Publishing Open Badges to Mozilla Backpack

We have had problems with publishing Open Badges to the Mozilla Backpack directly from LearnUCS (Blackboard), as have all other institutions.

Blackboard have been looking into the problem and have now applied a fix to our database, meaning we can now automate the awarding of an achievement and publishing the Open Badge to Mozilla Backpack.

We have one area already waiting to use this feature, if you would like to offer these skills based awards please speak with a member of the Elevate team, elevate@ucs.ac.uk

Issuing Open Badges at UCS - Where are we?

After the development and completion of the Open Badges Generator (http://goo.gl/Vj0ymZ) we trialled the use of open badges at various events over the last few weeks here at UCS. These included the annual Learning and Teaching Day, AMC Development Day and the Research Colloquium as well as badges for attendees to our Digital Literacy Programme courses.

The objectives needed to obtain the event badges were not to simply turn up, but to submit a short (~150 words) reflective piece reflecting on a key message that you had taken away from the event or workshop and how you could use that in your everyday work. This method also helps to provide event organisers with a source of feedback.

These reflections were captured using a Google Form and attendees were given two weeks to submit the form.

After the two weeks had past, a member of the Elevate Team would simply open the Open Badge Issuer selecting the correct badge and using the form information to issue badges to those who submitted their reflections.

We issued 41 badges in total over the various events and workshops.

Here is a brief overview of the process:

1. Initial meeting with event/workshop organiser explaining 'What are Open Badges' and how they could be used for their sessions - 15m
2. Create Google Form (Name, email address, reflection) and send link to organiser- 5m
3. After event, Issue badges - ~30s per response

We have a main open badges page which can be found using the link below which details how we are using Open Badges at UCS.

http://www.ucs.ac.uk/openbadge/How-are-we-using-open-badges-at-UCS.aspx

Looking back over the whole process it's clear to see that for quite a significant result, I.e issuing an Open Badge, the process it self was very administration light.

The only issue we had with this process was one recipient having issues logging into their Mozilla Backpack, the issue was resolved by getting the recipient to use a different browser such as Mozilla FireFox or Google Chrome rather than Internet Explorer.

Each badge that got issued points to a 'Criteria' page on the UCS website where information about the badge is stored. 

Some questions for future use have arisen from the recent use of badges for these events. These include:

• Does there need to be a review of the quality of reflections before issuing of badges and if so, who would do this?
• A need to revoke or expire badges if the badge is for a re-occurring event or CPD which continually needs updating.

The expiring of badges is on the development list for our next sprint with this project. We will also look at scripting in some unique identifiers for each badge to help us track and maintain a clean and error free database. 

With word spreading and interest climbing for the use of Open Badges for face to face workshops and events, scripting in some sort of analytics would help us track 'number of badges issued' for individual events/workshops.

If you are a member of staff at UCS and would like to know more about Open Badges or how you could use them, feel free to contact us :)

Open Badges Generator

Having tested the initial generator (http://ucselevate.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/open-badges-generator.html) and having since updated to a multi-function system, the first generator will be turned off at the end of the week (Fri 13th).

This will free up some development space for us to debug the current system and make way for future enhancements.

If you have tested the generator above and have any comments, please feel free to email us at elevate@ucs.ac.uk

Open Badges Generator Update - Source Code

Following on from our previous post on the Open Badges Generator we have updated our system to include both badge creation and badge issuing components.

We have now written up a small guide to help anyone who would like to implement this elsewhere. The system we have built and documented is still in it's initial pilot/proof of concept phase so expect there to be some discrepancies in the source code.

Here is the link to the guide:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/12qRhAc9rzUH7FXBW0J4NtLkY-8RoQVw-Z4yOk3mTJmA/edit?usp=sharing

And here is a link to the source code:
https://gist.github.com/thedavidmullett/54a5153f6298539ce05d

This documentation is provided on the basis that the viewer has some technical knowledge of Javascript Syntax, basic Google Apps Script and basic HTML/CSS knowledge.

Over the coming months we will be piloting the issuing of badges using this system for events here at UCS, such as the Annual Court, Teaching & learning Day and the Research Colloquium. These events will allow us to test out both the system and the processes behind issuing the badges from the initial team talk with the event host to the claiming of the badges from the attendees.

We are keen for recipients to participate towards the event in order to be eligible for a badge, not to simply turn up. So we are asking participants to fill in a form (Name, Email) including a small reflective piece (150 words max) maybe about a key message they took from the event or some feedback.

Currently we have a small list of developments we will be looking at for the next iteration of this system, these include but not limited to;

• Unique ID for each badge issued to allow for row deletion in DB.
• Option of Expiry Date for issued badges, this will help reinforce a potential 'renewal' process, for example, continuing digital literacies programme.
• A statistics component to record and show how many of each badge has been issued.

