Rationale

 

BRIDGE Chairman John Gilmour said recently that the world of education development cannot afford to be competitive; instead it needs to focus on ‘deep collaboration’.

 

One way BRIDGE works in support of collaboration is in its ‘knowledge management’ role. Knowledge management is the process of capturing, developing, distilling and sharing knowledge that improves practice. Knowledge is the currency of social networks and learning communities which support knowledge co-production, trust building, and collaboration. BRIDGE manages knowledge which flows from and between our members and our Communities of Practice, and shares this with the broader educational community.

 

 

Approach: The Knowledge Hub

 

BRIDGE processes for gathering and sharing knowledge can be described as both techno-centric (through the use of technology platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and our online community interactions) and ecological, focusing on the interaction and collaboration of people with common interests and identities through the convening of Communities of Practice and other events.

The  Knowledge Hub is a repository for the knowledge products generated by our work with our members, and for a range of shared resources. As educators we all suffer from information overload. There is so much going on in our sector: the amount of knowledge and information coming out of policy developments, schooling interventions, funded projects and research is vast. If we want to keep informed, we all have challenges in terms of both volume and access to different kinds of documents.

 

The Knowledge Hub includes a range of ‘knowledge products’, often related to the BRIDGE Focus Areas, to help with these challenges. These are summarised below:

 

• What’s Trending Updates: key issues and debates in the BRIDGE Focus Areas that are getting a lot of attention.

• Working Practice Profiles: school profiles, stories or case studies which illustrate working practice in an area of education.

• Impact Stories: brief narratives from our members on major learnings they have taken from an interaction.

• Fact Sheets: summarised elements of new policies, directions or events in education.

• Meeting Highlights: overviews and highlights of Community of Practice or other meetings, including any ‘hot topics’ for debate.

• Presentations: power point presentations from Community of Practice or other meetings.

• Tools and Resources: tools, templates, guidelines which help in the practical application of classroom or school-based strategies.

• Maps: databases of systemic information, such as a map of provision in a specific sector with provider details. These maps help to keep a sector informed and promote collaboration by making information visible.

• Videos: short videos of key presentations or debates in a Community of Practice or other meetings.