Maren Deepwell

Author: Maren Deepwell

  • A moment of celebration

    A moment of celebration

    It’s my birthday at the end of this month, and I want to make the most of this moment of celebration in my life.

    Looking back

    The past year has been one of change for me, and A LOT has happened. Having so much going on makes it hard to recall and celebrate what I have accomplished and enjoyed. To make some time for reflection, I have looked back at photos from the past year, month by month, and picked one from each month from July ’22 to June ’23 that shows me doing something that I really enjoyed, a moment that stayed with me. I purposefully chose photos of only me, rather than including family and friends.

    What I noticed looking at those twelve photos is 7 of 12 photos are outside, on the beach and in the woods…, four pictures include the dogs (no surprises here), although there’s no pizza visible in any of the shots (atypical), ice cream and holiday cocktails do feature. They reflect the things that are important to me and things that I enjoy.

    I also made a list of things I’ve achieved in the past twelve months, which includes publishing my first book (a lifelong ambition), started running again, going to see live music and supporting my parents in a move from Britain to Germany.

    Looking at my list (20+ things in all), I had not appreciated how recently lots of things happened. Some of the things that I did last autumn seem much longer ago and similarly, some of the things I started to work on as recently as February now seem well established.

    • Most fun of all, this past year, has been embarking on more travel and holidays again, especially the trip to Greece with my partner, which was definitely the highlight of my year.
    • Most unexpected was becoming excited about seeing ice hockey locally in Cardiff!
    • Most hard won… that’s probably a tie between getting my first book published and completing my coach training and 50+ practice hours in my evenings and weekends.
    • Most creative… starting my first podcast and developing a podcast based course.

    Charting my course

    I have a five year plan that I find extremely valuable. I used a lot of the tools I trained in as a coach and applied them to my own values and vision, resulting in a comprehensive plan that covers everything from adventure to career, health and family. Some parts of the plan are mine alone, others focus on goals shared with my partner.

    On the career front, major change is happening: after 15 years in the same organisation, I am now only three months away from starting a new self-employed career, so that’s an exciting and somewhat scary prospect.

    I didn’t accomplish everything that was on my plan for the past year, some goals changed or were abandoned all together, but overall I followed the direction I set out in and I am really happy with my progress. I’m proud of what I’ve achieved.

    Here’s to what’s next

    The past twelve month felt hard. It took so much energy and time and effort to achieve the things I wanted to achieve, to move ahead with what’s important to me. It had huge moments of joy and fun and yet it felt like a grind a lot of the time.

    It feels good to let go of all that effort. Those days are behind me, the effort spent and the goals accomplished. Having done what I set out to do, now I am set for a year of… creativity.

    I’m going to do less heavy lifting and succeeding by sheer determination alone and find more balance. I am looking forward to re-imagining my daily and weekly routine as I start a new chapter in my professional practice, and I am excited about bringing creativity to all aspects of my work and play. I will prioritise my physical and mental health and enjoy the outdoors on walks and runs and in all seasons.

    Here’s to year year that lies ahead. A brand new chapter.

    Photo credit: Photo by Amy Shamblen on Unsplash

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  • Thank you #EDEN2023

    Thank you #EDEN2023

    I had a fabulous time at the EDEN Annual Conference, and really enjoyed giving my keynote on Tuesday. If you’d like to revisit the talk, you can explore the slides and a summary or watch the recording on Youtube:

    It’s been inspiring and motivating to have input and feedback from so many delegates, and it was an honour to share the stage with so many brilliant speakers in Dublin.

    If you’re keen to catch up with talks and resources, revisit the conversation #EDEN2023, or watch one of the many videos available on the EDEN Youtube Channel.

    ALT and EDEN have much in common, and I enjoyed spending three days with colleagues from across Europe and many other parts of the world sharing practice and policy. It reminded me of how much we have in common and how much we can learn from each other if we take the time to do so.

    This was my first experience of the EDEN Annual Conference, but not my first time at DCU, this year’s host organisation, and I was very impressed by how welcoming and well-organised the event was. Dinner at the digital museum for immigration, EPIC, was a particular highlight for me.

    Image credit: with kind permission of Mark Brown, DCU / EDEN 2023.

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  • Hope on the Horizon. An EDEN Annual Conference 2023 Keynote

    Hope on the Horizon. An EDEN Annual Conference 2023 Keynote

    I am delighted to be one of the keynotes at EDEN’s 2023 Annual Conference at Dublin City University this year. The conference theme is “Yes we can!” – Digital Education for Better Futures:

    This theme focuses on the language of opportunity and challenges participants to dream big! While there are many big and small challenges that we can’t ignore in building a more inclusive digital future, the conference places the spotlight on the “art of the possible” in reimagining teaching, learning and assessment and delivering on the promise of better futures for all. We hope to encapsulate throughout the conference the spirit of hope and optimism through the enabling language of “yes we can”.

    My keynote talk (slides) sets out to find inspiration to create our visions of the future, without losing a critical perspective on digital innovation but with a renewed sense of hope and empowerment.

