Students Engaging with Change
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I think the most exciting part of this project has been that it is possible to make a change even at such a large institution. Before this
project I did not expect it to be possible to make a change, but this
has shown me that with a little work and dedication you can make
things happen. (First year Business undergraduate)
Comments illustrate enthusiasm: ‘a fantastic and innovative opportunity’ and, in
particular, indicate recognition of the power of evidence in bringing about change:
‘Conducting real research into what students actually think and being able to present this information to senior staff in full knowledge that what you’re saying is
backed up by proof’; or ‘Making recommendations to the School with research support and the hope that this can make the Uni a better place for students’. They
highlight the skills they gain for a CV, and for some students their experiences are
transforming: ‘Completely changed how I think’; ‘I have learnt that I really enjoy
the process of carrying out projects/research and this is influencing my choice in
career path’.
Overall, however, it seems highly likely that the success and impact of the
‘Students as Change Agents’ initiative comes largely from the fact that projects are
conceived and designed by students according to their needs and interests, with
support and guidance from academic and central services staff to achieve their aims.
This in itself provides motivation. After an initial sense of astonishment on being
asked: ‘Well, what are you going to do about it?’ students give continuing evidence
that they can take responsibility and rise to the challenge, giving them a sense of
leadership, ownership and empowerment.
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30.3.2. Engagement with Curriculum Change for Academic Credit: Mathematics
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30.3.2.1. Setting the scene
As all students, mathematics students are busy people with many demands on
their time: academic studies; work to fund their university education; relaxing and
socialising; more experience from industrial and commercial placements. Extra
engagement with activities such as course evaluations, student staff liaison committees or curriculum development projects represents a decision to invest precious
time and energy in one activity at the expense of another. In many ways, it is a small
miracle that any of our students choose to engage with such activities. Whom
exactly does it serve to fill out a course evaluation questionnaire when this is conducted after the course has been delivered? What precisely can you get from sitting
on a student staff liaison committee that you could not get from a debating society,
or working part-time? Assuming that the opportunity to engage with curriculum
development projects is an investment decision in which the student invests their
time as capital, two natural questions arise:
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1. What is the expected return on the investment?
2. To what extent are the outputs of value to the student?
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Elisabeth Dunne et al.
The single most successful student engagement stories in the mathematical
sciences at Exeter have focused on the creation of learning resources by students for
themselves and their peers. Since this activity is embedded within the curriculum for
credit, there is a clear return on investment if students are successful, and the outputs are of value both to themselves and to their fellow students. It also highlights
two further key elements to creating an environment in which students will readily
engage with curriculum design. The first is that, to bring such a project to a successful conclusion, tells both staff and employers a lot about their potential to work
effectively in the graduate workplace. Hence, it seems sensible to bring such opportunities within the auspices of the curriculum itself, ensuring that students can
obtain accreditation of key graduate attributes within their degree programmes.
Second, if we truly believe in the participative, socially mediated models for learning
that form the founding principles of co-creation (Wenger, 1998; Wenger,
McDermott, & Snyder, 2002), then we need to move towards an assessment model
in which the outputs are of value to the wider community of practice, rather than
having a life expectancy restricted to the present assessment cycle and for the eyes
of one or two individual experts only.
30.3.2.2. What do students do?
A student-led audit of employability in the curriculum (a change agents project)
identified areas for curriculum improvement, particularly in the third year when students need examples of skills and activities for CVs and interviews. A key outcome
from the audit was the design of a third year assessed group project. These projects
have been offered for the last two years and are compulsory for all final year
students on the BSc mathematics programme. Students complete an extended
project over three months in a group of six to eight, with a subject specialist as an
adviser. Typically this will be a project in their research area, but academic staffs
have also offered curriculum development projects. The student groups devise their
own project title, aims, objectives, methodology, time-line and evaluation strategy
and submit these within one month of the project starting as an assessed piece of
work There are common assessment criteria for all projects, which must contain elements of data gathering and analysis, a discussion of the aims and methodology
pursued in the project, a comparison of the findings of the project with the published literature, and execution of an evaluation strategy to determine the success of
the project in relation to its original aims.
In two years, 153 students have been offered 21 projects. Six projects have
focused on curriculum development or design, with a total of 72 students. The
demand for curriculum projects has outstripped the number of projects on offer
and, in both years, additional advisers had to be recruited to cater for this. Topics
covered have concentrated on technology-enhanced learning (TEL), research-led
education in mathematics, e-assessment, feedback in mathematics and designing
resources to challenge misconceptions in the theory of relativity.
