The Journal of Educational Innovation, Partnership and Change

Evaluation of short answer question assessment platforms through student-staff partnership

Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this paper we will report on a student-staff collaborative ChangeMakers project, ‘Evaluation of short answer question assessment platforms through student-staff partnership’.

The content of the project focused on the comparison of two platforms for in-course assessments (Moodle and WiseFlow). We evaluated the two platforms to investigate which one was preferred by the students. In addition, by conducting the project in partnership with all stakeholders that are directly involved in the delivery of assessments (module organiser, Digital Assessment Teams and students), we pioneered a student-staff partnership and established a mode of successful communication between the stakeholders. In the first part of the paper we will concentrate on comparing the two assessment platforms and in the latter part we will introduce our student staff partnership. The study used questionnaires given to the student cohort after each of the three in-course assessments, a focus group of 12 students of the first year Neuroscience cohort and wider cohort discussions outside of the structured focus group, which were communicated by text. We had recognised the problem of closing the feedback loop between students and staff and wanted to address it through the ChangeMakers project. To this effect we developed a space where the student voice was heard, feedback was directly implemented and continued student-staff dialogue was ensured.

Our results revealed that both platforms are fit for purpose, and we were able to identify specific features, e.g. word count and training, as beneficial to the student experience. In regard to the successful implementation of our project, key findings were the importance of a democratic partnership between all stakeholders, the fact that the stakeholders were trusted representatives of their cohorts, and in the case of staff that they had the power to make changes to procedures. This enabled the team to directly respond to recommendations by the students and to successfully close the loop between student feedback and response.

The project resulted in recommendations on short in-course assessment delivery that can be accessed and implemented by the wider UCL community, as well as recommendations for the successful design and delivery of student-staff projects. These can be applied across the higher education sector, and can serve as a framework for student-staff partnerships. The recommendations can be found at the end of the paper.

The Reflexive Relay: Using Reflexive Journals to Promote Student Agency and Staff-Student Syllabus Co-Creation

Geoff Bunn, Paige Livingstone — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this Case Study we report on an assessment that promoted student agency and inspired staff-student syllabus co-creation on a Level 6 undergraduate Psychology BSc unit. Representing 50% of the final mark of a Conceptual and Historical Issues in Psychology (CHIP) course, the Reflexive Journal required students to critically reflect on how the unit had impacted on their identity. In Part I of this report, Geoff, the unit leader, outlines the rationale for the Reflexive Journal. In Part II, Paige, a former student on the unit, writes a personal reflection on the effect the assessment had on her sense of self. After overcoming their initial anxieties about the process, students reported the sharing of personal stories to be enlightening and empowering. One student created a blog as a vehicle for publishing student narratives. The blog changed the scope and remit of the assessment. Another unanticipated benefit of the assessment was its ability to nudge students out of what Jacques Lacan (2007) called the ‘Discourse of the Master’ and into the more critically agentic ‘Discourse of the Analyst’. We have subsequently come to understand reflexivity as a disruptive but vital element of the student experience.

Co-chairing and co-creating in Staff-student Liaison Committees: the experience of co-creating and running a course for staff acting as co-chairs

Ana Cabral, Steph Fuller, Janet De Wilde, Marianne Melsen — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This case study presents a course co-created by staff and students to enable educators acting as chairs in staff-student liaison committees (SSLCs) to adopt a co-chairing approach and co-create change.

The design, facilitation, monitoring and evaluation of our course followed a co-creation approach. Partners included staff from the Queen Mary Academy, colleagues from the Professional Services and the Office of the Principal (Education), educators from the three faculties and student representatives from Queen Mary Students’ Union.

This case study is written collaboratively by staff and students and presents both perspectives on the successes, challenges and recommendations. We discuss the specific context required to promote a shift towards co-creation in institutional culture.

Making it Real : Towards Authentic Assessment at Masters Level

Mary Fargher — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This article critically explores the extent to which Geography Education masters students taking part in a UCL ChangeMakers project were given opportunities to connect their university studies and their Geography teaching. An adapted authentic assessment model was created to mirror workplace context. Students were given opportunities for higher order thinking through assessment design linking teacher choices, Geography subject knowledge and school student experiences. Staff and students made judgements on best practice together. Three stages of formative, summative and sustainable feedback were incorporated. Analysis of the findings of workshops and a focus group with 6 masters students indicates that such approaches can help students connect their masters studies with their work as teachers more authentically. Being challenged to apply theory and research more directly to their construction of the curriculum was reported to be a very positive experience for most students. ‘Critical moments’ between staff and students in judging best practice made feedback more meaningful for others.

