What is an ePortfolio?

An ePortfolio is your personal online space. It is somewhere where you can put things that are yours and that you should have some control over who gets to see what. I think of my ePortfolio as control tower where I can access information about myself in one place, but it doesn’t necessarily need to be kept in the one place, some of the information can be stored in a different location.

What types of files can I store in my ePortfolio?

What type of documents can be stored on your ePortfolio depends on your ePorfolio provider. There may be some terms and conditions of use of the ePortfolio system so you may be restricted by what is required or allowed. What you will find in most ePortfolio systems is that the most commonly used file types and documents will be able to be uploaded eg Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, MP3 recordings, mpegs, pdf files and so forth. What you want to think about again is how you want to present the information, do you want to put it all in the one place or is it about creating an effective online space that makes you look different from others or is appealing to people and so you stand out from the crowd. You may also want to consider storing information in other places other than your ePortfolio such as sharing spaces such as Flikr photo sharing space and Youtube video sharing. It not only allows you to have access to freely available space but also opens you up to a network of people with similar interest to yourself that may help you connect to a network of friends and colleagues. So not always having to store it in the ePortfolio environment. Also if you already have a space online, if you already write a blog or use a wiki or are already uploading things to Youtube then please make sure you leave them there as it is good to have some open social network spaces and then what you should be able to do in your ePortfolio is draw that information in through RSS or through a hyperlink or getting a copy of the information as well. Consider the different kinds of places you can store data and you might need to test them as well.

Is my privacy protected?

Privacy of your information in an ePortfolio is the responsibility of yourself as well as the training organisation or whoever is providing the ePorfolio service. Your training organisation or ePorfolio service provider needs to make sure the space is secure in terms of passwords and who can access the information and also where the information is stored also has secure measures, people can’t break in and access information. It is also about making sure you know about who can see what in the ePortfolio. Different systems have different ways of sharing information, so check with your teacher / trainer or training organisation or ePortfolio service provider about what information is automatically public and what is default private. You might also want to check with your training organisation or ePortfolio supplier what the terms and conditions of use are. There may be restrictions of what you are allowed to put in your ePortfolio because it is there for a particular purpose, so keep in mind you may not be able to include just about anything. You also want to keep in mind your different audiences; you shouldn’t be sharing personal or confidential information from a workspace on an online space anywhere, whether it’s your ePortfolio or a FaceBook page. Confidential information should remain confidential and you can’t be guaranteed that something that is placed online will remain confidential. Also consider what your ePortfolio is saying about you, so the idea of privacy is it protects your personal information. Consider what is personal information to you, when you put pictures of yourself or pictures of your friends online what is saying about you. Maintaining your privacy is very important but also work with your training organisation/ePortfolio supplier as well as your teachers and trainers and employers to make sure you understand what is already private and what is okay to share in online spaces.

What are the benefits of an ePortfolio?

As a student the benefit of having an e-portfolio is that it helps you manage all of your work in the one place and what it also does is that it allows you to re-use information so if you have produced something really good as part of an assessment or as part of your learning it may also then be able to be used to demonstrate your skills for a promotion or it may be for getting a job or volunteer work. Again think of that memory box it's really your space, identifying what is interesting information for you and for the people you are likely to need to supply information to so we are talking about employers, professional associations, it may be tertiary admission centres if you are trying to get into a course so there are all these places/people that are interested in information about you. It can also be what I consider to be a quite place to think and reflect - you know, somewhere where you can jot down information or notes and then keep that there and either use it for planning or coming back at a later time and thinking did that work or didn't that work? So it allows you to reflect on what your ideas were what your goals were so it can help you for goal setting and it can help you keep that together in the one place.

How long can I keep my ePortfolio?

How long you keep your ePorfolio depends on the ePorfolio system you are using. It may be that if you are using it with a training organisation or an employer there may be a restricted time and that you can use it in association with that training organisation or employer. Some training organisations are considering having an alumni approach, that if you continue to have an association through a membership you would have an ongoing access to your ePortfolio. Others are applying licences to the ePortfolio system according to the learner so you would have a licence to the ePorfolio system that you are using, it would be yours and if and when you were no longer associated with the employer or training organisation you could choose whether you want to continue to pay for the licence or leave it to go dormant and come back to it. Ideally any portfolio system you do want to be able to get back into it and change and update through out your life. What you will find is that ePortfolio systems like a lot of online spaces are going to be changing, peoples ideas will change, so the most important thing is being able to get your information out. It is important to use an ePorfolio system that has an easily exportable functionality that allows you to zip out the information and be able to import that to a different space. Some ePortfolio systems are already organised in this way then your data will always be yours regardless of the ePortfolio system that you have access to.

What information do I include in my ePortfolio?

What information you include in your ePorfolio may depend on who is providing the portfolio and they may set down terms and conditions of use and may restrict what you can put in there. What information will go in there will really depend on what you want to do with the ePortfolio. If it is for assessment work or for training it may be specifically about managing all of your learning assignments and assessments in the one place, examples notes all gathered there. If it is about creating a presentation ePortfolio that you might want to use to get into another course or to get a job or get a promotion then it will be the related information to what you want it for. So if it is a job it will be job related information, if it is a promotion it may be about demonstrating the skills you have to get that promotion. Some people use their ePortfolio for what we call a memory box, a place to put examples of things they have done regardless of when and how and where they have done it. This acts as a trigger further on in life when you are looking for information about what you have done, again related to either getting into a course or a job or a promotion or it may even be around recognition of prior learning. It is about trying to work out what information you think is valuable about you, examples of things that you do either for learning or work or volunteering, you sport or community commitments and what is important to you Also what is important to other people now and in the future, that comes with a bit of experience and hopefully the people who are helping you to develop your ePortfolio will give you some examples of the type of things that work really well in ePortfolios One good thing about an ePortfolio as opposed to a paper based portfolio is that you can gather information much more interesting ways such as using a video camera or audio recorder or might see things like point of view glasses or smart pens. You can be really visual or lots of audio and sounds can be used about how information is gathered and shared.

Can I control who sees my ePortfolio?

Depending on the ePortfolio system that you are using will depend on how much control you are going to have over who can see what in your ePortfolio but in a good ePortfolio system what should happen is you should have all levels of control as to what information is shared with others so in an ideal setting you should be able to say nobody can see this, one person can see this, a group of people can see this, my teacher can see this, my employer can see this or the whole world can see it and ideally in a time stamped way that you can say "Yep, you can see this from today until next week and then the system automatically blocks you out. Some ePortfolio systems also provide what they call a secret URL or a link into your ePortfolio where the person you share it with doesn't need to be a member of the site but they get to see a view of your ePortfolio. You should also have the opportunity to create different views and different accesses for different people for different purposes.