Learning Design Summer Camp (LDSC) is an informal, community-designed gathering of people from across Penn State who are interested in the big issues related to the learning design process, including instructional designers, faculty, students, librarians, education technologists, and multimedia developers. Attendees discuss issues such as student engagement, assessment and feedback, digital literacy, open educational resources, gamification, accessibility, and the impact of disruptive technologies on the learning process. You never know what kind of fun activities you will do at camp. LDSC is a community partnership across the University including Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT), John A. Dutton e-Education Institute, Business eLearning Design and Innovation Group, Center for Teaching Excellence at Harrisburg Campus, World Campus Learning Design, College of Agricultural Sciences, College of Arts and Architecture, College of IST Office of Learning Design, and University Libraries. A great time to catch up and connect with the Learning Design Community
Tentatively named Keystone Learning and Instructional Community Conference (KLICC), KLICC will run in a semi-synchronous conference mode through Discord and HAX containing pre-recorded videos.
To begin, please review 'getting started' and create an account through Discord.
Additional details coming soon.
LDSC for 2024 will feature a return of the un-conference format.
An un-conference works to serve the community in less formal, more dynamic way by focussing on the needs of the community it serves. The speed in which services and technologies change has prompted us to consider presentations and proposals that can be as uniquely informed as the deeply researched to a recently published news item from NPR heard on the morning commute.
One of the advantages of the un-conference format is to provide cohorts for a variety of topics that a traditional conference might leave behind. These include people who want to know who their broader community might be regarding a specific question or the ability to combine presentations that are linked, but the presenters weren't aware of the opportunity. The ability to engage with your direct peers in this way turns it into an active learning lab.
If you have a presentation that you would like present to the group - bring it!
The un-conference, despite its quirks, is still a conference. Email the chair in
advance if you have technology needs.
Finally, the un-conference is largely a democratic one. We don't adhere to tracks or specific theming, we want and hope people will follow their interests with their feet. The point of an un-conference is to be able to glean as much as possible within the community. That may be a small nugget that helps them think about something or an entire conversation. The community at all scales chooses what will go on the wall (schedule) and each attendee goes from there.
For more information, you can defer to the video below, filmed as an intro to the un-conference last year or email questions to the conference chair.
So what does this look like? When campers check in for summer camp on July 16th, they will congregate in a room as a group at tables and be asked to think about what they came to camp to learn, or to teach. They will brainstorm ideas and share around the room. After sharing ideas, campers will be asked to write down the topics they are most interested in seeing as a session for the day. Each topic is written on a piece of construction paper and turned into the “master scheduler” at the front of the room.
This is where the magic happens. The master scheduler has created a large wall schedule with time and room location blocks waiting to be filled with session titles. Campers will turn in their sheets of construction paper and the scheduler will place them on the wall in an assigned space. This will continue until all of the spaces for times and rooms are filled. This is how the agenda for the day is created. By campers, for campers.
At the beginning of our imagining of LDSC24, we wanted a speaker from Penn State who could talk about the unique experiences of being at Penn State in the learning design community.
Last year at LDSC2023, Bryan Ollendyke and Bill Rose presented on a web development tool they've been working on for the last few years called HAX (Headless Authoring eXperience) In the wake of that presentation LDSC24 as part of featuring points of interest in the College of Arts and Architecture and promoting the work of instructional design units around the University, LDSC24 is proudly using HAX to build and host its conference and website.
HAX is a service provided through a collaboration between Penn State College of Arts and Architecture, Eberly College of Science, College of Information Sciences and Technology, and University libraries. , The platform is powered by HAXcms, originally developed to power 100s of high scale online courses.
HAX is available to all Penn State Affiliates to use by using your Penn State log in information.
Contact : Bill Rose, Product Owner
Penn State IT does not monitor websites and does not assume responsibility for any published content. The content authors are responsible for the content of their websites. Use of this service is governed by
Penn State policies and guidelines, including Penn State IT Web Services Policy.
All pages must be compliant with Accessibility Standards, Policy AD69.