Optimising student engagement with blended learning

Frederika Malichova, Barnabas Beres, Daniel Ward, Margaret Mayston — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Background: The evolving UCL Educational Strategy indicates that blended delivery of module content and assessment is the future of the academic landscape. Blended strategies implemented within UCL’s department of Neuroscience, Physiology and Pharmacology in the academic year 2021-22, yielded mixed results. We instigated a student-led review of student opinions on blended learning in Systems Neuroscience.

Method: Two module participants were selected from volunteers, to serve as student researchers (SRs) and led two semi-structured hybrid interviews with module participants, using Mentimeter to enable anonymous participation. Data were collected and analysed by the SRs.

Results: Half of the students who attended the interviews reported that the balance between in-person and pre-recorded content was appropriate, the other half said they would prefer more or entirely in-person learning. In-person Q&A tutorials created to support online lectures were generally negatively rated and poorly attended (reasons provided for poor attendance varied), performance in assessment linked to this aspect of the module also decreased (relative to years with in-person lectures and no Q&A tutorials). By contrast, lab visits (which were supported with online video tours), were well attended and positively rated by students.

Conclusions: Some students favour in-person teaching over a blended learning approach, but when the latter is pursued, we need to ensure that both in-person and online elements offer something that students value if we hope to maximise engagement and learning.

Baking in an ethos of partnership – an institution and student union’s approach to enhancing student representation and feedback mechanisms.

Maisha Islam, Dan Chevalier, Ben Robson — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This case study reports on an institutional approach to enhancing and addressing feedback loops at The University of Winchester and Winchester Student Union, specifically in reference to our largest student representation mechanism. This mechanism, our Student Academic Representatives scheme (StARS), is administrated by Winchester Student Union but employs a partnership model with the university. Drawing on Bols’s (2017) framework for effective student representation, we hope this paper, outlining our rejuvenated approach to the scheme, can support the development of others seeking to improve their own approaches by considering an ethos of institutional partnership and co-creation, namely in the context of a university and students’ union working collaboratively to fulfil such aims.

Students as Co-creators of an Online Assessment and Feedback Resource

Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The provision of high-quality assessment and feedback is integral to effective teaching and learning. However, it remains that students (certainly at university) are often least satisfied with assessment and feedback relative to other aspects of their experience. In the present study, we provide the first evaluation of a newly developed “Assessment Hub” (which included a range of innovative assessment and feedback resources): this was co-conceived and co-created by university students and their programme teams (i.e., university staff). An anonymous survey derived from a self-selective sample of undergraduate students revealed that the “Hub” was found to be clear and accessible, leading to a better understanding of assessment, marking criteria, and feedback, and supported student confidence towards completing assignments. Moreover, thematic analysis of open-ended survey responses identified three superordinate themes: Cognitive Benefits and Enhanced Understanding; Emotional Benefits: Raised Confidence and Reduced Anxiety; and Optimising the Range and Delivery of Resources. Taken together, the findings indicate that the “Hub” was successful in achieving its aims: to be a clear, supportive, and developmental assessment and feedback resource for students. Moreover, there would appear to be great benefit in involving students as partners/co-creators in the development and provision of assessment and feedback resources.

Reframing Success in A Pivoting Partnership – Student Mentors Trying to Engage: A Tale of Trial and Error

Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This case study focuses upon the work of our student-staff partnership project working together on a new elective first year module. Focusing on the role of student partners acting as peer mentors we aimed to support the transition of new students into university and provided a bridge into the Law School community.

Student partners attended online and in-person classes, offering support and feedback to first year students. However, they struggled to get the first-year students to engage with them; the community support and mentorship that our student partners felt had been missing from their own pandemic-impaired first-year experience, was not welcomed by the new cohort studying on campus with more in-person classes.

The student partners share their experiences of trying to engage first-year students to build a learning community. We highlight the way we pivoted our approach to meet student needs, with partners switching from mentoring to researching, to gain an insight into how the first years’ needs differed.

