'Out There and In Here': Social Inclusion through Distributed Team Collaboration

Rather than students in isolation bound to their disabilities, classrooms, PCs or mobile devices the goal of this project is to develop technologies that support people working together in a suitable manner for their locations. One of the benefits of mobile technologies is to combine 'the digital' (e.g., data, information, photos) with user experiences in novel ways that are contextualized by peoples current physical activities. However, people with mobility disabilities are often excluded from engaging in such peripatetic user experiences. Watching the world go by on a TV or computer screen may be engaging but it doesn't support a student's interaction with the physical world. Our proposal bridges this gap by developing hybrid 'social inclusion' systems supporting co-active participation between mixed teams of physically able and disabled users, enabling experiences of both being in the field and at a stationary base. To this end, mobile and tabletop technologies will be linked to support synchronous distributed team collaboration. A prototype system will be developed and evaluated in situ to demonstrate the benefits of technology-interlinked with socially interdependent experiences. As an analogy, consider the 1980s TV series 'Treasure Hunt' where teams of 2-3 people, based in a library accessing various resources, have to find a location where treasure is buried through solving various clues. They relay their suggestions, via two-way radio links, to a 'skyrunner' (Anneka Rice), who is transported by helicopter to follow their directions to find it. Although they could communicate with the skyrunner via the radio link, they could not actually see her. Based on this kind of distributed interdependency, our proposal aims to develop new ways of connecting those excluded from participating in outdoors activities with those included, providing enjoyable and equitable roles for all. The goal is for distributed mixed teams to work together cooperatively. In order for students in the field to progress they need to communicate with and follow suggestions made by students at the home station who use the tabletop.This research will take an HCI approach that is informed by a transformational design perspective. These perspectives are both grounded in an interdisciplinary approach which is essential to a project of this nature that initially requires the expertise from science, technology, design and elearning. The transformational design perspective will use the skills of; looking for the user point of view, making things visible and prototyping. The work will comprise of two phases: in the first 6 months a review of the pilot research will: (i) extract requirements for the prototyping of equitable collaborative inquiry experiences and (ii) evaluate technological capabilities, define initial development of middleware requirements and develop prototype solutions. In the following 12 months, these solutions will be: (i) iteratively developed, (ii) evaluated and (iii) refined with potential beneficiaries and (iv) within the last 3 months of the project findings will be documented, demonstrated and disseminated.

There are two different types of direct beneficiaries from this research those within the private technical development sector and those within the public educational sector: - The immediate private sector partners (OOKL and Microsoft) will benefit from the development of two separate technologies into a joint synchronous application for a newly defined scenario and educational sector (i.e. HE). Substantial economic benefits will not be realised within the lifetime of the project and may take several years to be realised. - Further technology developers within both the tabletop and mobile device domain will also benefit from advancements in approaches to distance learning. These benefits will impact on more effective approaches and developments which could be realised within the lifespan of the project. - Disabled and disadvantaged students will be immediate beneficiaries with an increased likelihood of equitable accessibility to a range of field-based courses. The impact of these benefits are potentially very dramatic for these students and with current changes in OU learning design could be realised within several years of the project. - Accessibility designers and policy makers will also benefit from the technical evaluations with guidance on the implementation of these technologies. These could be a significant immediate impact. An indirect immediate benefit could also be the increased profile within the partnering companies and the media of innovative approaches to accessibility. - Distance learning developers and policy makers will benefit from alternative innovative approaches to distance learning that support both aspects of face-to-face collaboration whilst also supporting the needs for distance learning. These benefits although important may take some time to filter through. - Science learning designers and students will indirectly benefit from these developments as costly and inaccessible field trips increasingly threaten the viability of field trips within science courses. These technical developments could also change the profile of science learning as something 'FUN' for students of all ages. The time-scale of these impacts varies according to the effectiveness of differing dissemination routes. - The work-based learning sector will indirectly benefit from these developments as these innovative approaches to distance learning could support effective collaboration for a wide variety of users (e.g. nurses, patients, construction students). These benefits although important may take some time to filter through. - Project staff will also benefit in the development of their technical skills in improving these technologies. Collaborations between the industrial partners and academic project staff will also support the development of effective collaboration networks and an increased understanding of how to develop systems under the pressures of a commercial market. These will be important impacts for the project members with immediate effect. - This project could significantly impact on public perceptions of science learning and disabled access. The project benefits could impact quickly and widely through effective dissemination of these developments through the media. The benefit opportunities detailed above will be realised through a detailed plan of dissemination and engagement procedures which seek alternative routes to impact on beneficiaries (see the impact plan) The project team know the benefits and difficulties of working in interdisciplinary teams that bring academics, public sector and industrial partners together. With this in mind the project team will draw upon the wealth of project management experience of Professors Rogers, Swithenby and Dr. Adams in running interdisciplinary academic/industrial/public sector partner collaborative projects.