Guide to Assessing Educational Technologies

Accessible: All learners and educators can access technologies without barriers regardless of ability, culture, language, sexuality, gender, etc.

• Anywhere, Anytime, Accessibility: Learners and educators can access learning materials and learning resources 24/7, on and offline, accommodating varying access to the internet along with diverse schedules and commitments.

• Disability and Learning Differences:  Technologies follow accessibility standards (e.g., WCAG, UDL), 16 ensuring accessibility features are built in as well as being compatible with assistive technologies and diverse learning needs.

• Inclusivity: Technologies are designed with inclusive principles, offering multiple formats and adaptive features to accommodate diverse cultural and social needs, ensuring equitable access for all learners. There are no identifiable biases built into the technology that would diminish the learning experience for some.

• Device Accessibility: Technologies are designed to function across different devices and browsers, reducing technological barriers for learners.

Designed for Learning Learning: goals are served by technologies, supporting evidence-informed, enriched learning.

• Active Engagement: Technologies enhance active engagement by providing options for personalization, participation, collaboration, sharing, and creation, whether through collaboration, problem-solving, reflection, or interactivity. This includes hands-on activities, real-world problem-solving, and experiential learning.

• Pedagogical Purpose and Clarity: Technologies have a clear pedagogical purpose and directly support course objectives, ensuring they enhance learning by having a learner and user centered design rather than introducing distractions or additional workload for educators.

• Customizable: Customizability will ensure that the technology can be adapted for personal learner preferences as well as various classroom contexts, but also to real-world applications.

• Aligned Assessment: Technologies support assessment that aligns with course goals and provides meaningful feedback to students via realtime communication, peer review, and annotation. Data analytics will provide insights into engagement and performance, helping instructors tailor their teaching. The result will be assessment that is both formative and summative.

• Faculty Consultation: Finally, for technologies informed by digital pedagogy to be implemented effectively, faculty consultation is essential. Faculty members are to be consulted before educational technologies are adopted by the university to ensure that educational technologies can ideally suit varied pedagogical environments and aid instructors in confronting an open-ended number of learning experiences.

Sustainable: Learners and educators can expect ongoing supported access to university-wide tools, knowing that technologies support economic and sustainability goals whenever possible.

• Environmental Sustainability: Adopting digital-first solutions and energy-efficient technologies with low carbon footprints provided by companies with environmentally ethical practices minimizes environmental impact.

• Resource Sustainability: Long-term digital learning strategies prioritize affordability, ongoing support, and interoperability to ensure enduring access.

• Economic Sustainability: Adopting cost-effective open educational resources (OER) where possible. When there is a choice, choose to engage with equitably priced technologies that recognize the needs and limitations of the educational sector and won’t unduly burden the university or its learners in terms of cost.

For specifics, please refer to MacEwan's privacy, IT security, and intellectual property policies.