This case study reflects upon and reframes the definition of “success” in a student-staff partnership project. By learning from our experiences, follow how our partnership pivoted from its original aims, but managed to see the positives amongst the difficulties, not least the obvious “success” in the process of developing employability skills for the student partners involved.

University–Industry Collaboration: Preparing Doctoral Students Through Co-Created Project Based Learning

Laura Blackburn, Dr Valerie Blair, Dr Sivaramkumar Shanmugam — Thu, 28 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Student-staff partnerships enable shared decision making between students and staff in curriculum design. Through a partnership, student voice can be heard, which can be useful for checking learning outcomes and assessments meet the requirements of the learner. Engaging students in curriculum decisions empowers learners and can increase student-perceived and actual control of their education, also known as learner agency. The Doctorate of Physiotherapy (DPT) programme at Glasgow Caledonian University integrates the principles of student-staff partnership, with students encouraged to co-create curriculum. DPT staff foster a programme pedagogy with the aim of creating a ‘safe’ space to critically reflect, share experiences, take ownership of learning, and participate in co-creation to make sure the curriculum meets student needs. Graduates are developed with the aim to ensure they have the skills, knowledge, and behaviours necessary to meet current challenges of the physiotherapy profession. Although a young programme, graduates have achieved positions of advanced standing.

The programme can be considered the first of its kind with integrated components of research and professional development in a pre-registration degree. Professional development modules aim for student personal and professional growth through critical reflection and the completion of a project in partnership with academic staff and external stakeholders. Each project involves a university-industry partnership, with students designing and delivering quality improvement. Students co-create project methodology with academic and industry partners and through this novel opportunity, learn skills for leadership, teamwork, and project management in response to challenges faced in real life contexts. Industry partners have included heads of profession in the National Health Service, NHS Education for Scotland, and senior academics in university.

DPT staff apply a pedagogic approach to the project based on the principles of the Project-Based Learning, with students encouraged to take a leadership role, to develop enquiry skills and skills for knowledge development when approaching authentic problem-solving. Student projects stem from an industry question or problem, which requires innovative solutions and enhancements. All partners hold a personal stake in the outcome of the project. Industry partners are familiar with the problem or question which instigated the project and find meaning in the outcome. DPT staff also find value in the project as the university benefits from the collaboration and knowledge exchange with the industry. During the project, students learn new skills while using quality improvement tools and share this knowledge with industry partners, also benefiting from new skill development. Placing industry partners as assessors of the project allows quick changes to be implemented prior to the final submission of the project.

The current paper provides a case study of a unique university-industry partnership in a pre-qualifying doctoral programme. For illustration purposes, a vignette of a student quality improvement project offers context and an illustration of the innovative nature of the partnership. A student-staff partnership approach has been used in the authorship, with a DPT student, a DPT staff member, and a practice partner co-writing.

Reflecting with students as partners: wellbeing in architectural education

Alex Evans, Tom Hughes, Ana Souto — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This paper explores the development of Staff Student Partnerships (SSPs) on the undergraduate Architecture degree at Nottingham Trent University (NTU) and reflects on the partnership journey of a particular project: the introduction of curriculum changes relating to wellbeing and sustainability. Architecture degrees have traditionally focused on sustainable design approaches, but tend to dismiss their social aspect, especially in relation to wellbeing. The impact of Covid on students and academics brought to the fore the importance of wellbeing (‘a positive state experienced by individuals and societies’, WHO, 2021), both for our communities and as a design approach to be embraced in our curriculum.

In the institutional context of a course that has not undergone any major curriculum revisions since being professionally accredited in 2006, the authors have been involved in a series of interactions which have supported increasing student autonomy. These have culminated in a partnership project to review the curriculum and make proposals for changes aimed at embedding wellbeing and sustainability more deeply into teaching, pastoral and extra-curricular activities.

The authors’ journeys through these collaborations are presented as a case study, revealing ways in which the process has supported all parties in developing their understanding and practice. Staff have developed the curriculum to give more opportunities for students to engage with wellbeing and sustainability, and their teaching practices to ensure that this engagement is valued in the assessment process and their pastoral practices to support and value mentoring. Students have had the opportunity to engage with the development of their curriculum, and recent graduates have been involved in mentoring and wellbeing projects.