Finally, if you are a member of staff at UCS and would like to discuss how you could use Open Badges please contact us :)

Open Badges Generator

We have been looking recently at how we could issue Open Badges, an initiative backed by the Mozilla foundation for standardising the issuing of badges for 'verifying learning'.

There are many systems available for issuing badges to recipients, however all of the systems we have come across (including BlackBoard) need the recipient to be a registered user of that specific system. This became a stumbling block for us as we would like to issue badges based on the more frequented face to face elements the Elevate Team offer. Workshops, Masterclasses and group sessions are all based away from systems such as BlackBoard, so how could we issue badges?

The option of creating a new module in BlackBoard's CourseSites was an option, however this would become cumbersome and yet another task a user would have to go through to simply claim a badge.

Whilst searching around various user groups and communities we stumbled across an article on how to use Google Sites as a badge issuer using Mozilla's Open Badges Issuer API by +Martin Hawksey . After testing what Martin had done, including using Google Forms to process user information, we decided to try and modify the system to suit our needs.

The 'proof of concept' we have ended up with ended up being quite different from what was detailed in the article. Martin's project issued a static two badges, we modified this code to allow us to issue any number of custom badges.

The process would be:

1. User signs up, for example a workshop session, leaving Name and Email
2. Attends the workshop
3. After, the Elevate Team uses the generator to select appropriate badge for the workshop, uses Name and Email in the form.
4. Users gets email to claim their badge

What's nice about this process is it only introduces one step for the end user outside of normal operations (Signup form etc), simply clicking a link in an email.

We created a dynamic Open Badge generator where only our team can select which badge we wish to issue and to whom. The script behind the form will dynamically pull the relevant information (Criteria, Evidence) for each badge based on what badge has been selected, rather than having it as a manual process. We intend to extend this function by having another form which will allow us to 'create' a new badge which can be referenced within this system.

If you wish to test the generator in it's development state and issue yourself either a 'Novice' or 'Expert' badge, please visit the Google Form below.

http://goo.gl/3vWfxY

We have integrated a faux-aunthentication function to negate any spamming of badges for unauthorised users, this was simply done by using a required field in the Google Form which had to match some text exactly to submit the form.

For this proof of concept, the Team Code is "pleaseletmehavethebadge" sans quotes.

If you have any feedback on using the system or if you wish to discuss with the Elevate Team about Open Badges, please contact us at elevate@ucs.ac.uk

Please note that by it's very nature, this system is likely to change and possibly stop working altogether.

The Elevate Open Badge Generator will be for the private issuing of badges by our team, however the underlying code and technical functionality will be posted under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. CC-BY which will come shortly.

With thanks to +Martin Hawksey 's original code and article - http://mashe.hawksey.info/2012/12/open-badges-issuer-gadget-google-sites/

Introducing Open Badges in Mahara

This is a small post to raise your awareness of a new feature which we've introduced to UCS' Mahara e-Portfolio system. Open Badges.

If you are weren't aware, an Open Badge (http://www.openbadges.org) is a Mozilla backed, open standard framework for defining web badges, in all senses similar to a physical badge you used to get in Boy Scouts or Girl Guides.

A badge can be rewarded to an individual for any number of different achievements. Previous pilots and projects over the last couple of years in the higher education sector have been run to promote an achievement or evidence system based around the use of badges, some have used in house bespoke systems, however, there is growing evidence of using a central 'Backpack' like Mozilla's OpenBadges standard. For example:

'Seton Hall – Created campus wide badges for students who participate in campus events. It’s pretty neat because students can simply swipe their ID card at events to earn the badges. They have another program where freshman earn badges by attending mandatory freshman events.' (Croom, A (2014)) - http://adamcroom.com/2014/04/a-brief-history-of-digital-badges-in-higher-ed/

Well, now you can import and visualise a collection of your own badges into your Mahara e-Portfolio page. You can follow the steps below to import your badges:

If you don't have a Mozilla Backpack, follow this link --> http://www.openbadges.org and register using an email address. If you already have a backpack you can skip to the next step.

1. In Mahara, go to your 'Profile' option under the 'Content' tab
2. Navigate to the 'Contact Information' section
3. Make sure the email address listed is the same as your Mozilla Backpack one, if it isn't, click the 'Add' button and add a the address you used to register for your Mozilla Backpack
4. Click 'Save Profile' at the bottom of the page.
5. You will need to validate your new email address (email will be sent)
6. Go to your portfolio page you wish to add the badges to
7. Click the 'Edit this page'
8. Click the 'External Content' option
9. Drag the 'Open Badges' (Shield icon) onto your portfolio page
10. Depending on what badges you have (if any) you will see what 'Collection' you wish to add.
11. You may need to create a collection in your backpack which is public. 

Any badges you are rewarded with, wherever they are from will now appear on your portfolio page.