EMBED

The EMBED project aims at offering higher education institutions expertise and guidance by developing a conceptual framework and a European maturity model on blended education. The project responds to immediate needs in EU countries, where blended teaching and learning is increasingly but still slowly introduced. It is an answer to current challenges for universities: keeping educational quality with large numbers of students and lower budgets per unit (low staff/student ratios), making education more adaptive, personalised and flexible to face issues of study progress and study success. In many cases, it is not built on recent concepts and theories on course design which leads to less advantageous implementations.

In the strategic partnership of the European Association of Distance Teaching (EADTU), Delft university, University of Edinburgh, KU-Leuven, DCU, Aarhus University and Tampere University of Applied Sciences, the EMBED project brings together leading experts in blended education, building a multi-level maturity model for b-learning and a framework for change based on progress markers related to stakeholder-focused outcomes.

The strategic partnership is about introducing innovations in higher education by implementing blended learning (b-learning) in the partnership and beyond. The partnership consists of frontrunner European universities in b-learning. They will create a reference model for developing and implementing blended learning, embracing all levels of an institution.

It is a maturity model with criteria and instruments to assess the degree of maturity of b-learning and innovation. Connected with this is a framework for change, based on progress markers related to stakeholder-focused outcomes. Internal stakeholders are learners, teaching staff, support services, technology departments and university leadership. External stakeholders, influencing practices and policies in universities, are governments, European university networks and the EU.