NSS 2012 and student engagement by Dr Karen Ayres and Dr Paul Glaister

By edwardwhite Comment Closed

Late in September 2012 we received our National Student Survey (NSS) results: 98% overall satisfaction across the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, including a perfect 100% for our BSc Mathematics programme, putting us (obviously) first place for all G100 courses, and second place in the Mathematics and Statistics (JACS code 3) table. A number of factors will clearly influence student satisfaction, but one thing we have always prided ourselves on is providing a friendly and supportive environment, and on fostering a strong learning community. In the last couple of years we have enhanced this further, to start to embrace all that is good about the principle of student engagement. We feel this is likely to have had a positive effect on the NSS results, though that was never a reason for our actions.

For example, with a large School we were finding that the Staff Student Liaison Committee (SSLC) was developing a more formalised reporting structure, and being dominated by some particularly vocal groups of students, focusing on modular issues that had little or no overlap with the majority of our students who were there. So to amplify the student voice in our Department, we took the decision in 2010 to create smaller, informal, Part-specific Staff Student Forums (SSFs) alongside the SSLC, which effectively act as focus groups. They are deliberately kept small to give everyone the chance to have an equal say, and include us both in our senior Teaching & Learning roles. Students feel relaxed enough to say what they like, and we discuss the issues, annotating the minutes with any actions taken after the meeting, and the minutes then feed into the wider SSLC.

Going further with student engagement, in April/May 2011 we conducted two surveys, one of our Part 1 students [1], and one of our Part 2 students, specifically to seek their views on the structure of their programme, so that those views might inform changes that we were considering. As a result of their responses we have successfully restructured our Part 1 tutorial format this year along the lines of the most popular choice. We have also set up a Teaching & Learning seminar series within the Department this year, which we feel is a unique selling point for us, since it is open equally to staff and students to attend and to present on T&L issues (the format being a short talk followed by discussion amongst the audience). About half of the presenters are students, who have identified their own issues to talk about.

In summary, we feel that high student satisfaction scores will most naturally arise out of an environment where both staff and students feel satisfied with the curriculum and the structure of programmes, and where a friendly dialogue is maintained. We’re ultimately all in this together, and a partnership approach can only help take us forward.

[1]          Glaister, P., Glaister, E.M. and Ayres, K. L. (2012) Engagement ‘with’ or ‘by’ students: two sides of the same coin. MSOR Connections 12. URL: http://mathstore.ac.uk/headocs/Connections_12_2_Glaister.pdf

Developing students’ digital skills through placements – Maximising student engagement by Rachel Glover

By edwardwhite Comment Closed

I have previously blogged about my trip to ALT-C in Manchester. In the same week I went to the RAISE Conference in Southampton. The Researching, Advancing & Inspiring Student Engagement day was my first opportunity to speak about some of the findings of our research so far.

At the last-minute, my supervisor Nadja Guggi had to take sick leave, but I felt confident enough to talk about our research and step up to the challenge of delivering our presentation on ‘Developing students’ digital skills through placements’  on my own.

RAISE presentation

I focused on five key areas that had stood out for me so far, addressing each theme in turn: confidence, time, participation, social media and value.

After my presentation I opened the floor to questions. This was a particularly valuable experience. One member of the audience queried a point I had made about students’ social media skills. With hindsight, I could have made a clearer distinction between skills and practices – the difference knowing how to use social media, and using social media in a professional context, as part of a communication strategy. This is something to take forward for future presentations.

RAISE Students

Another delegate wanted to know if I had asked students about how they initially heard about their placement opportunity. I had indeed done this, with the majority of students hearing about the placement from a friend. The delegate had also done some research with similar findings. It was really valuable to hear about other research projects and to discover similarities between them.

See the clip below for a summary of the common themes addressing my RAISE presentation. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90-WurbS5-4&feature=youtu.be

Teaching and Learning Away Day Reflections by Dr Cindy Becker

By edwardwhite Comment Closed

As usual, it was great to see so many colleagues at a Teaching and Learning away day – it always reminds me how much we all care about this important aspect of our lives as academics. I enjoyed this session especially because I met several colleagues with whom I have never worked before. Two of us even discussed the possibility of a joint module.

I was a little disappointed that the day did not relate as much to Part One engagement as I had expected. I was expecting to hear lots of ideas about how departments other than my own keep their Part One students engaged and enthusiastic. Having said that, I enjoyed the chance to consider how students might engage with all aspects of university life and I will raise some of the ideas generated by the day with colleagues in my department.

Response to Student Engagement Event: A Students’ Union perspective

By edwardwhite Comment Closed

The 2nd May saw CDoTL host an exciting event billed as ‘Exploring Student Engagement at Reading and Beyond’. Attending as a students’ union staff member with a passion for student engagement on a local and national level, I was excited to get the chance to hear about different viewpoints and approaches – especially from Scotland, where I feel the funding climate means the pressures & priorities within Higher Education are slightly different.

