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<p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande",
Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Mike Richards joined
The Open University in 1996 to help trial teaching over the Internet. Since then he
has taught courses ranging from an introduction to robots to the engineering works
of Leonardo da Vinci; but has spent most of his time writing about security - everything
from the Enigma machines to e-shopping. </p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px;
font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:
12.800000190734863px;">Mike started by supporting a small group of pioneering students
and associate lecturers - using sluggish modems and primitive browsers to connect
them with a purpose built server running on equal mixes of scripting languages, prayers
and swearing. From these trials, Mike joined the team that presented M206, the Open
University's first computing module designed for online study. It wasn't just
the students who learned a lot - Mike realised that sites with tens of thousands of
users, hundreds of pages and huge numbers of changes really needed better technology;
so two years later he created the OU's first interactive module site built using
ColdFusion database integration that allowed students to report issues and receive
regular email updates.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">In this
time, Mike was also working with the BBC on material for the series'People's
War' about the experiences of those who lived and fought in the Second World War.
He developed and presented teaching material relating to the pioneering cryptography
that took place at nearby Bletchley Park.'People's War' became a road-show
that took exhibits to locations across England during which Mike was invited to speak
about code breaking and the work of Alan Turing.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em
0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Clearly, he didn't have enough to do, so Mike
was next set the task of working on the educational potential of robots. As well as
developing OU teaching materials about LEGO MindStorms, Mike took robotics into
schools in the Milton Keynes area as well as helping officiate in the RoboFesta
educational movement. This was his first introduction to the concept of teaching computer
programming using blocks; an idea invented by the MIT Media Lab - pay attention this
becomes important later.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">A short
break from teaching computing had Mike work on an OU short-course about the lesser-known achievements
of Leonardo da Vinci. Intended to accompany a major BBC documentary series, the tie-in
OU materials became one of the most successful promotions the university has
ever produced. Mike's contribution to the new course included the engineering
concepts behind Leonardo's unbuilt Galata Bridge and his colossal Sforza Horse.</p><p
dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial,
Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Back in the world of Computing,
Mike was assigned to the team developing the OU's first computing course designed
for absolute beginners; M150. He wrote material describing the workings of the
world-wide web, the importance of markup languages such as HTML and XML as well as
developing a range of activities to allow a huge number of students to begin
exploring their potential as authors of web materials. Still on M150, he wrote the
first substantial material about the role of cryptography in modern society and the
ethical issues of computer technologies as they relate to intellectual property. A
pattern was beginning to emerge.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Around
this time, Mike made his first inroads into working with the BBC as an academic consultant
for factual programming developed in conjunction with the Open University. Gone
were the days of kipper ties and wonky blackboards. In were world-spanning adventures
with shiny new presenters. The first project Mike worked on was <em>The Virtual
Revolution</em> broadcast in 2010 that introduced BBC2 audiences to the people
who invented the Internet, the WWW and who were developing the services that we now
all rely on. <em>Virtual Revolution</em> went on to win digital Emmys and
BAFTAs; someone neglected to invite Mike to the parties.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:
1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Instead, Mike was doing something really dumb -
he said <em>'I have a great idea!'</em> - and someone in power gave
him the money to create a new level one module, TU100, based around the infant
technology of ubiquitous computing (the internet of things). Before the iPhone was
even a thing, Mike's team were developing radically new teaching materials to
explore the potential of this technology using hands-on learning that had been pioneered
by children's education. Using his experience of the LEGO Mindstorms technology,
Mike went to MIT Media Lab to ask if the OU could use their Scratch programming language
in the context of adult learners. MIT were delighted to help and so Sense was born
- an internet connected drag-and-drop language that could communicate with sensors.
