From miles.ellis@etrc.ox.ac.uk Fri Apr 6 12:54:55 2001 Received: from oxmail.ox.ac.uk (oxmail4.ox.ac.uk [163.1.2.33]) by dkuug.dk (8.9.2/8.9.2) with ESMTP id MAA89744; Fri, 6 Apr 2001 12:54:55 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from miles.ellis@etrc.ox.ac.uk) Received: from heraldgate2.oucs.ox.ac.uk ([163.1.2.50] helo=frontend2.herald.ox.ac.uk ident=exim) by oxmail.ox.ac.uk with esmtp (Exim 3.12 #1) id 14lTEf-0005oh-00; Fri, 06 Apr 2001 11:12:57 +0100 Received: from com1.etrc.ox.ac.uk ([163.1.85.1]) by frontend2.herald.ox.ac.uk with esmtp (Exim 2.02 #1) id 14lTEf-0005Zm-01; Fri, 6 Apr 2001 11:12:57 +0100 User-Agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.02.2022 Date: Fri, 06 Apr 2001 11:12:57 +0100 Subject: Miles is leaving Oxford! (Well, the University, anyway) From: Miles Ellis To: External email contacts Message-ID: Mime-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Dear friend, Please forgive the impersonal nature of the above salutation, but I am sending this email to everyone in my email address book or who has recently sent me email. If anyone receives more than one copy please also accept my apologies. I am writing to tell you that after 17years (and 13 days!) at the University of Oxford I shall be taking early retirement on April 13th. My decision to take early retirement was brought about mainly as a result of the strongly expressed view of the University's ICT Committee over the last couple of years that Oxford cannot justify a central video/multimedia/audiovisual service - particularly following the reorganisation of the structure of the University last year which, it was felt, highlighted the so-called top-slicing of funds for central service departments. I disagree with this view, especially in a period when all educational establishments should be paying more attention to the benefits to be gained from the use of multimedia technologies in their teaching, but the current financial position of Oxford, in common with most other UK Universities, means that a perceived financial saving almost always takes priority over anything else (:-<). Nevertheless, due in part to my contractual situation, the University was not proposing to take any drastic action unless I approved of it - although that might have resulted in a somewhat uneasy relationship, to put it mildly! However, last year the University introduced a new scheme to encourage staff to leave (as being the only way in which costs can be seriously cut :-<) and this has enabled me to take early retirement on financially acceptable terms. As a result, on the same day that I retire, my department, the Educational Technology Resources Centre, will cease to exist - although pressure from some of our users means that the department's core video production unit will remain in existence as the new Media Production Unit within the University's Public Relations Office. I had anticipated a quieter period, with just a bit of freelance work, but I was both surprised and gratified to find myself the object of two, rather different, approaches when it became apparent that I would probably be leaving the University. Although both offers were attractive, one of them seemed to offer a more interesting and challenging future, and from April 17th, therefore, I shall be taking up a new appointment with an investment fund specialising in the Telecommunications, Media and Technology sectors, where I shall have particular responsibility for investment and related activities in the Online Learning area. As part of this overall responsibility I shall be managing a start-up company called Blue Chip Learning, which will be based in Oxford. We have not yet finalised details of my new office, and so I cannot give you my new telephone number or postal address at this time. However my new email address, from 17th April, has already been set up and will be although my existing email address will continue to work for a while - probably until the end of the current academic year. I shall send you all another message when everything has been sorted out, and hope to keep in contact with many of you in my new job. But I thought that I should let you know of my new email address from April 17th in case any of you wish to communicate with me before my full revised contact details are available. With my best wishes to you all, Miles -------------- Dr Miles Ellis Director: Educational Technology Resources Centre University of Oxford, 37 Wellington Square, Oxford OX1 2JF, ENGLAND Telephone: +44 1865 270528 Fax: +44 1865 270527 Email: Miles.Ellis@etrc.ox.ac.uk miles@oph.u-net.com (home) WWW: http://www.etrc.ox.ac.uk/information/staff/Miles/Miles_Ellis.html