Day two - final thoughts

Again, this is a snapshot only. Other people went to different sessions and those who went to the same ones as me probably have way more relevant and interesting things to say! I also missed the final key note address – so looking forward to feedback on that J.

But overall: Participating in the conference has for me confirmed that we run some fabulous innovative programmes and are doing some spectacular work at Massey. It is also reassuring to know that other universities grapple with many of the same issues that we do. It is also always interesting and very valuable to see a slightly different take on similar programmes and activities – and of course it saves us so much time and effort to hear from others about what they’ve tried that works well and some of the pitfalls along the way. There is a lot of food for thought possibly especially in relation to our Centre, and our aims, objectives, purpose, focus and mission. Big picture questions such as will we continue to follow a centrally-based  model and if so what is the best way to embed the teaching of academic literacies into the curriculum using such a model. And it also raised questions in relation to the delivery of our services, for example, how will be continue to provide afterhours support for students which we know, and others know, students want and value.

Session 13 & 15

Session thirteen: (13C) This was an interesting session partly because it was about a great idea and initiative that hadn’t actually worked in practice. At Flinders University they have a Student Learning Centre that is a centrally-based model – not embedded in faculties. They are also a team of academic staff members. Flinders University has many students from “non-traditional backgrounds”.  The view is that students who are lacking academic skills are vulnerable – essentially they are at risk of becoming at risk…

The Student Learning Centre was asked (top down request) to work with the English department to deliver a new compulsory paper called Academic and Professional Communication, to replace the “largely focussed on grammar” compulsory paper that had been taught for years by the English Department.

What they wanted to do was a) adopt a multi-literacies framework (Traditional: spelling, grammar, Academic: structure and referencing, Institutional: “reading” their environment, and Critical: critical reasoning); b) use a “flipped” classroom model. Some information would be provided in advance online and classroom sessions were to be more interactive and engaging than the traditional lecture format; and c) they wanted students to reflect on learning.

Unfortunately though the collaboration didn’t work and the English department continued to teach the old paper…
They are also working on designing a numeracy programme as well (another one that will be compulsory for some students) and this time they have developed 12 modules that faculties can pick and choose from, depending on the focus of their paper.

I missed a session to rest my brain…

Session 15 (15F): Causes of attrition among diverse students. Research completed at Victoria University by their research arm (means that there won’t necessarily be any action or change but the report and recommendations have been passed on). They found that the reasons for leaving the university are multifaceted and include being accepted into another university, employment, the distance required to travel (not a lot currently delivered online) and work-life balance. Feedback from students on how the university could change included: flexible delivery (including online and after hours) and learning support offered over summer school (before students start).
The presenter posed some questions at the end, and I thought this one particularly interesting: “how to we as a sector reconceptualised notions of the student life-cycle from one which is linear, to one which is (possibly) circular, where students enter and leave tertiary education a number of different times?”

 

Sessions 10 - 12

Session 10 (10G): This session was about establishing a partnership approach to embedding research and learning skills development in the first year. Learning Advisors are located in the library and they work in the same faculty specific teams. There model was in reaction to the “old” model, the deficit model of “professionals” working with the “other”:  the student with problems. Rather than viewing interactions as an apprenticeship into the academic experience, they take a normalised approach, positive (not deficit) and believe it is the responsibility of many.

Monash University have committed to ensuring that course curriculum matches the Research Skills Development Framework (I have a copy). The Learning Skills Advisors sit under the library, and the Head Librarian describes their activities as underpinning “the University’s programmes by ensuring that all students develop their ability to study and undertake research as independent learners”. The boost academic literacy skills and support students from the 1^st year to PhD level.

The role of Learning Skills Advisors is to work collaboratively with lecturers to map the curriculum against the framework, described as “a consultative conversation approach”. And essentially the framework is used as a “conversation tool” to highlight areas of improvement in student assessment. Overall, the outcomes of working more closely with faculties and lecturers has been improved communication to students of assessment tasks and rubrics, better promotion and take-up of services, and the mainstreaming of the work of Learning Skills Advisors. Again though, there is no specific data on if retention rates and student success has been improved.

Session 11 (11F): This workshop was on assessing the impact of an intrusive academic support initiative. Although like many of the sessions I’ve been to, the actual data (and therefore assessment bit) was largely missing. At Deakin University student attrition is seen to be a problem – a financial problem for the university, and a personal problem for the students and also teaching and administration staff.  Many more students are participating in higher education and see this time as era of universal or open access to education. There are low admission hurdles and students are assessed as being able to cope, although of course many don’t.

