Interconnecting networks of practice for professional learning

The article explores the complementary connections between communities of practice and the ways in which individuals orchestrate their engagement with others to further their professional learning. It does so by reporting on part of a research project conducted in New Zealand on teachers’ online professional learning in a university graduate diploma program on ICT education. Evolving from social constructivist pedagogy for online professional development, the research describes how teachers create their own networks of practice as they blend online and offline interactions with fellow learners and workplace colleagues. Teachers’ perspectives of their professional learning activities challenge the way universities design formal online learning communities and highlight the potential for networked learning in the zones and intersections between professional practice and study.
The article extends the concepts of Lave and Wenger’s (1991) communities of practice social theory of learning by considering the role participants play in determining their engagement and connections in and across boundaries between online learning communities and professional practice. It provides insights into the applicability of connectivist concepts for developing online pedagogies to promote socially networked

An outdoor and environmental education community of practice : self stylisation or normalisation?

In this article, I draw on a qualitative longitudinal study to explore the influence of a tertiary Outdoor and Environmental Education (OEE) course on the formation of environmental ethics among students. In this task, I bring together Lave & Wenger (1991) and Wenger’s (1998) concept of communities of practice and Michel Foucault’s later work on ethics to underscore some of the difficulties of an OEE community of practice as a space for (environmentally) ethical self-stylisation. Bringing these theoretical ideas together is significant because my analysis suggests that the OEE community of practice (re)produces an environmental ethic based on normalised codes of conduct rather than a self-fashioning of an ethical existence as conceived by Foucault. I demonstrate that membership in overlapping communities of practice is influential in participants’ performance of environmental identities and normalising codes of conduct are particularly significant in the physical education/pre-service education communities of practice of which participants are members.

Socio-technical factors influencing channel use for knowledge-sharing in regional SME networks

The economic sustainability of regional areas is dependent on cross-industry innovation and knowledge-sharing among Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). The web-based initiatives deployed in regions worldwide to facilitate SME knowledge-sharing have typically been unsuccessful. This paper argues that the main reason for these failures is the lack of understanding of the socio-technical factors which influence the use of web-based channels (websites, online forums and expertise databases) as well as the more conventional channels (face-to-face and e-mail). This paper reports the findings of interpretive case studies of two regional SME business networks. It evaluates the major channels on six socio-technical criteria: link strength; trustworthiness; tacitness; usability; durability and currency. None of the channels were strong against all socio-technical factors. This highlights the importance of achieving an appropriate mix of channels to facilitate SME knowledge-sharing.

Towards web support for tacit knowledge exchanges

Organisations are continually looking for means to stimulate innovation and creativity, within and across working groups, functions and geographical boundaries. One of the ways to achieve this is through tacit knowledge exchanges in the form of sharing and transfer of knowledge by means of narratives, storytelling, reminders, best practices etc. Knowledge is an invaluable part of the shared practices of communities that need, create, adapt, transform, shape and use it. These Communities of Practice (CoPs) are informally created, evolve over time, and socially bind people together that share the same interests and passions. At the same time, organisations are turning more towards information technology and seek ways of leveraging their investments in Web technologies, in particular, to foster knowledge exchanges between individuals and working groups. The Web may be applied in new, innovative ways to draw dispersed community members together virtually and in particular, to promote tacit knowledge exchanges. We argue for a content-rich web environment that combines tools, services and mechanisms tailored towards tacit knowledge exchanges to support the unique work practices and situational knowledge needs of CoPs.

The telehealth skills, training, and implementation project: an evaluation protocol

Background: Telehealth appears to be an ideal mechanism for assisting rural patients and doctors and medical students/registrars in accessing specialist services. Telehealth is the use of enhanced broadband technology to provide telemedicine and education over distance. It provides accessible support to rural primary care providers and medical educators. A telehealth consultation is where a patient at a general practice, with the assistance of the general practitioner or practice nurse, undertakes a consultation by videoconference with a specialist located elsewhere. Multiple benefits of telehealth consulting have been reported, particularly those relevant to rural patients and health care providers. However there is a paucity of research on the benefits of telehealth to medical education and learning.

Objective: This protocol explains in depth the process that will be undertaken by a collaborative group of universities and training providers in this unique project.