    Title: “Hope on the Horizon: Setting out in a New Direction for Digital Education”

    Abstract: Over the past five years we have seen digital education scaled up, with fully virtual, blended and hybrid learning expanding to more and more learners. As we move beyond education in crisis response mode, we have a unique opportunity to shape what’s ahead and also a responsibility to apply the lessons learnt in 2020/21.

    We saw what’s possible in an emergency, and also what isn’t. I want to acknowledge that we are seeking hope at a time when many are battling burnout, still picking up the pieces in a world in which many are still feeling the lingering impact of the global pandemic.

    How do we find optimism, and a vision for a better future? Grounded in new research from ALT, on how professional practice in digital education is changing, and aligned with the Framework for Ethical Learning Technology (FELT), I will explore:

    • Who has a say in shaping the future and whom we may be missing?
    • What the future will hold for our students moving from hybrid learning to hybrid working?
    • What do we need to consider in order to avoid going back as well as moving ahead into a future that doesn’t deliver?

    Let’s find inspiration to create our visions of the future, without losing a critical perspective on digital innovation but with a renewed sense of hope and empowerment.

    Maren Deepwell is the chief executive of the Association for Learning Technology, the leading professional body for learning technology in the UK with around 3,500 members. She has led the organisation since 2012 including a strategic transition to becoming a virtual team in 2018. Her particular focus is on professional recognition for learning technologists, the development of a new ethical framework for professional practice and the future of technology in education. As a trained sculptor and anthropologist, she brings both her creative and executive expertise to her professional practice as a leader, strategic adviser and coach.

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  • Running. Trials and tribulations.

    Running. Trials and tribulations.

    I have been blogging about getting back into running for the past two years. This journey back into running has felt really tough at times, and at the same time I am well aware that it doesn’t signify in the face of what many others face daily, especially in these often gloomy times.

    This is blogging as personal record keeping, and as such only really of interest if you are prepared to suspend the ‘so what!?!?’ instinct for a while.

    The story so far

    In 2021, I blogged about reclaiming my morning run, and making my way back to running… little did I know that shortly after I wrote those posts I would have to stop not only running but exercise all together for a long while. Then in December 2022 I tried to get back into it again… and now, six months later I have (I hope) finally reached a new milestone.

    Rather than blogging about hoping to get back into running, I am now actually running. Phew! and YAY!

    Last month I ran 5k for the second time this year and now I am back to running 3-4 times a week, slowly working my way up from 5k to 10k and beyond. I’m blogging about this (admittedly unimpressive) achievement not because of what I did, slowly plod along for 3 miles on a sunny Sunday, but because of what it represents to me: this run was very hard won.

    At the start of this year I finally recovered from a serious, year-long shoulder injury. It took far more time, money and effort to restore my shoulder to normal mobility than I ever imagined and once I was able to get dressed on my own again and attend a gentle yoga class, I assumed the job was done. I felt ready to return to my usual activities.

    As I’d kept working throughout most of the year that I was injured, taking some days off for hospital treatment and physio, and kept doing lots of things as normally as possible, it didn’t really sink in for a while how much strength, flexibility and fitness I’d lost overall, or how much physical confidence.

    Fortunately I can afford to keep going to see my physio every 4 weeks, and with his help I started the long journey back to being able to do things. Obviously day to day activities were the main focus of my recovery: being able to get dressed again on my own, getting things from kitchen cupboards.. being able to walk the dogs on my own. Being able to travel for work, carrying a laptop case and so on. Physical exercise however did and continues to play an important role as it helps not only my body but also my mental health.

    Running, which has long been my most effective coping strategy for a stressful and demanding week, started 30 seconds at a time. Then a minute. Then two.

    After 3-4 months, over the course of this spring, I got used to doing 30 min of exercise again. A big achievement. Although my phone unhelpfully reminded me that by every measure my efforts were ‘below average’, it meant a lot of progress for me. My yoga teacher was a big source of encouragement and helped me find some joy in moving my arms and legs, tentatively at first, fearful of pain and injury.

    Brief rant about sports bras

    Although I appreciate the sentiment that all you need for running is a pair of trainers and to head out of the door, my experience as a curvy middle aged woman has never really lived up to that. Anyone who’s ever wrestled into a sports bra with a 5 hook fastening at the back will appreciate that the combination of a shoulder injury that reduces mobility + getting back into running is not fun. I am still waiting for the promise of technology and design to deliver the hype that every single new overpriced sports bra promises for me and all the other people frequenting chat forums on chaffing and avoiding bounce.

    Mind AND matter

    I’ve always run for primarily my mental health, finding calm and release in the ritual of heading out in the mornings. In my most anxious years, I ran nearly every morning, capturing serene sunrises in all seasons. I also ran to raise money for the cancer charities supporting my mum’s recovery from lymphoma, and gradually half marathons became an achievable goal. Running felt empowering and gave me balance, as well as a connection to the outside world that I have missed a lot during the past few years when my weekly milage was low or nonexistent.

    Once I got some fitness back and managed to get out of the door regularly, I was expecting things to get easier, but my body and my mind were not happy to cooperate. I had every ache and pain in the book after just minutes of running and a sense of fear and panic that was not helpful at all. A mile seemed entirely unachievable.