Auto-ethnographic reflection is used as a tool to analyse the participants’ experiences of this journey. This revealed some of the difficulties involved with introducing SSPs to the existing institutional structures, but also some of the potential for student and graduate-led activities aimed at starting a conversation around the issues of wellbeing. In conclusion, the advantage of a protracted journey for staff and students along the route to full partnership status is identified.

Rethinking Transformative Education.

Mara Torres Pinedo, Amanda Kartikasari, Ismat Zehra Juma, Hemant Kumar — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This case study examines the experience of a staff-student partnership to evaluate and co-design a postgraduate dissertation module. The article explores the motivations of students and staff for developing this partnership and its impact on participants' experiences in higher education. The article is based on The IGP Dissertation Workshop: Research as a Community Practice, a ChangeMakers project at University College London, where students and staff from the Institute for Global Prosperity (IGP) planned and developed a series of activities to improve research training as well as the academic and wellbeing support students get during the dissertation period. The project's reflections enriched previous conversations on module and programme improvements and the conviction that an authentic transformative education needs to be grounded in a constant horizontal dialogue between staff and students. This dialogical process enables a turn from dominant models of education where students are passive receivers of knowledge, which Paulo Freire (1970) called the "banking concept of education", and walks together towards a learning process where both students and academics teach and are taught while being co-responsible for their growth and transformation.

The IGP promotes the idea that innovation can serve social justice and equality and that different communities have different dreams and understandings of prosperity. With this project, we asked what prosperity and innovation would look like in a student's dissertation module while reflecting on the challenges and opportunities to nourish equity and inclusion in their learning journey. The project engaged well with IGP's ethos and commitment to transdisciplinary approaches to create prosperous futures for all.

The co-development of this case study provided a unique opportunity for the authors to explore the project experience and its influence on the continuous evaluation and improvement of the IGP dissertation module. Moreover, building on the project experiences, the article offers recommendations for co-design and co-creation partnerships to develop transformative postgraduate education.

Preface

Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Reflections on partnership and co-creation in an EU project: GNurseSIM Intercultural Simulation for Caring for Elderly Patients

Sheila Cunningham, Pam Hodge, Nora Cooper — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This reflective case study uses the Driscoll (2007) model to explore nursing lecturers and students’ experience of co-creating artefacts for Intercultural Care for Elderly Patients video simulation.

What? Globally, the number of people aged over 75 is expected to more than double by 2050, often with complex and comorbid health needs. It is likely diverse elderly patients will be cared for by professionals with equally diverse values and cultures. To date, no simulation resources appeared to have a primary focus on intercultural care for older people. An EU funded project attempted to address this need (7 partners, across 5 countries). The project also offered a co-creation opportunity with pre-registration nursing students.

So what? This UK case study emerged from student reflection and learning from the co-creation approach; devising, acting, reviewing and interrogating the scenarios. Five scenarios within a larger complement were developed using authentic patient examples aligned to intercultural elderly care benchmarks. Reflective narratives from students and lecturers on this process reveal an awareness of the breadth of culture expression, fallibility of assumptions, self-development and being a ‘professional’ that translate into practice.

Now what?: The experience of partnership in building these simulation videos points to a deep and transformative learning experience through student co-creation. This approach offers the opportunity to enhance cultural awareness and knowledge for students and lecturers.

A view across UCL ChangeMakers: 8 years of student-staff partnership at UCL

Abbie King — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Through this reflective essay I, Abbie King, explore the development of UCL’s student-staff partnership initiatives: ChangeMakers and SQR. I show how the scheme developed from a ‘student-as-change agents’ model to a student-staff partnership approach that has fostered the development of partnership learning communities, as described by Healey, Flint and Harrington (2014). I also examine the tensions and benefits between the support and needs of the institution and the individuals involved who enact the values of partnership at a grassroots level and how this has impacted the decision we have made for the initiatives to drive and develop them. I will also reflect on how having an established student-staff partnership scheme builds resilience for the institution, which is critical in the current climate to be able to respond effectively to emerging challenges and think through the implications of education as we emerge from a global pandemic.

Reflection on student-staff partnership to co-create study-skills resources for UCLMS medical students

Carys Phillips, Nicole Tay, Anais Deere, Emma Kelley — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Four students from UCL medical school (UCLMS) and two members of staff collaborated on a ChangeMakers project on study skills. Two staff and two students from the partnership reflect on their experiences of collaborating on a staff-student project, collaboratively identifying learning points and take-home messages. This reveals an insight into both the process and reflection of student-staff collaboration, hopefully encouraging other educators and students to participate in such projects in the future.

