This paper aims to contribute some reflections on the relationship between digitization in higher education and employees' experience of mastery, participation, and inclusion. The paper presents results from a survey on how university staff use and experience the institution's digital solutions, such as Canvas, Teams, Inspera, Panopto, Zoom, Microsoft 365, Leganto, and KI-chat services/language robots, etc.   

The intention of the survey is twofold:    

- To get an overview of the training needs of staff with research and teaching responsibilities related to digital tools, in order to better target training and support  

- To gain a better understanding of which factors (gender, age, language, views on teaching, employment conditions, etc.) may be significant for the individual's mastery of digital tools, and for the experience of digital inclusion at various arenas and levels.  

- Identify inclusion and exclusion processes and develop innovative measures to create good conditions for diversity.  

Other central guidelines are found in the Norwegian government's high ambition level for digitization and educational quality in the university and college sector. This includes strategies for competence development for employees and leaders (Ministry of Education and Research 2021, p. 27, 28). The Corona pandemic, combined with expectations from the students, has also led to expectations of more flexible digital solutions and educational offers.   

Such developments reflect how Norwegian and Nordic university and college employees (and employees in the labor market more generally) find themselves in the middle of what many call "the digital turn" (Fossland, 2015, p. 11; Buhl, Dille and Kårstein, 2023). Increasing digitization involves demands for increased digital competence; to be able to master, understand and apply technology in the activities they are involved in (Henderson et al., 2017; Selwyn, 2016). The Nordic network for adult learning points out that decision-makers responsible for digital education and competence development for adults have an explicit focus on and strategies for digital mastery and inclusion (Buhl, Dille and Kårstein, 2022, p. 11 and 17).   

In this context, more emotional aspects of digitization and restructuring are also central, something Hargreaves (1998) emphasizes: "Important as all this reform work is, many of those who initiate and manage educational reform, or who write about educational change in general, ignore or underplay one of the most fundamental aspects of teaching and of how teachers change: the emotional dimension" (Hargreaves, 1998, p. 835).   

With these issues in mind, the present paper addresses the following research questions:   

- What do employees experience as opportunities and challenges with various technological solutions - and why?   

- What significance does this have for the experience of inclusion and how they master their work?   

- Are there correlations between employees' experiences and factors such as age, gender, first language, views on learning and teaching, etc?   

- What do the employees think the institution can do to contribute to digital mastery and inclusion?  

Adopting a systems theory approach (Luhmann, 1995) as well as a socio-cultural approach (Wertsch, 1998), on learning and communication the research questions are investigated in terms of individual experiences of meaning, relevance and disturbances within different situated and digital practices, and communication systems. To be able to discuss digital inclusion and exclusion in higher education, we also draw on theories about this (Pietilä et al., 2021; Qvortrup & Qvortrup, 2016). 

This paper presents results from an online survey. This is conducted at a Norwegian university during the spring of 2024. The survey is directed towards a strategic selection of staff with teaching and research obligations. The survey consists of both open and closed response options. Respondents are encouraged to evaluate various services as most/least helpful (e.g., Canvas, Inspera, Teams, Panopto, Zoom, Microsoft 365, Leganto, and the college's own AI service) and justify why. Other key questions are what challenges the staff experience and what associations these experiences give about inclusion/exclusion. To gain more insight into which factors may be significant for the individual's coping and experience of the solutions, background variables such as gender, age, first language, employment conditions, views on teaching and learning, and their familiarity with the university's training/support apparatus are also examined. A broadly composed research group has collaborated on design, data collection, and analysis of results. The analysis of the survey aims to identify the extent and type of technology use as well as some main themes in the material. It is also a goal to map any correlations between the individual's experience of mastering the technologies, and variables such as gender, age, language, employment conditions, views on teaching and learning, etc. The study has been conducted in accordance with ethical guidelines at the relevant college. The study has been conducted in accordance with the ethical codes of the Norwegian Data Protection Services (SIKT). Our presentation will focus on results from a survey, but the plan is also to collect qualitative data in the form of interviews to gain a deeper understanding of employees' experiences. The interviews will both build on and supplement the survey. The interviews will be conducted in the fall of 2024 based on the results of the survey.

The paper presents and discusses results from a survey as part of a project aiming at examining how university employees experience and reflect upon a variety of digital resources in terms of perceived relevance, challenges, digital competences, and inclusion/exclusion. The main focus is on subjective experiences and interpretations of digital technologies in diverse educational activities. These are seen in relation to more contextual aspects to illuminate how such aspects influence employees' practice, roles, and experience of inclusion/exclusion. According to Buhl et al (2023), digitization and restructuring processes are shaped by "(...) several organizational conditions of which they are a part, and thus they change the individual's tasks, functions, roles, and professional identity" (Buhl et al., 2023, p. 10). In this project, we expect to gain a deeper understanding of how employees relate to the digital tools they are expected to use in their day-to-day work. Our initial hypothesis is that how different platforms are experienced, and what emotions and reactions they elicit, might be related to factors such as age, gender, prior experience, academic field, education, and length of employment. Moreover, these factors might influence not only how employees use and relate to these platforms, but also how they experience expectations towards their ability and efficiency in using them. The results from the survey will be important both as background for the qualitative interviews, but also as insight into how employees can and should be trained in the tools needed to do their work, and how we can avoid digital exclusion in the workplace.

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