ePortfolios as Learning Construction Zones: Provost's Perspective

Abstract

ePortfolios can be more than storage devices of the learner’s best work when faculty develop a curriculum that integrates them across each student’s academic career. This chapter describes how one version of an ePortfolio, designed using faculty-held learning principles and assumptions, helps students explore and extend their learning in a developmental manner. It also describes how a provost sees the ePortfolio system fulfilling an often neglected CAO responsibility: improving the educational effectiveness of faculty. The author also outlines other educational goals that can be met with a developmental ePortfolio system. Finally, the author comments on the downside of using such a system, but suggests that the benefits outweigh the deficits.