Create. Share. Engage.

What did Prof Dr Mark Brown learn about portfolios in his 21+ years of experience at Massey University and at Dublin City University , working with Mahara? He highlights three lessons: Be clear about the purpose of the portfolio. Support from the institution's leadership. Embed portfolios into programme-wide assessment. Mark advocates for learners to retain the ownership of their portfolio. M...

Penny Leach, MA , from Catalyst , interviews podcast host Kristina Hoeppner, MA , on her time on the Mahara project since mid 2010, her experience working on Mahara and supporting organisations around the world in their portfolio implementations. Resources European Language Passport and European Language Portfolio Event 'Celebrating and sharing ePortfolio practice' , for the 10th anniver...

Christa Matlack, MSc , and Associate Teaching Prof Dr Rebecca Thomas from Bucknell University help students go deep into their reflection in their portfolio. They use the Taxonomy of Reflective Inquiry (TORI) to build their prompts for their students. Students can also use OpenAIR , the Open AI Resources, to use generative AI tools to help them with their reflection. The AI does not do the reflect...

Artificial intelligence, in particular generative AI, can produce writing that - at first glance - looks polished. But does that indicate that a student has learned? That this is their own experience? Teaching Professor Dr Theresa Conefrey from Santa Clara University in California, U.S.A., is all for her students using AI to support their writing, to tweak it, and to find ways to express themselve...

Dipl.-Lehrerin* Enikö Parrag sees portfolios as vital educational practice in schools, vocational education, and beyond, especially at present when artificial intelligence can produce content easily. Portfolios are much more than an educational technology tool. They foster reflection, collaboration, and tell the learning journey of a student. Artificial intelligence can be used to augment portfoli...

Relational marking, a variant of negotiated marking, is part of the ungrading movement. It emphasises learning, regular feedback, and taking all of a student's work during a term into consideration. Thus, it is in direct opposition to anonymous marking where only the final output counts. Portfolios are very well suited for relational marking, and students - as well as faculty - reap enormous...

Professionals in the workplace can benefit greatly from portfolios. They can reflect on their practice, get feedback from colleagues, collaborate with others, and tell their whole learning story while also gaining a certification. Tabitha Parker, GradDipl HE , is an Education Consultant, Learning Solutions Architect, and Technical Lead working on large-scale change projects in the space of learnin...

Portfolio work can start at the school level and foster digital resilience through supporting students' technological adaptability, self-directed learning and metacognition, and critical digital engagement, says Molebogeng Esther Thage, MEd . She and Amokelo Given Maweya, MEd, developed a conceptual model to draw these connections and illustrate why portfolios are important in teaching and le...

Dr Heather Pate is a Lecturer in the Academic Practice Team, and Rebecca Scriven, SFHEA , is the Digital Learning Lead, both in the Centre for Learning and Teaching at Edith Cowan University (ECU). They are instrumental in supporting the curriculum shift to a programmatic approach to learning that centrally features portfolios. In this episode, they talk about how portfolios were used at ECU in th...

Prof Dr Candyce Reynolds ( Boise State University ), Prof Dr Debbie Oesch-Minor ( Indiana University Indianapolis ), and Dr Helen L. Chen ( Stanford University ) were on the organising teams of the AAEEBL Annual Meeting and / or AAEEBL Symposium , held in June 2026. In this episode, we look back at these two events, what we are taking away from them, and share what some of the plans are for the As...

Developer Doris Tam, BE , and Senior Visual Designer Evonne Cheung, BDes , from Catalyst IT talk about the redesign of Mahara that went live at the end of April 2026. The redesign marks a milestone in the almost 20-year history of the Mahara project. It overhauled the look and feel of Mahara entirely, aligning it to modern principles of design-led and responsive web design. This makes it easier fo...

Host Kristina Hoeppner looks back at the advice that the learning designers, faculty, and students from the past year have for learners who create portfolios. Their advice can be put into five different categories: Authenticity and identity Embracing creativity and risk Purpose and audience Reflection and growth Ownership and pride Interviews in alphabetical order: Amy Cicchino and Brandi Gilbert...

Dr Rob Lowney , SCMALT, SFHEA, SFSEDA, is a Senior Learning Technologist in the Teaching and Enhancement Unit at Dublin City University in Ireland. He's been working with digital technologies for many years and supports students and staff at DCU in their work with them. Rob is also active in the Mahara and Moodle communities because DCU contributes knowledge and features that benefit everyone...