At Deakin, in the Business Studies programme, they had the additional challenge of students in their first year at the university actually being in their second year (come from colleges and TAFE etc), so many of the support mechanisms available were no longer being provided. In addition, the course was set up so that students were in a better position to succeed if they had completed a number of papers in their first year – students being cross credit had not participated in those papers and additional support wasn’t being provided. So they discovered that there was an additional group of “at risk” students, who were engaged students who were not necessarily succeeding. So they decided to bring support services to students and integrated support into their subjects. 75% of students were contacted by phone and these calls were outsourced to a company (Hobsons), the calls were directed at students failing and they were asked a series of non-intrusive questions about where they were at with their studies. Hobson’s also did research for the university and suggested they run an exam preparation workshop. They also developed a new flyer for students to identify where they were at and directed them to the appropriate services (called “Just in time: Just for me”).

Session 12 (12B): This session was about integrated learning centres. Essentially at Monash they have Student Learning Centres (as we know them) and have also received HEPP funding so have set up a programme similar to PASS. The purpose of the integrated learning centres is to provide free academic support (content), pastoral care and create learning communities. Each of the schools of science (there are five) receive 10 hours of tutor support each week. Tutors are usually PhD students in those schools, and the hours are used differently: some offer drop in centres, other offer a combination of appointments and drop in times. The role of the mentor is to help teach the students content, but also mentor in the broader sense of being a role model and offer guidance etc “a friendly face with listening ears”. The mentors were trained by Student Centre staff (I think) and were given an A-Z of services within the university.

There is no data on attendance, partly because they keep the sessions very casual, although they hope to gather data in the future. One of the things I really liked about this model was the amazing rooms used by the tutors and students – really nice spaces with different sized tables, white boards, colourful furniture etc. Looked great. One of the things I thought was interesting was that the presenter said that PhD students were well suited to the role of providing support because they were closer in age to the students. She then made the comment that as it can be a long time between starting out and finishing your degree they found the process of remembering what students went through interesting/challenging. I guess if these PhD students become lecturers themselves that will be really useful.

 

Sessions 8 & 9

Session 8 (8C): (sorry Fiona, this was supposed to be 8B, but just realised I went to the wrong session…).

This session was about improving student engagement by improving teacher training – focusing on short training sessions for sessional staff using the AVID Tertiary model.  Sessional staff are being targeted for the training, as they are primarily the ones teaching first year students.  The focus was on “engaged teaching for engaging students”. The challenges facing the university are diverse student cohorts, low ATAR ratings (university entrance ratings), many students first in family to go to university, high attrition rates and little evidence of deep learning. Other challenges include tenured staff not wanting to teach the large first year classes, and the “traditional” teaching methods of “stand and deliver” not working.

The AVID training model consists of 2 days of customised training. Teaching methods are modelled and time is set aside for modifying the learning plans to incorporate the skills.  Staff are taught the skills, they practice the skills and then they integrate them into their learning plans. The reason for the success of the programme is that it has a practical focus: skills are explicitly taught, the skills are modelled and teachers can use the skills straight away. The AVID model also alerts teachers to the academic skills they need to pass on to their students as well as useful practical engaging ways of doing so (including how to take notes etc).

Session 9 (9G): The Teaching and Learning Development Centre at James Cook University are trialling the SILA program (Systematic Integrated Learning Advisor Model). They offer the “traditional” services of one-to-one consultations and generic workshops. They have funding to run SILA which involves Learning Advisors working directly with different faculties.  The model involves: broad inquiry, specific inquiry, intervention plan, academic development and programme evaluation. It is a voluntary scheme and collaboration is essential – Heads of Department essentially opt in, and then the Centre determines whether they have the expertise, and whether the faculty is one that requires extra resources (high attrition rates etc). While they are embedded into the faculties, it’s more that they would run a session after a lecture rather than during one.

One of the keys concerns is that it might not be sustainable when the funding runs out – although to counter that they are attempting to develop resources so that departments can continue to receive some benefit after the learning advisor is no longer working directly with them. Other issues are that is isn’t always possible to provide the extra support across campuses, communication across teams can be an issue, there is often the need for specialist expertise and the age-old problem of the students needing the most support not taking up any of the options.   Also, the team currently have no data on whether the embedded model makes a difference to retention and grades.

 

Day one

Day one at the conference. Other people will be writing up their views and thoughts and we collectively went to a range of sessions. So this blog is really a brief snapshot of the conference so far.  And it’s all back to front, so you have to start at the bottom and read up to here…

This photo for me captures the conference so far. Some really familiar ideas but perhaps the setting or take on a the project is a bit different from what we've come to expect, which only adds to our knowledge and boosts our inspiration.