The sensors were supplied by the SenseBoard, a plug-in USB board based on Arduino
technology developed especially for TU100. As well as leading the team, Mike authored
a sizeable part of TU100, including sections exploring the potential of ubiquitous
technology to change the world (and we still managed to undersell it), the digital
divide and was a co-author on the programming guide that allowed novices to become
confident programmers using Sense and the SenseBoard to explore their world
and communicate their findings to fellow students. TU100 saw OU staff sent
to every corner of the world from Seattle to Iceland to Nepal in order to show how
technology was changing people's lives - for good and for bad; and how different
societies employ technology in different ways. TU100 went on to win a number of teaching
awards and was taken by many thousands of students.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:
1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">After handing over TU100, Mike was put to work performing
an academic edit on the OU's novel computer forensics module M812. Mike's
role was to consolidate the writing of a number of staff, to reduce its overall
length, impose a pedagogy and develop a technology primer for students less familiar
with some aspects of computer technology such as computer operating systems and
encryption (there it is again).</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Mike
and Arosha Bandara jointly developed Computing's first MOOC on the Open University's
FutureLearn platform. Their <em>Introduction to Cyber Security</em>, sponsored
by the then Department of Business, Innovation and Skills and supported by the MoD,
Cabinet Office and GCHQ supported government campaigns to increase computer security
awareness amongst the public and business alike. Over eight weeks of study, novices
are introduced to key cyber security concepts as well as a range of techniques to
improve their own security and their ability to find reliable information. During
four years of presentation, the course has been studied by more than 203,000 learners,
adopted by a number of institutions including the Metropolitan Police, GCHQ itself
and Crown Estates; and nominated for education awards. Mike and Arosha later worked
with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Qatar University to develop an Arabic-language
version of the MOOC. The MOOC has also been converted into a self-study course hosted
on the Open University's OpenLearn service. Following the introduction of
the MOOC, Mike was invited to join a United Nations panel developing cybersecurity
awareness in sub-Saharan East Africa.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">During
this time, Mike was also working on several projects with the BBC; including the six-part
BBC News series, <em>Cybercrimes with Ben Hammersley</em>, which became the first
OU programme to be available on Netflix; and <em>Game Changers</em> - a
dramatisation of the development of <em>Grand Theft Auto</em> starring Daniel
Radcliffe. Mike later had an 18 month secondment to act as a liaison between
the OU and BBC for the development of new television and radio programming.</p><p
dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial,
Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Returning to teaching, Mike
found himself joining two teams each producing one-half of the replacement for
TU100. For TM111, Mike's involvement has been to write material explaining the
concept and use of data from the very simplest spreadsheets through to the processing
of'big data'. He is particularly proud that he spotted the use of big data
in American elections nearly two years before anyone had heard of Cambridge
Analytica. His second contribution to TM111 was an introduction to algorithmic thinking
which is conducted entirely through playful activities using pieces of paper,
coloured pens and pencils. This material compliments video resources from the BBC
TV programme <em>The Secret Rules of Modern Livin</em>g developed during Mike's
time working with the BBC.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">At the
same time, Mike was working on TM112 where he is the author of six weeks of study
concentrating on the social aspects of computing - in particular computer security.
Beginning with an introduction to the threats facing every computer user, Mike leads
the student from how simple spam messages are the tip of an iceberg of computer crime
and the involvement of state players in such threats as the Stuxnet attack on Iran.
Students are encouraged to proactively explore beyond the teaching materials, to research
and evangelise the role of computer security. In the second and third parts,
students learn about hashing and encryption and how they are used (and abused) to
secure and authenticate data. The material is explored in the context of everyday
activities such as online shopping - showing how technologies such as TLS/SSL are
built on the fundamental building blocks introduced earlier; as well as the currently
fashionable/snake oil of blockchain technologies.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em
0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Moving on to parts three and four of Mike's
contribution to TM112; he introduces the Tor network and guides students through the
Darknet - what it is, why it isn't all bad and why it is both liberating and scary.
During these parts, Mike begins to introduce the ethical aspects of computers - encryption
keeps us safe and simultaneously threatens us. Attempts to legislate acceptable content
and encryption are discussed and students are expected to develop arguments for both
sides of the debate using a number of tools including argument mapping. These parts
introduce legal aspects of computing; most notably the Regulation of Investigatory
Powers Act, the Computer Misuse Act and the Data Protection Act (including GDPR);
the latter two are explored using the extended case study of the 2016 hack of
TalkTalk - a topic with which most students will be familiar, even if they did not
know what actually happened.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Mike's
final part for TM112 is an exploration of freedom of speech and censorship. Using
John Perry Barlow's <em>Declaration</em> as a starting point, Mike asks
students to question what is meant by freedom of speech and how censorship takes many
forms; from government intervention (such as in China), through self-censorship and
the role of algorithms to generate filter bubbles of information. Students engage
with these contexts by researching scientific papers on the role of search engine
rankings on vaccination information and political candidates, as well as studying
how algorithms on social media distort people's view of breaking, controversial
news stories.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Moving
on from TM112, Mike is going to be looking at developing hands-on cybersecurity teaching
for OU students and exploring the potential for more problem-based approaches to teaching
and assessment. Though he is secretly hoping someone from Marvel will call and offer
him the role of Tony Stark if Robert Downey Junior ever gets bored.</p> |
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Mike Richards |
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mr42 |
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Description |
<p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande",
Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Mike Richards joined
The Open University in 1996 to help trial teaching over the Internet. Since then he
has taught courses ranging from an introduction to robots to the engineering works
of Leonardo da Vinci; but has spent most of his time writing about security - everything
from the Enigma machines to e-shopping. </p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px;
font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:
12.800000190734863px;">Mike started by supporting a small group of pioneering students
and associate lecturers - using sluggish modems and primitive browsers to connect
them with a purpose built server running on equal mixes of scripting languages, prayers
and swearing. From these trials, Mike joined the team that presented M206, the Open
University's first computing module designed for online study. It wasn't just
the students who learned a lot - Mike realised that sites with tens of thousands of
users, hundreds of pages and huge numbers of changes really needed better technology;
so two years later he created the OU's first interactive module site built using
ColdFusion database integration that allowed students to report issues and receive
regular email updates.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">In this
time, Mike was also working with the BBC on material for the series'People's
War' about the experiences of those who lived and fought in the Second World War.