Take out your planner or open your digital calendar and get ready to enter the upcoming events that give you the opportunity to chat with other portfolio practitioners because you don't want to miss any of them. There's a mix of Mahara focused events and wider portfolio community events and a mix of free and paid-for events. Here they are in chronological order: May 2026 6, 7, and 12 May...

Pablo Avila, MA , is the Associate Director of The Center for Teaching and Learning at LaGuardia Community College (City University of New York). He's been creating portfolios and supporting students and faculty with their own and the strategic implementation of portfolios at LaGuardia since 2008. In this episode, Pablo talks about his own portfolio journey, how it influenced his work with po...

Associate Prof Dr Amy Cicchino , the Director of the Writing Center at the University of Central Florida , is back for another interview. This time it's all about student support and the student perspective. Two of her students, McKenna Slaughter, BA, and Nghi Chau , join her to talk about their experiences creating portfolios themselves in the Department of Writing and Rhetoric and as Gradua...

Associate Prof Dr Mpho-Entle Modise and Prof Dr Norm Vaughan are the editors of the book ' Digital resilience of ePortfolios during and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic: Lessons for the future ', which was published in 2025 and brought together 85 authors from around the world who shared their diverse portfolio stories. In this episode, Mpho-Entle and Norm share highlights from this publishi...

Dr Vickel Narayan is a Senior Lecturer in Digital Learning in the Institute of Education at Massey University in Aotearoa New Zealand. He's been working with portfolios for nearly two decades at various institutions of higher and tertiary education in Aotearoa and Australia. Vickel shares his thoughts around the use of artificial intelligence, in particular large language models, in education...

Dr Megan Mize is the Director for ePortfolios and Digital Initiatives in the Academic Success Center (ASC) at Old Dominion University (ODU). She's been supporting portfolios at ODU since 2012 and is currently involved in a couple of strategic initiatives at her university that incorporate portfolios to support students. Resources Monarch Humanities Internship Academy ODU General Education Ref...

Yvonne Moore, MA , is the Digital Education Developments Lead, and James Pearce, BA , is the Educational Software Development Manager in the Centre for Learning & Teaching at University of Bath . They support faculty at the university to implement educational technologies meaningfully and effectively - Yvonne from the pedagogical side and James from the technical side. The university has been...

Prof Dr Debbie Oesch-Minor and her student Salsabil Qaddoura from Indiana University Indianapolis talk about portfolios at IU Indianapolis, in particular in Debbie's composition course that Salsabil took where she created a portfolio that showed her the power of this practice. Debbie shares her reasons for working with portfolios and supporting other faculty and students in the portfolio proc...

Associate Professor Dr Jaye Ryan, SFHEA , headed the nursing ePortfolio programme at Birmingham City University (BCU) in the UK between 2010 and 2019. She supported students and staff in creating ePortfolios and introduced Student Academic Mentors ePortfolios (StAMPs) to help students as peers. In this episode, Jaye talks about the ePortfolio practice in her nursing programme, the challenges she f...

Soropepeli Ramacake , MSW Applied, PGDip in Supervision, Dip in Counselling, BTheology works at the University of the South Pacific (USP) in Fiji as Assistant Lecturer. He is also a PhD candidate at the University of Sydney. Soro uses Mahara as portfolio platform with his social work students who are on placement in various South Pacific countries, supporting them mainly from the distance. Resourc...

Associate Prof Dr Amy Cicchino , the Director of the Writing Center at the University of Central Florida and Brandi Gilbert , MPH, the Director of the Life-Health Sciences Internship Program at Indiana University Indianapolis talk about high-impact practices and how portfolios fit in. Resources Assessment Institute HIPs in the States AAC&U list of high-impact practices AAEEBL Digital Ethics Ta...

In this episode, podcast host, Kristina Hoeppner , MA, from Catalyst IT , picks out a few memorable situations from her recent trip to Europe in September and early October 2025. Resources MoodleMoot DACH MoodleMoot Global 2025 Kawaiicon Mahara UX review 2024 Mahara refresh mock-ups CPD enhancements Mahara subscription 'Mahara Ask Me Anything' sessions AMA on 25 November 2025 AMA on 16/1...