Methods: Training sessions in telehealth consulting will be provided for participating practices and students. The trial will then use telehealth consulting as a real-patient learning experience for students, general practitioner trainees, general practitioner preceptors, and trainees.

Results: Results will be available when the trial has been completed in 2015.

Conclusions: The protocol has been written to reflect the overarching premise that, by building virtual communities of practice with users of telehealth in medical education, a more sustainable and rigorous model can be developed. The Telehealth Skills Training and Implementation Project will implement and evaluate a theoretically driven model of Internet-facilitated medical education for vertically integrated, community-based learning environments

Faster, richer, better: rapid appraisal techniques for the study of IS implementation in virtual communities

A major issue in Information Systems (IS) research is how to combine relevance and rigor (Benbasat and Zmud, 1999) and reduce the widening gap between research results and adoption (Dunn, 1994). Qualitative researchers make use of interpretivist methods to add richness and depth to their understanding of user problems. Interpretivist methods applied to IS implementations can thus result in research which communicates those findings more effectively. However standard interpretivist data-collection and analysis methods can be time-consuming and expensive. Findings based on these methods may be irrelevant to practitioners by the time they reach publication stage. A potential solution to this problem lies in Rapid Appraisal or RA, a qualitative appraisal methodology derived from rural development-related research. It offers IS researchers an additional technique for learning and acquiring relevant information in a limited period of time that  supplements current data collection and analysis techniques. RA adds value to the traditional approach for studying diffusion of innovation, supporting and extending the IS researcher’s qualitative ‘tool-kit’. In this paper we review an electronic gateway designed to facilitate the diffusion of an Australian government to business [G2B] export documentation system, EXDOC, which was first implemented with meat producers. RA techniques were used to collect and analyse data regarding the implementation of the first regional Electronic Trade Facilitation Center [ETFC] successfully established for Australian exporters in the horticulture sector. The findings from the original EXDOC implementation in the meat sector were confirmed and extended through this study. These include the importance of developing a governance structure that ensures all community members share the benefits of an implementation and the fact that virtual trading communities are attractive to users only if they add value to their business and extend standard ways of operating. Interactive interviews, part of the RA approach; also enabled us to expand our understanding of the way in which procedures developed in the course of implementing an electronic market represent value-adding opportunities for virtual trading communities. The paper has special relevance for researchers investigating adoption and diffusion issues experienced by small-scale producers with low exposure to technology in remote and rural settings.

The wellhouse of knowledge globalization : IT & virtual communities

Information technology (IT), especially as it merges with mobile telephony and the next generation of wireless applications, is often credited with continued development of virtual communities. Like a well house, IT is bringing people together on a global scale, as well as at a community level. New virtual
communities are utilizing email, digital short message service (SMS) and many web-based software applications for fulfilling human needs for socialization and work. This article discusses how virtual communities facilitated by IT have developed and can provide an infrastructure with both opportunities and drawbacks in relation to connection, collaboration, and communication during the growth of knowledge globalization.

Engaging rural communities in health care through a paramedic expanded scope of practice

Introduction: This article explores how community engagement by paramedics in an expanded scope role contributes to both primary health care and to an overall improved emergency response capacity in rural communities. Understanding how expanded scope paramedics (ESP) can strengthen community healthcare collaborations is an important need in rural areas where low workforce numbers necessitate innovation.

Methods: Four examples of Australian rural ESP roles were studied in Tasmania, New South Wales, South Australia and Victoria to gather information on consistent elements that could inform a paramedic expanded scope model. Qualitative data were collected from semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders and organisational documents. Thematic analysis within and across cases found community engagement was a key element in the varied roles. This article relies heavily on data from the Victorian and Tasmanian case studies because community engagement was a particularly strong aspect of these cases.

Results: The ESP in the case studies increased interactions between ambulance services and rural communities with an overall benefit to health care through: increasing community response capacity; linking communities more closely to ambulance services; and increasing health promotion and illness prevention work at the community level. Leadership, management and communication skills are important for paramedics to successfully undertake expanded scope roles.

Conclusion: ESP in rural locations can improve health care beyond direct clinical skill by active community engagement that expands the capacity of other community members and strengthens links between services and communities. As health services look to gain maximum efficiency from the health workforce, understanding the intensification of effort that can be gained from practitioner and community coalitions provides important future directions.

