ALT FEC 25th October

The ALT Further Education Committee was held in Birmingham at the Priory Rooms.  In fact it was a meeting of all four operational committees - the Membership Services committee, the Publications committee, the Research committee and the Further Education committee.  There was an introductory session for everyone to discuss general issues and then the topics raised from these groups were taken up by the appropriate committee during their meeting throughout the day. There was a plenary session at the end where each committee fed back to the whole group.  
I thought this worked really well for a number of reasons.  The introductory session at the beginning meant that you worked with people from the other committees which is not possible if the committees meet at separate times and places.  It helps put it into the context  of ALT as a whole organisation.  It is nice to meet everyone and fascinating to watch the interactions.  It provides a feedback loop in a short space of time i.e. matters that are brought up at the beginning of the day can be discussed by the appropriate group during the day and possible solutions or courses of action brought back by the end of the day.
The Further Education Committee is really interesting and all of the members are friendly, approachable, very knowledgeable and good at discussions.  I find it very beneficial to be involved and to be able to have discussions with people who are really interested in learning technologies and committed to using them and developing them for students and staff in the FE sector.
I think it is important that Further Education has a strong presence in ALT and hope to promote it as such.  But I think the most important thing is that ALT is a brilliant organisation and anyone and everyone who is a Learning Technologist should be part of it.