with videos being removed at far higher rates than with human moderators.


    Gap between rich and poor university students widest for 12 years

    Via The Canary.

    The gap between poor students and their more affluent peers attending university has widened to its largest point for 12 years, according to data published by the Department for Education (DfE).

    Better-off pupils are significantly more likely to go to university than their more disadvantaged peers. And the gap between the two groups – 18.8 percentage points – is the widest it’s been since 2006/07.

    The latest statistics show that 26.3% of pupils eligible for FSMs went on to university in 2018/19, compared with 45.1% of those who did not receive free meals. Only 12.7% of white British males who were eligible for FSMs went to university by the age of 19. The progression rate has fallen slightly for the first time since 2011/12, according to the DfE analysis.


    Quality Training

    From Raconteur. A recent report by global learning consultancy Kineo examined the learning intentions of 8,000 employees across 13 different industries. It found a huge gap between the quality of training offered and the needs of employees. Of those surveyed, 85 per cent said they , with only 16 per cent of employees finding the learning programmes offered by their employers effective.


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