Mustering consent: government-sponsored virtual communities and the incentives for buy-in

The global trend to electronic service delivery (ESD) by governments can include the sponsorship of virtual communities that create value and become places where people, content, and communication come together around a need, enabling government agencies to extend their traditional service-provision role. Implementation is sometimes problematic, however, and understanding the implementation process is crucial to the success of such virtual communities. This paper reports a case study of a virtual community (an on-line export-documentation system) that links government and business. The study employs Bijker's framework to conceptualize the process of defining the technical standard and implementing the documentation system. Diffusion effects shaped the implementation and influenced participant responses, illustrating Bijker's argument that an artifact or product demonstrates interpretive flexibility before it stabilizes.

Power relations in virtual communities: an ethnographic study

Peoples' need to socialize with others and greed for power can be best captured with Aristotle's description of human beings as “political animals”/“social animals.” This paper reports on observations of how cyber communities, such as Web-based forums and mailing lists, manifest themselves through social interactions and shared values, membership and friendship, and commitments and loyalty. The paper highlights the importance of power relations in these communities, how they are formed, exercised and evolve. This paper explores power relations as they emerge in two online Vietnamese communities and suggests a new understanding of the formation and evolution of power in virtual societies.

Communities of enterprise: SMEs, ICT and regional development

Many regional economies have pursued a strategy of stimulating the development of regional clusters. Such clusters typically include small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as a core component of those economies. Effective cluster development in that context depends on SMEs sharing knowledge and generating innovation. ICT networks can be an important resource for this sharing and innovation. This paper proposes the concept of ‘Communities of Enterprise’ to conceptualise the relationships and communication patterns used in cluster development. This concept builds on theoretical understandings of information systems, clustering and regional development. The value creation potential of Communities of Enterprise, supported by ICTs is substantial, but only when the socioeconomic elements of regional clusters are understood. The Community of Enterprise approach addresses the fact that without an industry focus it can be difficult to engage and link SMEs from different industries, although this is where the greatest potential for value creation in regional clusters is to be found. This paper concludes by considering the relevance of Communities of Enterprise for understanding and researching eCluster development in the Australian regional context.

Virtual non-profit organisations : literary virtual communities in Russia

This paper is a study of one of the "unknown" segments of the Internet - non-profit ventures in the Russian language. Based on the understanding of the concept of virtual community we consider the family of free publishing literary websites. We discuss their experience to demonstrate their contribution not only to the national culture, but also to the creation of open and democratic society in the former communist world, and to new forms of literary life. Some of the innovative concepts, principles and practices, adopted on those sites may be of interest to the Internet developers and communities worldwide.

Virtual non-profit organisations: literary virtual communities in Russia

This paper is a study of one of the “unknown” segments of the Internet - non-profit ventures in the Russian language.Based on the understanding of the concept of virtual community we consider the family of free publishing literary websites. We discuss their experience to demonstrate their contribution not only to the national culture, but also to the creation of open and democratic society in the former communist world, and to new forms of literary life. Some of the innovative concepts, principles and practices, adopted on those sites may be of interest to the Internet developers and
communities worldwide.

Information navigation and knowledge discovery in virtual communities

Over the past decade, advances in the Internet and media technology have literally brought people closer than ever before. It is interesting to note that traditional sociological definitions of a community have been outmoded, for community has extended far beyond the geographical boundaries that were held by traditional definitions (Wellman & Gulia, 1999). Virtual or online community was defined in such a context to describe various forms of computer-mediated communication (CMC). Although virtual communities do not necessarily arise from the Internet, the overwhelming popularity of the Internet is one of the main reasons that virtual communities receive so much attention (Rheingold, 1999). The beginning of virtual communities is attributed to scientists who exchanged information and cooperatively conduct research during the 1970s. There are four needs of participants in a virtual community: member interest, social interaction, imagination, and transaction (Hagel & Armstrong, 1997). The first two focus more on the information exchange and knowledge discovery; the imagination is for entertainment; and the transaction is for commerce strategy. In this article, we investigate the function of information exchange and knowledge discovery in virtual communities. There are two important inherent properties embedded in virtual communities (Wellman, 2001):