Research and Consultancy

Steve Wheeler has undertaken consultancy work for a number of agencies as a researcher and advisor. He has worked on some of the world’s largest distance education projects including the RATIO project (UK: 1996-1998) and the Star Schools South Dakota Digital Network (USA: 2001-2003). He has also worked on Erasmus funded projects including ATLANTIS (student mobility collaboration with German, Polish and Irish universities) and CONCEDE (user generated content evaluation project).

Most of Steve’s recent small scale research focuses on the use of social media in Higher Education. Two recent projects, both funded by the Centre for Excellence in Teacher Training (CETT) were the WikiLit project (where wikis were used to support and encourage better academic writing and literacy skills) and MentorBlog (where two-person blogs were used to support remote student teacher mentoring). He also recenly won a Teaching Fellowship award to investigate how Mino Flip Cameras can be used by students on overseas visits and placements to capture their experiences and share them on Video Blogs.

Steve was a finalist in the 2010 University of Plymouth Vice Chancellor’s Enterprise Research Awards for his research into how user generated content can be evaluated and quality assured (Concede Project). In 2008 he was awarded a life fellowship by the European Distance and E-Learning Network (EDEN) of Academics and Professionals for his services to European distance education research. In 2011 he was elected to the steering group of EDEN’s Network of Academics and Professionals, and he is the current chair of the UNESCO sponsored IFIP Working Group on distance education. He has reviewed for a number of funding agencies including ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council, UK) and the Academy of Finland and is an academic reviewer for several publishing houses.

PhD Examinations

• Rita Kop (University of Swansea, Wales) 2010
• Andreas Meiszner (The UK Open University, England) 2010
• Katina Hazelden (Plymouth University, England) 2011
• Diana Andone (Brighton University, England) 2011
• Edilson Arenas (Deakin University, Australia) 2012
• Tharindu Liyanagunawardena (University of Reading, England) 2012

Current PhD Supervision

• Ensaf Al Mulhim – ICT training needs of female novice primary school teachers
• Ahmed Al Mulhem – Designing, implementing and evaluating an Educational training Programme to develop technological and pedagogical teaching skills of academic staff.
• Bandar Faisal – PhD thesis title to be decided

Research grants

• 1996-1998 RATIO Project (UK): Rural Area Training and Information Opportunities. c £5,000,000
• 2001-2003 Star Schools Digital Dakota Network (USA) c US$ 95,000
• 2007 WikiLit and MentorBlog projects. Centre for Excellence in Teacher Training. £6,000
• 2008 CoreNet Project. Centre for Excellence in Teacher Training. £10,000
• 2009-2011 Concede Project. European Union Lifelong Learning Programme. Euro 40,000
• 2011 Teaching Fellowship award to investigate the use of Flipcams and video diaries in student placements overseas. £5,000

Photo Credit: The picture on this page was taken outside Napier, New Zealand in October 2010 by Joyce Seitzinger.