W/B 16th January 2012

It seems like a long time since I updated this with Christmas and early january being quiet so apologies.

Learning Development Projects

Prior to Christmas the learning advisory group met to agree this year’s Learning Development Projects. This year these projects will run slightly differently with each school still having a project led by an academic but they will run as research projects and the funds will pay for students to undertake the research.

Here are the projects that have been agreed for this year

Project Leads	School	Focus of project
Ana Gaio	Arts Cultural Policy	Alternative forms of assessment
Ann Brown	Cass Business School	Assessment and Feedback approaches
Chris Smart	Informatics	Improving communication
Claire De Than	Law	Differences between internal and external student evaluations
Stephen Abbott	SHS	Students’ perceptions of assessment methods
Arti Agrawal	SEMS	Effective assessment
Stian Reimers and Elliot Freeman	Psychology Social Sciences	Expectation and reality in students’ satisfaction with assessment and feedback

It was agreed that many of these would be valuable projects and LDC was planning to use the final reports to draw together some across University information. We discussed dissemination of the projects and the showcase on 1^st February would be too early for these projects however the conference theme for June for the Learning at City conference is assessment and feedback and most of these could provide a paper at this with students presenting in the team. There was also a requirement for the projects final report to be written up so they could be published in the learning at city journal.

Student recruitment

Schools have been encouraged to recruit students themselves but we will do this if they do not have students and Keri is leading on this.

Budget

Each project has £6000 except SHS who has £8000 and CASS acknowledging the size of the schools. The money is to be used as follows: £1000 honorarium which is taxed to be awarded to staff after the dissemination at the conference and in the journal. There is £1000 for resources such as equipment, transcribing, going to an external conference etc which leaves £4000 for students to be employed. We would be paying students through their time sheets and they could do 35 hours per month projects should finish in July. This means schools can recruit more than one student to work on the project.

Funding is dependent upon the project holders achieving each stage of the project. If at critical points no progress has been made then funding to continue the project will not be provided beyond this point.

Deadlines and next Steps

January-February: scoping, research design

It is hoped the students will be in place for this time and the teams can then provide an outline of their projects in more detail ensuring the following is covered:

·Research question(s)

·Theoretical drivers/framework underpinning the project

·Methodology

·Clear outcomes

·Dissemination and possible applicability beyond your school

·Check on whether ethical approval needed for your project

Monday 27^th February 2012

Critical point here is to submit a project report which will be reviewed by Monday 5^th March to decide if the project funding will continue. The report should include the project outline including the full project team names including the students, the scoping and research design

March-June: implementation and dissemination to date

·Undertake the project collecting data and analysing data

·Prepare abstract and if accepted present at Learning at City Conference 13^th June

Monday 21^st May 2012

Critical point here is to submit a draft final report summarising the project to date with any findings or outcomes and highlighting the conference presentation to be given at the Learning at City conference. The report will be reviewed by Monday 28^th May to provide any feedback

July: evaluation, dissemination, planning phase 2

·Evaluation of your project

·Write the final report for publication in the Learning at City Journal

·Propose a stage 2 project if you believe there is scope to transfer this beyond your school

Monday 6^th August 2012

Critical point here is to submit a final report in a format for the learning at City Journal. The honorarium is dependent upon this.

We had not allocated mentors but I will talk to people over the next week to allocate these.

Monday 16^th January 2012

Today I attended the first Key Information Set (KIS) meeting. KIS data has to be produced for all undergraduate programmes running from September 2012. This is a HEFEC initiative and not optional. The groups role is to oversee this development and the group has membership from marketing, strategy and governance, IS, Academic Services, one ADE rep, Student Union and us.

In order to develop the KIS revisions will be needed to programme and module specifications. The sorts of data that is produced is focused on contact hours, fees, assessments, careers etc. The significant changes are that HEFEC have provided a set list of teaching and learning approaches that will be used by all and assessment methods. We cannot change these. In order for this work to be done all programme and module specifications will need revising and further information about this will be available by the end of February so once confirmed I will let you all know. These will all need checking and signing off in schools and then all post graduate programme and module specifications will also need revising ready to have all these on the web.

Tuesday 17^th January 2012

In the afternoon Annemarie, Olivia, Neal and I as mentors met with the Learning Development Associates (LDA) to discuss their progress since appointment in October and to discuss their future plans. Each LDA this year is focused on one of the SLE themes and whilst starting their work in their school they are expected to also consider how whatever they have focused on will transfer to other areas of the university. Here is an outline of what was discussed for each of the LDA’s and their role.

Lorna Saunder – Communication and Collaboration

Lorna has chosen to focus on school communication difficulties with staff off site but this also has relevance to visiting lecturers. Lorna decided to set up a module in moodle for communication. She did explore other platforms such as my city but this was felt to be more appropriate at present. The moodle space was to enable sharing of information and this could be in video, postings and discussion boards. Lorna has found however that staff have been reluctant to use this although the number of staff who have been lurking has increased. Lorna has also trialled audio of team meetings but there were issues with this so this has stopped. There is going to be a twitter feed for this and guides to what to post here. Lorna plans to continue with exploring good practice and barriers and look at what other modes could be used. Olivia is Lorna’s mentor for the project and meets her regularly for this.

Chris Wiley – Assessment and Feedback

Chris has been undertaking arrange of activities exploring what is already available on assessment and feedback but also exploring aspects such as the NSS etc to see what needs to be focused on. Chris has been considering undertaking a project particularly focused on feedback and criteria and is in contact with the student Union who also have an interest in this area. Chris has been exploring what is available elsewhere as well and what conferences are examining. Chris is being mentored by Neal.

Angela Dove – Learning Environments and Curriculum Development

Angela has two posts and so is trying to balance how she manages this. In terms of learning environments she undertook some activities with Rae for the pilot learning spaces which are now available and has posted a vignette on this activity. Angela is considering how this work can be extended throughout City so others exploring their learning spaces. Angela for this aspect of her role is mentored by Annemarie.

Angela’s curriculum role has led her into looking at Cass for examples of good practice in curriculum which can be posted on the Vignettes blog but also exploring the module she was involved in developing last year which is management practice and skills re-design which is part of one of the U/G programmes. Angela is currently looking at why they re-designed and what was different. A case study is being written for JISC about this. I mentor Angela for this part of her role.

All the LDA’s have been asked to publish regular case studies for their role on the vignettes blog. I also have some funding for them to attend small conferences. We will all meet again in April once a date is agreed.

Anise Update

Many of you saw Anise when she was in the office which was great.  Anise will be having her last chemo on 13^th February and will have 5 weeks of radiotherapy. Although Anise will then continue to have some treatment until Christmas she hopes to return to work in May. Anise will however pop when to catch up with people prior to then as and when she is able.