Karl Hobley, the President of RUSU opened the event with a frank statement about the impending threats to quality engagement with students for the UK HE sector and passionately requesting that Reading lead the way in national debate on the matter. He stressed that discussions about ‘engagement’ can frequently focus on methods rather than results & stressed the importance of reacting to student input and ‘closing the feedback loop’.

The main speakers of the event (Dr. Catherine Bovill from University of Glasgow and Prof Peter Kruschwitz, Helen Bilton & Dr. Richard Mitchell from University of Reading) provided some varied and interesting perspectives on and methods of engaging with students in relation to curriculum design, student representation & red-flagging of issues. I particularly enjoyed Prof Kruschwitz’s light-hearted yet frank approach to the bureaucratic barriers to effective engagement (such as new module approval delays) and his statement that ‘working towards the equality of opportunity to participate is better than chasing the unrealistic goal of total participation’.

Dr. Bovill’s interactive session involved the audience discussing and ranking examples of curriculum design on her ‘ladder’ of student engagement. It was clear that Dr. Bovill had done (and published) extensive research on the matter, but I felt that there were few conclusions – the session led to further questions for most attendees. These included questions such as: ‘should students be able to design their own learning outcomes?’ The ensuing discussions failed to arrive at a consensus, but I believe this was Dr. Bovill’s intention.

A shining example of excellent representation work came from Helen Bilton of the Institution of Education, who provided logistical and evidence-based accounts of the way her Staff Student Liaison Committee functions. What was most apparent about Ms. Bilton’s departmental success was the amount of tangible changes that had been made as a result of student input – something that echoed Mr. Hobley’s comments on ‘closing the feedback loop’.

Dr. Mitchell presented some very interesting examples of the systematic tracking of individual engagement which has huge potential in being integrated with the RISIS database. Dr. Bovill voiced my own concerns at the binary nature of the system (students were either ‘engaged’ or not) but with some tweaks I am excited to see what this type of system might mean for an institution’s ability to correlate engagement with academic success.

Overall, the event raised very interesting questions as well as suggesting innovative answers to some existing ones. The audience was a refreshing mix of academics, administrative staff & students and the discussions brought to light some important ideas, questions and concerns for the future. The finest quote of the session was, in my opinion, from Prof Kruschwitz: ‘we need to empower students to take ownership of their brains and invest that power as they see fit’.

Emily Collins – RUSU

Response to Student Engagement Event: An academic perspective

By edwardwhite Comment Closed

Last month I attended the first part of an afternoon conference on ‘Exploring Student Engagement at Reading and Beyond’, which took place in the Agriculture Building at Reading University. Towards the end of Cathy Bovill’s excellent keynote talk I asked the following:

“Shouldn’t we be thinking about why we want to engage students in the curriculum? There seem to be two parallel agendas here. In the first, student engagement is an end in itself: it takes some control away from academics and demystifies the profession at the same time as it increases the influence and the responsibilities of students. In the second, student engagement is a means to an end since students will learn better if they have a bigger stake in the curriculum and understand how it is constructed.”

The question was poorly timed because the discussion had moved on to practicalities and away from the rationale for student engagement. I ought to have saved it up, if I was going to ask it all, for the closing session – but I had to leave before then. But I want to suggest here that the rationale for student engagement can affect the practicalities. A key issue for me here is who exactly we mean by ‘students’ when we talk about ‘engaging students’.

If we say that student engagement is a good in itself then this goes some way to explaining the increased presence of students in the University’s committee structures, including committees that control the curriculum – for example boards of studies and periodic review panels. But these offices are available to only a minority of students; and they tend to provide opportunities for those who are already keen and articulate. There is a clear gain for the University from having a student perspective in discussions; but the wider benefit to individual students is harder to track.

If however we say that student engagement has instrumental value in the learning process then this encourages lecturers to involve all their students in the management of teaching and learning. Plenty of this already goes on. When I supervise a third-year dissertation the student chooses the topic and frames research questions; so, with guidance, the student is responsible for setting some of the criteria for a successful piece of work. Perhaps there is room to do this in taught courses too, asking students not only what topics they want to cover but how and why; making them think what the learning outcomes will be.

All of which is to oversimplify some awfully complex arguments. I do not wish to suggest that my two suggested rationales for student engagement are in any way in competition with each other; or that there is only one way to realise either of these aims; or that there is no sense of continuity between engagement in the lecture room and broader curriculum planning. But it does seem to me that at the present time we need to have a conversation on what we mean by student engagement as well as how we expect to put it into practice. I am grateful to Cathy for starting it off.

Dr David Carter