The staff and students critically reflected on their individual experiences of how the student-staff partnership facilitated the project, using the Integrated Reflective Cycle (Bassot, 2013). Reflections were collated and four overarching themes were identified: using the partnership to develop new skills, ensuring a flat hierarchy, how the student voice in the student-staff partnership encouraged student perspectives and staff support within the partnership.

Within the reflection, we outline top tips and learning points for future collaborative projects, allowing others to learn from our experience. Via the student-staff partnership, we were able to better understand student views on study skills and utilise the student voice to improve study skills at UCLMS.

EyeInclude: A qualitative feasibility study utilising staff-student partnership to create a diverse and inclusive postgraduate taught ophthalmology curriculum

Fong Yee Liu, Elsa Lee, Christin Henein, Rashmi G Mathew — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction / Aims

In many ophthalmic diseases, patient ethnicity impacts prevalence, hospital non-attendance, access to treatment, type of treatment offered, and response to treatment. Such variation in outcomes has been linked to a number of reasons, one of which is clinician unconscious biases engendered during education. Some postgraduate ophthalmic curricula lack purposeful and structured diversity pedagogy theory, despite the need to sustain behavioural change that actively addresses inequalities in patient care.

The EyeInclude project established a staff-student partnership from the onset. This study aimed to understand the lived experiences of students and co-create a diverse and inclusive curriculum for a postgraduate module, with the potential for application to external postgraduate courses and international ophthalmic curriculum design.

Aim: Curriculum Redesign

Methods

The study redesigned the curriculum in collaboration with two student ambassadors from minoritized groups. Collectively, a literature review was conducted and discussions with different UCL EDI leads took place to understand the work being done in this area. Paired pre- and post-module student surveys were co-created with students and adapted from focus group thematic analysis and the UCL Curriculum Inclusivity Health Check. Surveys and semi-structured focus groups were conducted with a diverse cohort of domestic and international students. Changes recommended by students were implemented into the curriculum and evaluated by the same cohort. Student recommendations included low stakes activities, group work, diverse case studies, revision of reading lists and nuances in management of patients from different ethnic backgrounds.

Results

A total of thirteen (87%) students responded to surveys and focus groups. The median age of participants was 24 years (range 21-47). There was a preponderance of female participants 64%, Asian descent 77% (East, South, and Central Asia), home students 54%. Professional backgrounds of participants included junior doctors (46%), intercalating medical students (31%), and allied ophthalmic professionals (23%). Thematic analysis elicited health inequalities, representation of teaching materials, faculty values and method of delivery as pertinent to curriculum diversification and inclusion.

After curriculum re-design, students agreed or strongly agreed that the module contextualised ophthalmic health inequalities (100%), raised cultural awareness (100%), and considered age (100%), race (100%), disability (92%), pregnancy/maternity (85%), studies beyond Europe/USA (85%), gender (85%), and religion/belief (54%) in the context of managing ophthalmic patients. There was marked improvement of students’ reported confidence in knowledge of ophthalmic health inequalities, from 38% (agree) to 92% (agree or strongly agree). Student awareness of under-representation of patient populations underpinning investigational and diagnostic algorithms (54% to 100%) and in clinical trial literature (31% to 85%) increased.

All students agreed or strongly agreed that diversity in the curriculum is important to them (100%). Students perceived their cultural needs were considered (8% to 46%). There were increases in students who strongly agreed that they felt connected to the staff (62%) and that others on the programme understood them as a person (54%). The majority of students (92%) would like more opportunities to discuss health inequalities.

Conclusion

A staff-student partnership created and implemented a diverse and inclusive ophthalmic postgraduate module curriculum. The multi-stakeholder pedagogical approach contextualised practice-influencing evidence, emphasised health inequalities, and engaged with all faculty. Our curriculum changes enhanced students’ sense of belonging, increased their confidence in managing multi-background patients, and has the potential for transforming postgraduate and international ophthalmic curriculum design.