He developed and presented teaching material relating to the pioneering cryptography
that took place at nearby Bletchley Park.'People's War' became a road-show
that took exhibits to locations across England during which Mike was invited to speak
about code breaking and the work of Alan Turing.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em
0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Clearly, he didn't have enough to do, so Mike
was next set the task of working on the educational potential of robots. As well as
developing OU teaching materials about LEGO MindStorms, Mike took robotics into
schools in the Milton Keynes area as well as helping officiate in the RoboFesta
educational movement. This was his first introduction to the concept of teaching computer
programming using blocks; an idea invented by the MIT Media Lab - pay attention this
becomes important later.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">A short
break from teaching computing had Mike work on an OU short-course about the lesser-known achievements
of Leonardo da Vinci. Intended to accompany a major BBC documentary series, the tie-in
OU materials became one of the most successful promotions the university has
ever produced. Mike's contribution to the new course included the engineering
concepts behind Leonardo's unbuilt Galata Bridge and his colossal Sforza Horse.</p><p
dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial,
Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Back in the world of Computing,
Mike was assigned to the team developing the OU's first computing course designed
for absolute beginners; M150. He wrote material describing the workings of the
world-wide web, the importance of markup languages such as HTML and XML as well as
developing a range of activities to allow a huge number of students to begin
exploring their potential as authors of web materials. Still on M150, he wrote the
first substantial material about the role of cryptography in modern society and the
ethical issues of computer technologies as they relate to intellectual property. A
pattern was beginning to emerge.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Around
this time, Mike made his first inroads into working with the BBC as an academic consultant
for factual programming developed in conjunction with the Open University. Gone
were the days of kipper ties and wonky blackboards. In were world-spanning adventures
with shiny new presenters. The first project Mike worked on was <em>The Virtual
Revolution</em> broadcast in 2010 that introduced BBC2 audiences to the people
who invented the Internet, the WWW and who were developing the services that we now
all rely on. <em>Virtual Revolution</em> went on to win digital Emmys and
BAFTAs; someone neglected to invite Mike to the parties.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:
1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Instead, Mike was doing something really dumb -
he said <em>'I have a great idea!'</em> - and someone in power gave
him the money to create a new level one module, TU100, based around the infant
technology of ubiquitous computing (the internet of things). Before the iPhone was
even a thing, Mike's team were developing radically new teaching materials to
explore the potential of this technology using hands-on learning that had been pioneered
by children's education. Using his experience of the LEGO Mindstorms technology,
Mike went to MIT Media Lab to ask if the OU could use their Scratch programming language
in the context of adult learners. MIT were delighted to help and so Sense was born
- an internet connected drag-and-drop language that could communicate with sensors.