An example highlights what students have been doing. Several groups decided to
work on TEL, with the broad aim to explore how technology could be used to
enhance the student experience in the mathematics curriculum. To this end, students
Students Engaging with Change
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chose one module (or in the case of one group, two modules to do a comparative
study between the potential for TEL in different types of module), for which they
would design resources and measure student engagement and satisfaction with them.
The student groups requested and were given their own pages on the university VLE
(Moodle) and worked with lecturers and e-learning specialists to develop their
resources. Two groups chose to concentrate on developing resources for a module
they were currently studying, whilst another focused on a module that was a critical
foundation for the more advanced material they were studying in their final year.
The pages were truly innovative, pushed the technology close to its limits, and are
being used as exemplars of best practice around the university. All staff involved
directed students to the new resources with a subsequent impact on the learning
experience of approximately 300 students. One particular highlight was that students
came to challenge the notion that ‘interactive’ can be used synonymously with ‘multimedia’, finding that to produce truly engaging and interactive pages, they had to do
more than embed videos and other media clips. There has been a wider impact on
academic practice both within and outside mathematics at Exeter, with internships
to produce student-designed resources having been offered in mathematics, physics
and medical imaging, as a result of the successes of these projects.
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30.3.2.3. What do students gain?
Student feedback from focus group interviews gives a rich picture of what they
thought of the module. Although they were proud of their outputs, it was involvement in the processes that engaged them the most. Despite being little practised in
managing a project, these third year students particularly appreciated being allowed
to organise their activities: ‘We had to do that ourselves, it is much more grown up’.
This feeling was repeated over and again.
From the beginning we had to just pick a topic but it was quite an
open ended topic so then we had to decide what direction we wanted
the project to go in… what level of workload we wanted, what deadlines we wanted, and we just managed the project ourselves.
It is the first project that I have done where you have not had a set of
bullet points… and get a paint-by-numbers project at the end of it, all
groups will have their own one and they will all be different.
There was a recognition not only that they had to be successful as a group but
also that there was a broader community who would be worth collaborating with,
and this was perceived as a very different ethos to the competitive world of their
degree:
We all had to learn to take responsibility for the group as a whole
rather than just our own sections.
I am surprised that the groups that weren’t even doing the same topic
as us we were able to collaborate with as well.
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Elisabeth Dunne et al.
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A genuine sense of motivation, involvement and enjoyment was also apparent:
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In this, you have got the freedom to actually enjoy what you’re looking at … as opposed to essentially doing a ‘wikipedia presentation’.
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Because you are so involved in it … you want to tell people about it so
you want to write the report, you want to do the presentation so people can see how your group is doing and because you are so involved
in it, you know what you want to write and what you want to say.
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Especially in maths, we are always working towards, how can we do
this coursework right? How can we do well in the exam? Whereas this
project was, how can we show what we have done?
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The work seemed more ‘real’, both in terms of maths and in relation to
employability:
With the tutor not holding your hand, that was a bit like how it
would be with a client… you would get given this brief outline and
you would be told to sort the project out yourselves and that is like
what we had to do.
Of interest also was the importance they gave to having opportunities to develop
as people, not just to study mathematics: ‘In the 1000 word evaluation, it was good
to be able to actually talk about yourself’; ‘It did help the whole class… develop us
as people’. The comparison between knowledge and whole person development is
marked:
…would definitely say it has been one of the ones [modules] that has
helped me develop more than other ones where it is just about gaining
knowledge, increasing your knowledge…this one was something different and actually developing you as a person.
The difference in style of this module clearly captured the students’ interest and
commitment. It allowed them to develop as people, leading to the comment: ‘I
would say if you only take one module, make it be this one’.
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30.3.3. Engagement with Societal Change for Academic Credit: The University of
Exeter Business School
30.3.3.1. Setting the scene
The third case study, from the University of Exeter Business School, describes a second year undergraduate module which has now run twice, and in which around 100
students have been supported in leading the design of a social or environmental
change project. It is centred on experiential learning, with students being immersed
in the process of enquiry, bringing theory to life through real-life issues. The module
is delivered in partnership by an academic lead with experience in industry, and an