Approaches to inclusion, diversity, and partnership: Reflecting on institutional policies of student-staff partnership in research across 15 institutional schemes in the UK

Xiuxiu Bao — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Equipping students with the necessary competencies to navigate an unpredictable world is becoming an important purpose of higher education. Approaches to centring students in learning and teaching have been suggested to evolve from research on students, to facilitating students as partners (SaP) in research. Student-staff partnership in research (SSPnR) provides a sophisticated approach to building partnerships with authentic processes and outcomes. Many studies have showcased SSPnR regarding implementation, administration, benefits, challenges, and risks in practical schemes. However, relatively few studies have explored SSPnR issues emerging before schemes recruit participants, such as those in policies and documents available to the public. This study addresses the importance of institutional contexts in SSPnR by teasing apart the governance of SSPnR across 15 institutional schemes in 14 British universities. Two main themes emerged from this qualitative thematic analysis, including the vagueness in defining and supporting inclusion and diversity, and four distinctive patterns of achieving partnerships in British universities: co-creating ideas, co-constructing projects, co-leading direction, and co-changing future. This study is an initial step in exploring approaches to rethinking power relationships and to improving inclusion and diversity through SSPnR, based on institutional contexts from the policy lens encompassing institutional values, conceptual structures, and political heritage.

Exploring experiences of educational exclusion for engineering undergraduates: reflecting on the value of staff-student partnerships for researching sensitive topics

Helen Knowler, Irina Lazar, Jules Godfrey, Mayra Rivera Lopez — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This paper investigates the affordances of staff-student collaboration in exploratory research on a potentially ‘sensitive’ issue. Our work garners a better understanding of the relationship between students' narratives of school when they had been subject to forms of exclusion and subsequent Higher Education (HE) experiences. The harmful impacts of educational exclusion have been explored in the compulsory education sector but are unresearched in an HE context.

Utilising a co-produced approach to exploratory research design, we worked with postgraduate students to survey and interview undergraduates in 6 HE institutions. We found that some students experienced exclusion at school and could describe and explain various types of exclusionary practices. They outlined many coping strategies and some described reticence to using official forms of support. While some students ‘moved on’ from these self-reported negative experiences, others talked of the enduring impacts of exclusion.

We argue that a better understanding of exclusionary practices before attending university will enhance the understanding of students' attitudes towards the system and help enhance support. We then reflect on the vital importance of the staff-student partnership in this project. Talking about exclusionary experiences is difficult enough, but even more so in overcoming their impact on getting a university place.

‘Do you identify as under-represented?’ A wellness focused exploration of co-designing a reverse mentoring scheme in partnership with under-represented students

Rachael O'Connor — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Co-design and partnership work between staff and students in higher education contexts is a vast and growing field. However, the meaningful inclusion of diverse student experiences and voices in such work, the co-design of diversity and inclusion interventions (as opposed to curricular interventions) and the wellness impact of co-design and partnership experiences on students remains under-explored. This work sheds further light on these issues through exploration of a unique co-design project undertaken at a Russell Group University which saw 15 students who self-identify as under-represented recruited to a student consultation team. The author and students worked together during early 2022 over a 10-week period to co-design a staff/student reverse mentoring scheme to run within the same University the following academic year (2022/23) whereby students who self-identify as under-represented are mentoring members of academic staff across over 20 disciplines on issues relating to their lived experiences. This piece uses Deci and Ryan’s Self Determination Theory (SDT) and its three basic psychological needs (autonomy, competence and relatedness) as an analytical framework to assess whether the co-design of a diversity and inclusion initiative such as reverse mentoring by students, who such an initiative ultimately seeks to support, can lead to positive wellness outcomes for the student co-design team. Students’ experiences were captured via recorded reflective conversations in pairs without the author’s presence. Findings suggest the co-design experience, intimately intertwined with students’ under-represented identities, had strong influence on students’ sense and feelings of autonomy, relatedness and competence, with relatedness being a particularly impactful outcome. According to SDT, satisfaction of these needs significantly contributes to wellness. Consequently, this piece argues that the achievement of student wellness should be a central goal for all co-design and partnership work with students, reflecting on the indicators and facilitators of this, as well as some of the challenges and pitfalls experienced in this project to inform and inspire future work in the field.