The sensors were supplied by the SenseBoard, a plug-in USB board based on Arduino
technology developed especially for TU100. As well as leading the team, Mike authored
a sizeable part of TU100, including sections exploring the potential of ubiquitous
technology to change the world (and we still managed to undersell it), the digital
divide and was a co-author on the programming guide that allowed novices to become
confident programmers using Sense and the SenseBoard to explore their world
and communicate their findings to fellow students. TU100 saw OU staff sent
to every corner of the world from Seattle to Iceland to Nepal in order to show how
technology was changing people's lives - for good and for bad; and how different
societies employ technology in different ways. TU100 went on to win a number of teaching
awards and was taken by many thousands of students.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:
1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">After handing over TU100, Mike was put to work performing
an academic edit on the OU's novel computer forensics module M812. Mike's
role was to consolidate the writing of a number of staff, to reduce its overall
length, impose a pedagogy and develop a technology primer for students less familiar
with some aspects of computer technology such as computer operating systems and
encryption (there it is again).</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Mike
and Arosha Bandara jointly developed Computing's first MOOC on the Open University's
FutureLearn platform. Their <em>Introduction to Cyber Security</em>, sponsored
by the then Department of Business, Innovation and Skills and supported by the MoD,
Cabinet Office and GCHQ supported government campaigns to increase computer security
awareness amongst the public and business alike. Over eight weeks of study, novices
are introduced to key cyber security concepts as well as a range of techniques to
improve their own security and their ability to find reliable information. During
four years of presentation, the course has been studied by more than 203,000 learners,
adopted by a number of institutions including the Metropolitan Police, GCHQ itself
and Crown Estates; and nominated for education awards. Mike and Arosha later worked
with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Qatar University to develop an Arabic-language
version of the MOOC. The MOOC has also been converted into a self-study course hosted
on the Open University's OpenLearn service. Following the introduction of
the MOOC, Mike was invited to join a United Nations panel developing cybersecurity
awareness in sub-Saharan East Africa.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">During
this time, Mike was also working on several projects with the BBC; including the six-part
BBC News series, <em>Cybercrimes with Ben Hammersley</em>, which became the first
OU programme to be available on Netflix; and <em>Game Changers</em> - a
dramatisation of the development of <em>Grand Theft Auto</em> starring Daniel
Radcliffe. Mike later had an 18 month secondment to act as a liaison between
the OU and BBC for the development of new television and radio programming.</p><p
dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial,
Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Returning to teaching, Mike
found himself joining two teams each producing one-half of the replacement for
TU100. For TM111, Mike's involvement has been to write material explaining the
concept and use of data from the very simplest spreadsheets through to the processing
of'big data'. He is particularly proud that he spotted the use of big data
in American elections nearly two years before anyone had heard of Cambridge
Analytica. His second contribution to TM111 was an introduction to algorithmic thinking
which is conducted entirely through playful activities using pieces of paper,
coloured pens and pencils. This material compliments video resources from the BBC
TV programme <em>The Secret Rules of Modern Livin</em>g developed during Mike's
time working with the BBC.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">At the
same time, Mike was working on TM112 where he is the author of six weeks of study
concentrating on the social aspects of computing - in particular computer security.
Beginning with an introduction to the threats facing every computer user, Mike leads
the student from how simple spam messages are the tip of an iceberg of computer crime
and the involvement of state players in such threats as the Stuxnet attack on Iran.
Students are encouraged to proactively explore beyond the teaching materials, to research
and evangelise the role of computer security. In the second and third parts,
students learn about hashing and encryption and how they are used (and abused) to
secure and authenticate data. The material is explored in the context of everyday
activities such as online shopping - showing how technologies such as TLS/SSL are
built on the fundamental building blocks introduced earlier; as well as the currently
fashionable/snake oil of blockchain technologies.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em
0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Moving on to parts three and four of Mike's
contribution to TM112; he introduces the Tor network and guides students through the
Darknet - what it is, why it isn't all bad and why it is both liberating and scary.
During these parts, Mike begins to introduce the ethical aspects of computers - encryption
keeps us safe and simultaneously threatens us. Attempts to legislate acceptable content
and encryption are discussed and students are expected to develop arguments for both
sides of the debate using a number of tools including argument mapping. These parts
introduce legal aspects of computing; most notably the Regulation of Investigatory
Powers Act, the Computer Misuse Act and the Data Protection Act (including GDPR);
the latter two are explored using the extended case study of the 2016 hack of
TalkTalk - a topic with which most students will be familiar, even if they did not
know what actually happened.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family:
Tahoma,"Lucida Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Mike's
final part for TM112 is an exploration of freedom of speech and censorship. Using
John Perry Barlow's <em>Declaration</em> as a starting point, Mike asks
students to question what is meant by freedom of speech and how censorship takes many
forms; from government intervention (such as in China), through self-censorship and
the role of algorithms to generate filter bubbles of information. Students engage
with these contexts by researching scientific papers on the role of search engine
rankings on vaccination information and political candidates, as well as studying
how algorithms on social media distort people's view of breaking, controversial
news stories.</p><p dir="ltr" style="margin: 1em 0px; font-family: Tahoma,"Lucida
Grande", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.800000190734863px;">Moving
on from TM112, Mike is going to be looking at developing hands-on cybersecurity teaching
for OU students and exploring the potential for more problem-based approaches to teaching
and assessment. Though he is secretly hoping someone from Marvel will call and offer
him the role of Tony Stark if Robert Downey Junior ever gets bored.</p> |
| 126722a57fca65316bcd5aa2ed2c91ca |
in dataset |
oro |
| 126722a57fca65316bcd5aa2ed2c91ca |
in dataset |
profiles |