    After a few weeks of being stopped in my tracks by this mental block, I tried a different approach: I tried a running meditation, headed out and had only one goal: run slowly for 5k and don’t stop no matter what. Slow down if you need to (I did) but do not stop. And… it worked. Mind AND matter, with a lot of help for the mind.

    Now, a few weeks on, I am back to a regular routine, a very gentle one, but a routine nonetheless, for the first time in a long time and it feels great. I am back to listening to music or just letting my thoughts wander, enjoying the feeling that I have a bit of my morning all to myself before another busy day begins.

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  • Meditation and mindfulness in a virtual team

    Meditation and mindfulness in a virtual team

    During the recent Mental Health Awareness Week, I looked for new tips and ideas for virtual and hybrid teams keen to embed mindfulness and meditation into their ethos.

    I’ve previously shared tips, which I have updated and included again below. This year my focus has specifically been on finding resources for meditation and mindfulness.

    Sometimes it can be most helpful to bring in external facilitators to lead this kind of work, and run live sessions for teams. One of the challenges however is to schedule these sessions at a time when everyone can attend and also find a format that meets the needs of diverse individuals.

    So instead of looking for a specific course or facilitator, I have been looking to find approaches that are easily available and accessible in a flexible way, so that colleagues can engage as and when they wish to. There are a lot of free resources online as well as specialised apps such as Headspace, Calm Business and Insight Timer for Work.

    We tried Insight Timer for Work and offered colleagues the opportunity to explore resources such as meditation recordings in a huge library of content available in 44 different languages. We are a small team, and as such as weren’t focused on creating a particular level of engagement or meeting goals. We don’t use the analytics that the platform can provide.

    Instead, we started to share content we came across that was helpful to us, and we organised an informal meet up for staff to spend 15-20 min online. To make this as flexible as we can, the format we adopted brings us together in a video call at the start of the session, and we say hello and check-in with each other. It’s encouraged but not required to share what 5 or 10 min track you are planning to listen to. Then cameras and mics are switched off, and everyone engages in their meditation or mindfulness activity. At an agreed time, we return to the video call, and reflect a little on how we got on.

    Scheduling the meeting provides a way to stay accountable to the intention to take a mindful break for those who want it, and is opt-in only. We decide each time if we want to meet again, and then put another date in the diary.

    It’s a small step, but a welcome reminder to take a breath in what is a very busy time indeed.

    More Tips for hybrid and virtual teams:

    • Create time and space to talk: For many people working from home seems to be a never ending marathon of back to back meetings in Teams or Zoom. That’s a tough context in which to create time or space to talk about mental health. I’ve often blogged before about different ways of working, around a document, whilst walking, offering time to reflect and write together… and you really need to find pockets of time and space that suit your team(s) in order to get meaningful conversations.
      In addition to weekly group meet ups, make time to have one to one catch ups and wherever possible don’t schedule meetings back to back for the whole day or week. Consider how you might use informal and formal spaces which are always there, such as chat channels, for meet ups, chat and conversations.
    • Read the signals: For some, what works for everyone else isn’t a good fit. That applies to in person management just the same, but I feel working virtually increases the danger of missing obvious signals. If you have just come from one meeting and the other person has done something different, it’s easy to talk at cross purposes. So if you are talking about personal stuff, asking about wellbeing or mental health, you need to be prepared to look out for subtle signals, including tone of voice or chat, body language and even emoji.
      It’s helpful to have a communication channel in which discussing sensitive topics is safe and personal. Or rather than changing how you talk, consider what else you can modify to create a different atmosphere: go for a walk and talk; or have a phone call with cameras off. We don’t always feel the same, so our working practice shouldn’t always be the same either.
    • Talk about mental health: aim to normalise talking about mental health in an appropriate way and check in on how everybody is doing regularly. Clearly sign-post ways to seek expert or confidential advice such as via HR professionals, at appraisals, through organised coaching, therapy and other support.

    Enjoyed this post? Then listen to my podcast episode on mindfulness and meditation:

  • ALT appoints new Chief Executive: Billy Smith

    ALT appoints new Chief Executive: Billy Smith

    We are delighted to update members that the Association has appointed Billy Smith as our new Chief Executive. 

    Since the announcement of this leadership transition in February, the recruitment panel, chaired by ALT’s Chair Helen O’Sullivan, has worked through a rigorous and competitive selection process that involved the staff team, Trustees and ALT’s HR and EDI advisors.

    Helen commented: 

    “Billy immediately stood out from the strong pool of applicants through his strong commitment to the values and principles of ALT as a membership organisation. His energy and enthusiasm impressed the Panel and we are confident that he is the right person to take ALT forward into the next phase of our development.”

    Billy will join the team in early August and formally take on the role of Chief Executive at this year’s Annual General Meeting, which will take place on Wednesday, 6th September 2023 during our Annual Conference in Warwick. The AGM will also be our opportunity to say thank you to Maren Deepwell, who will step down as Chief Executive on that date.

    We invite you to warmly welcome Billy together with our Members, staff and Board of Trustees. 

    Read the full announcement on the ALT website.