First year capstone assessments: a partnership approach to evaluating and exploring new assessment approaches

Jesper Hansen, Abbie King, Jason Davies, Gift Kalua, Alex Drijver-Ludlam — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The COVID-19 pandemic instigated a national lockdown across the UK in March 2020, which would go on to affect how universities could assess their students once campuses were shut down. Many institutions were looking to reduce the amount of summative assessment in the short term, but following this the sector has been considering how it can reimagine assessments that are both more futures-focused and less fraught during times of crisis (Sambell and Brown, 2022). For University College London (UCL), its approach was to cancel all first-year assessments and move them to a single capstone assessment. Like many others, UCL is keen to learn from some of the emergency measures put into place.

Through a series of focus groups with students and interviews with staff, an interdisciplinary team of staff and students undertook research to evaluate the capstone as an emergency response and the value of a capstone-style assessment in the first year in a non-emergency environment. This article focuses on the latter of these two aims. Our research highlights how capstone assessments can support students to make better links between modules and their real-world relevance. We also put forward the idea that first year capstones can offer a more mature form of assessment that helps students explore and apply what they are learning.

In addition, this paper explores the value of a partnership approach to evaluative research of assessment. Given the calls for the sector to take this opportunity to make wide-scale changes to assessment practices, we believe that students should be empowered to partner with us during that process. With them, we can learn what worked, decide the elements we want to retain and set up conversations about the future of assessment, thus exemplifying the democratising of assessment practices as advocated by Deeley and Bovill (2017). As such, students were integral to the research process, contributing equally to the design, data gathering, analysis and recommendations. The learning from working with students in this way has already been felt across similar projects at UCL and we argue that working with our students to understand current challenges can lead to greater resilience in the face of huge change in the sector.

Principles for equity-centered learner-educator co-creation

Laura A. Killam, Mercedes Lock, Marian Luctkar-Flude — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Co-creation means working collaboratively with students on the design, implementation, or evaluation of course components. When co-creation is embedded in a course it may be more inclusive and reach more learners than opportunities outside of a course. Skilled facilitation of co-creation is needed to minimize potential barriers and mitigate negative outcomes of asking students to co-create with an educator. During decision-making with a whole class in digital or in-person environments there is a risk that relying on consensus-like methods for making decisions will exclude some students. Inclusivity and equity must therefore be at the forefront of how co-created decisions are made. In this paper we reflect on our co-creation experience in healthcare higher education and available literature to describe seven interrelated principles to guide equity-centered co-creation: prioritizing equity, ongoing reflection on values, negotiation of power sharing, active and honest dialogue, integration of choice and flexibility, respectful trusting-caring relationships, and promoting a psychologically safer environment.

When enacting equity-centered co-creation during a course, educators role model how to advocate for social justice which may help learners develop skills to challenge oppression in their future workplace (i.e. healthcare) and society. Further depth in the analysis of the principles proposed in this paper may be explored as part of future research that examines co-creation for the purpose of promoting equity in education.

Pedagogical Partnerships: A How-To Guide for Faculty, Students, and Academic Developers in Higher Education by Alison Cook-Sather, Melanie Bahti and Anita Ntem - A Book Review

Kiu Sum — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The pedagogical partnership is not a relatively new terminology for anyone working in higher education (HE). However, the success of any partnership is based on a list of factors contributing to its impacts. To those who are either relatively new and struggling to understand how we should develop and maintain pedagogical partnerships in HE, the book by Alison Cook-Sather, Melanie Bahti and Anita Ntem on “Pedagogical Partnerships: A How-To Guide for Faculty, Students, and Academic Developers in Higher Education” therefore seeks to provide a step-by-step guide for both staff and students in HE to utilise.

This book review aims to provide the key aspects of what makes pedagogical partnerships successful, drawing out the research-informed practices focusing on classrooms and the curricula from the nine-book chapters. Though detailed, the book offers a clear yet structured approach with questions across the nine chapters asking the reader why, how, and what a pedagogical partnership might look like within the learning space. The book further attracts staff and students within HE in addressing the diversity and inclusivity considerations experienced globally. Thus, facilitate that knowledge transfer by feeding into the readers’ own practices and applications in their institutional contexts.

Without a doubt, this book is not merely a guide to reading the authors’ experiences and practices, nor determining successful pedagogical partnership models. But instead, it offers a resource bank for the HE community to use to support readers in contextualising the pedagogical partnerships locally as staff and students.