JISC

The learner’s voice logo fades in and out with musical soundtrack followed by the video title: ‘the learner’s voice’. This is followed by a sequence of shots of learners, ending with the video sub-title: ‘Laura’.

A series of shots of Laura Hotchkiss working at her computer in her bedroom, including shots of different parts of her room.

Includes background musical soundtrack.

Voiceover: Laura is a first year international business student at GlasgowCaledonianUniversity. She lives at home in Falkirk, from where she can access her course information by logging into the university’s virtual learning environment. Technology plays an important role in Laura’s life.

Close-up of Laura Hotchkiss sitting in front of her computer with her name (‘Laura Hotchkiss’) briefly displayed. Followed by a series of shots of items in her room and a walk-through from her bedroom, down the stairs towards her living room.

Includes background musical soundtrack.

Laura Hotchkiss: Hi, I’m Laura, I’m 18 and this is my central hub of learning and not learning. Basically, because it has my entire CD collection and there’s a DVD player, and all my DVDs are in my room. So sometimes studying here isn’t the best place to be.

Downstairs, we’ve got the big family computer and more memory – more power basically. And less distractions.

Walk-through of Laura coming down the stairs and entering her living room. Followed by a series of shots of the technology in the living room and a close-up of Laura working at the computer.

Includes background musical soundtrack.

Voiceover: Laura’s home is full of state of the art technology, from a wireless network, to a digital TV with hard disk and DVD recorders. Laura is very comfortable with using the wide range of technology available to her, for both educational and recreational purposes.

Close-up shots of the computer screen and the website Laura is reviewing followed by a close up of Laura working at the computer in her living room.

Followed by a shot of Laura working at her computer, followed by a panoramic view around her bedroom.

Close-up of Laura sitting in front of her computer in the living room, including a series of close-up shots of the computer screen and the Blackboard VLE she is accessing.

This is followed by a close-up of Laura using the computer, including close-ups of the computer screen and the VLE.

Includes background musical soundtrack, fading out as Laura begins to speak and fading back in as she finishes talking.

Laura Hotchkiss: It’s just all these little technology things that just make your life handier. Even just the wider access to channels I’ve got now, I can watch all these documentaries about businesses that have collapsed and things like that. And old items. I’ve got all my songs on the computer upstairs, but I can listen to them all on the computer downstairs because iTunes allows you to send your songs through WiFi. So I’m quite happy that I’m living in this age where I get all these little extras.

This is Blackboard, which is our virtual learning environment that we use. So you can go into the website and you can get all your course information off it. Whilst you’re in Uni and whilst you’re at home. They put all the lecture notes up, so that you can have the lecture if you miss it and they’ve got all the course handbooks that they gave us at the start - for when you lose them! And bulletin boards where everyone just asks questions, and one of our lecturers would reply. Which was really handy coming up towards exam time.

Close-up of Laura working at the computer in the living room, including close-ups of the computer screen and the web sites and communication tools that she is using, including Laura saying “Oh, I have got messages. Ah, I’m popular today.”

Includes background musical soundtrack.

Voiceover: Laura communicates with other students on her course through a range of social software applications available through the internet. MySpace.com – a web community – is a virtual space where Laura and her fellow students network. 

Close up of Laura working at the computer in the living room with the door behind her.

Followed by a shot of Laura getting ready to go to university with a mirror behind her. This is followed by a walk-through from her living room to her leaving the house.

Includes background musical soundtrack towards the end of the clip.

Laura Hotchkiss: I’ve still got access to the university, access to all my friends when I need help. And then access to all the things I like, you know, for my spare time – when you don’t want to study anymore!

But now, I’m running late, I need to go to university, so I’d better go. No journey to university is complete without the iPod – this thing is glorious.

A series of shots of Laura walking through the university grounds, including a series of shots of the Saltire centre – exterior and interior.

Includes background musical soundtrack.

Voiceover: When Laura is on campus, she makes use of the Saltire centre – a high-tech learning centre designed as a single point-of-access for all student services. The Saltire centre is at the social heart of the campus, a place where students meet and converse as well as study.

A series of shots of the Saltire centre interior, including shots of students working at the computers, followed by a close-up of Laura inside the Saltire centre with other students working on computers behind her.

Followed by another series of shots of the interior of the Saltire centre and a close-up of Laura in the Saltire centre with computers and other users in the background, including a series of shots of Laura working on one of the computers.

This is followed by another close-up of Laura working on one of the computers, including a panoramic view of part of the Saltire centre.

Includes background musical soundtrack, fading out as Laura begins to speak and fading back in as she finishes talking.

Laura Hotchkiss: I really like the Saltire centre a lot. Because usually you expect libraries in universities to be quite, like, dark wooden panelling and sort of like, big wooden desks, and everything is serious. But here, it’s kind of light, and it’s fabulous. And they are starting to integrate other little things, like they’re doing Podcasts and things at the end of the seminar before the exams. A couple of weeks before the exams, they release them all in MP3 format, so you can download them and study.

Ok, that’s me done everything I need to do. So I just need to go see CJ, because we need to have a meeting about the next project we’re going to do.

Walk-through shot of Laura leaving the computer area of the Saltire centre and going into one of the meeting areas.

Close-up of Laura and CJ sitting at a table talking, followed by a panoramic view of part of the Saltire centre.

Includes background musical soundtrack.

Voiceover: Laura is passionate about digital film making. She is working with her friend CJ, who has written a horror script which they want to shoot in the coming months.

Close-up of Laura and CJ sitting at a table talking, followed by a close-up of Laura in the Saltire centre with computers and other users in the background, including a shot of her talking to another student in the computer area of the Saltire centre, and one of her walking in a corridor with some fellow students.

Shot of Laura standing in front of a door talking, then walking through the door.

Includes background musical soundtrack, fading out as Laura begins to speak and fading back in as she finishes talking.

Laura Hotchkiss: It’s nice, as well, to have a meeting point where you can just go “right, I’ll see you in the Saltire centre”. Because classes keep giving us group work, not really realising that we do live really quite far away. But having a virtual learning environment that is at hand any time, it’s really quite nice. So I don’t really have any more expectations. I don’t really have any, like, higher hopes, because they have pretty much delivered what is required.

I’ve really got a class now, after this – Laura’s lunch. Because I’ve got a class test to do, but, see you later.

The learner’s voice logo fades in with musical soundtrack and video closing screen made up of the Xube® logo and HEFCE copyright statement. Fades out to black screen.