Sessions 4 - 7

Session four (4E):  Shaping student experience and transition at ANU. ANU have overhauled their enrolment processes and orientation for their students: Simplifying procedures and clarifying communication. One of the changes to orientation was the students could download an app and create their own Orientation week schedule. They also created 8 “Uni Keys” which are short videos (cartoons with narration) that guide students through some of the aspects of orientation and enrolment that they find confusing. The new approach appears to be working well, although students living on-campus continue overall to have a better orientation experience than those who don’t.  Other people were at that session, so expect further insightful and coherent comment from them J

Sessions five and six focussed on the important of giving formative feedback.

Session five (5C): At the University of Queensland they found that although students were supposed to have achieved high school level chemistry this was not always the case and there were different student cohorts: some students had no chemistry background, some studied overseas, some had studied at school and thought they were ok, some had studied at school but a while ago. A group of academics developed a formative feedback strategy to inspire active self-regulated study. Students are tested using Concept Inventories and are then given formative feedback (not just the numeric value) so they would know what areas they need to focus on. The “diagnostic/intervention framework” is currently being trialled. Possibly a “watch this space” at this stage, but certainly presented some interesting ideas on getting students to be aware of their own knowledge and skill level early on in the semester.

Session six (6C): This session really just reiterated the importance of giving students formative feedback, even for students who do well – pointing out what they have done well can also aid learning. The general gist of the session was that effective and timely feedback can make a significant contribution to student learning and achievement. The argument was that assessment is part of the learning, and not just a measure of learning. Also raised, was that assessment has to be well designed to lend itself to formative feedback. The components of good feedback included: provide specific advice, easy to interpret, acknowledge achievements as well as shortcomings, language and tone used needs to be accessible (and appropriate), and feedback should be timely (which sometimes means before they hand it in).

Session seven (7B): The impact of online peer mentoring on first year student transition, problem solving skills and academic success. The programme is very similar to PASS (and our Peer Mentoring Groups). Biggest difference was that the students weren’t paid. The context is that this was trialled in the psychology department (University of Southern Queensland) and senior students were given the opportunity to try out some of their skills by mentoring first year students. It was described as assisting the transition in and out of university. The programme has shown to improve students’ problem solving skills. Other differences between that programme and PASS are that there are weekly de-brief sessions with the mentors, and there is a handbook to help train them. The mentoring sessions themselves consisted of using discussion forums on Moodle – an hour a week was set aside for a mentor to work with a small group of students.

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Sessions 1 - 3

Session one and two – both peer assisted learning, but one scheme for teachers and one for students.

Session one (1D): Supporting good first year course design: The First Year Peer Assisted Teaching Initiative (FY PATI). This initiative was based the Six First Year Curriculum Principles (Kitt, 2009) and offers practical support and ideas for teachers in a supportive and collaborative space. The project has been trialled in Newcastle and has been very successful. As well as helping change course design the project helps establish a strong sense of collegiality among teachers/lecturers.

Session two (2C): Peer to peer support for students at risk (Deakin). This project involved activities similar to our student success advisor role, however phone calls to students were made by students. Data is gathered on students deemed to be “at risk”: not attending first two tutorials, not accessing CloudDeakin (like Stream), non-submission of tasks, failure of assessment tasks and unit failure. The “at risk” students are then contacted (by phone) by 2^nd and 3^rd year students. The students making the calls are paid and trained by call centre professionals. The calls are largely positive, and are usually about either sorting out issues then and there (explaining to students where they can find information, or finding it out while on the phone) or referring students to counselling or learning services. Might be a good model for on-campus students but I’m not sure about distance students – also not sure whether the cost of running the scheme would provide benefits over and above what we do now. On the upside, does provide students with “real world” skills, experiences and training (albeit in a call centre, but still the training and experience could prove useful).

Session three:

Session three (3D):  At the University of Western Sydney, they have started providing “pit stop” sessions for students. These are 4 hour sessions delivered 3 times year and focus on delivering information and teaching skills related to particular courses. They involve lecturers, librarians and learning consultants (equivalent of), and are embedded in what students are doing (e.g., one session focuses on literature reviews 5 weeks before the assignment, and another on multiple choice exams two weeks out before the exam). The students really enjoy them. They sound quite similar to our contact courses, and it raises the issue of how we can become more embedded in internal papers – could there be an internal equivalent of the “contact course” for students (a shorter version). Or would that model encroach on distance students’ time (could internal students join contact courses?).