Rolling the DICE – Digital Innovation, Creativity and Enterprise at DCU Business School
DICE (Digital Innovation, Creativity and Enterprise) is a first year module in DCU Business school which has been developed and coordinated by Dr Theo Lynn and Roisin Lyons. It is in its third year of operation and annually involves over 350 first year and nearly 200 postgraduate students from the faculties of business and computing.
The module exposes participants to multiple modes of learning including online e-learning, mini-conferences, mobile app building, blogging and research posters. Students are specifically never ‘taught’ in conventional ‘classrooms’. Instead they are taught through team work, online learning, live webinars, project work and mini-conferences with speakers and attendees from the wider business community. The rationale is that all students should be exposed to industry and different modes of learning as early as possible. In doing so, students will gain insight into the reality of the business world while still developing their skills in key areas. More importantly, students can start identifying what types of learning work for them.
Students explore the themes (Digital Innovation, Creativity and Enterprise) through a variety of activities:4 mini-conferences in the Helix on Social Media, Mobile Marketing, Starting your own Enterprise and Cloud Computing and Commerce. Over 30 speakers and panellists participated in these conferences this year including Julie Sinnamon (Chief Executive, Enterprise Ireland), Bobby Healy (CTO, CarTrawler), Bobby Kerr (Chairman, Insomnia), Ciaran Mulligan (CEO, Blue Insurance), Karl Tyrell (CEO, Book-a-Bed) and many more.
Synchronous online learning on WordPress and Blogging and the completion of a personal blog on each of the mini-conferences.
PRINCE2 Project Management Foundation Level online e-learning course.
Participation in a cross-faculty team to develop a functioning mobile app. This year in association with Microsoft student teams developed over 90 published Windows apps, each focusing on tourism for a different town or region in Ireland. Student teams are managed by postgraduate NGM students who benefit from the opportunity to study and apply their project management skills.
Participation in a cross-faculty team to progress understanding in mobile app development which utilised cloud computing technology, presented by means of a research poster.
Facilitated peer-learning sessions with postgraduate mentors
This year, a highlight was the industry collaboration with Microsoft where students designed and developed their own mobile apps receiving coverage in the Herald, the Irish Times and the Irish Examiner as well as the online publications TechCentral and IrishTechNews.
