Academy of
Teaching Excellence Fellows Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence Fellowships
Academy of
Teaching Excellence Fellows Welcome from the Vice Chancellor I am both proud and delighted to present to you this publication to celebrate the work of the University’s Teaching Excellence Fellows. These members of staff have a vast amount of knowledge, skills and experience, thereby providing innovative solutions to a range of pedagogic challenges. With the Academy of Teaching Excellence Fellows, the University is capitalising on this rich resource, capturing the collective energy of this vibrant community in order to enrich and enhance the student learning experience. Professor Liz Barnes CBE Vice-Chancellor and Chief Executive of Staffordshire University
Introduction A Learning and Teaching Fellowship scheme was originally introduced into the University in 2002. Over the years, this scheme has been revised and improved, and has recently become the Teaching Excellence Fellowship Award. These Fellowships are awarded annually and are intended to promote a culture where learning and teaching is supported as a valued activity and where those who are engaged in it are proud to display and disseminate evidence of their best practice to others.
The specific aims of the Teaching Excellence Fellowship Award are to: • Recognise and celebrate excellent achievement in teaching and learning support; • Improve the quality of teaching and learning support through the dissemination of best practice; • Involve excellent practitioners in the educational development activities of the University; • Promote a culture of scholarship and reflective practice; • Contribute to the achievement of the University’s strategic objectives;
To find out more about the Teaching Excellence Fellowship award and how applications can be made, please contact the Academic Development Unit by emailing academicdevelopment@staffs.ac.uk
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Julie is an Academic Skills Tutor (IT) within the library. This role involves her taking responsibility for planning, designing and delivering teaching and training sessions in the use of key and widely used programmes such as Word, PowerPoint and Excel to staff and students across the institution. In addition Julie is heavily involved in creating and supporting a range of online learning tools such as the Assignment Survival Kit (ASK) and RefZone and leading on the development of the Academic Skills Know-how website. She led the MaPPPeD (Mainstreaming Podcasting Production, Publication and Delivery) project in 2011 which developed the Staffordshire University Media Library. As part of her Fellowship Julie plans to create a programme to develop and support digital media literacy and the use of digital technology for staff and students. This will help to enhance the digital and media literacy skills for University staff and support the Staffordshire Graduate attribute of being technologically, digitally and information literate. She will also review and refresh the current offering of IT and digital skills training for staff to ensure it meets the IT and digital literacy development needs of staff in the delivery of service and school plans.
Julie Adams
Jane is an Academic Skills Tutor within the library and has established the Study Skills Centre in the Thompson Library. She teaches across the University in all schools to develop transferable academic skills such as critical thinking and academic writing. Working alongside academic staff, she provides bespoke teaching sessions which address specific needs at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Delivering taught sessions on tackling different types of assignment, she demonstrates to students how to achieve the highest possible grade. Students are also able to book individual appointments with her. Jane is passionate about developing students’ understanding of the requirements of higher education. She wants to ensure that students have a positive learning experience at the University by helping them to achieve as high a grade as possible, thereby reflecting their true capability.
Jane Ball
The Teaching Excellence Fellowship will enable Jane to develop, trial and evaluate a peer mentoring system for first year students. Trained student mentors will be able to gain valuable experience which can both raise their achievement and increase their employability skills.
Elhadj is a Full Professor in Computer Science, the Director of the Service Computing and Cybersecurity Research Centre and the REF UoA11 Lead. Elhadj’s role spans across teaching and learning, research and enterprise. He is the founder of the Cloud Computing and Applications Research Lab and had published 130+ research papers in conferences, Journals and as book chapter. He has also been an editor to a number of Journals and conference proceedings. Elhadj has been very active in strengthening the University-business partnerships and international collaboration, and has been successful in securing significant funding. Elhadj is a Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy and a holder of MA in Education from Staffordshire University.
Dr Elhadj Benkhelifa
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Paul is a Librarian and supports library provisions for Psychology, Sport & Exercise and Biomedical Sciences. He also advises staff and students about resource discovery and utilising eResources for learning & teaching. Paul also helps students to expand their own digital literacies through teaching and support using eResources. Awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2016, Paul’s project focused on the use of technology in supporting students to use library resources through the development of the online Subject Resource Guides. Having already created a large amount of support via instructional videos and written guides using screen capturing and video editing software, his Teaching Excellence Fellowship found innovative ways to make these resources become more sustainable and accessible within Blackboard.
Paul Biggs
Rachel is an Award Leader for courses assessing professional competence within the Forensic and Crime Science Academic Group. She teaches crime scene investigation, analytical chemistry and policing science at undergraduate level, leads peer-mentoring initiatives supporting transition into higher education and integrates the Group’s student-led research conference into the curriculum. Rachel’s subject expertise in firearms identification and ballistics enables her to supervise numerous postgraduate researchers at MSc and PhD level. Rachel was awarded a fellowship in 2016 and has an avid interest in the use of digital technology to enhance teaching and learning, frequently analysing data to evaluate innovative practice and understand student progression. Rachel’s fellowship will therefore focus on supporting the university and colleagues across faculties to enhance their approach to learner analytics using a variety of electronic data sources to inform andragogic practice and improve student success from enrolment to graduation.
Dr Rachel Bolton-King
A Staffordshire University graduate and clinical practitioner who has recently joined the School of Health and Social Care as a lecturer, Emily is passionate about education and using education to improve the experience of patients within the NHS. Drawing on 7 years’ experience in the RAF reserve, Emily wants to create interprofessional simulation exercises, using major incident style training. She plans to enhance innovative thinking through real time simulation and debriefing exercises. She aims to promote learning and working together across multi-disciplinary fields, using human factors principles in real time simulation. Her approach will include peer assisted learning and assessment and will put leadership skills into practice, giving students the opportunity to learn in a safe environment. The Staffordshire Teaching Excellence Fellowship will allow Emily to develop staff and students through creation and delivery of simultaneous simulation exercises for nurses, midwifes, paramedics and operating department practitioners. This approach will be piloted with nursing students, potentially in welcome week, as an activity involving all three years.
Emily Browne
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James is the Head of Department for Sports and Exercise within the school of Life Sciences and Education. In addition to leading the undergraduate, postgraduate and research provision, James has a passion for teaching and has particular expertise in education collaborations, physical education and pedagogy. James was awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2015 and completed a piece of work which explored relationships between higher education, external organisations and education providers of different phases linked to employability and professional development. The work focussed on the successful characteristics of collaboration and how this can move from transactional to transformational relationships. The project culminated in the development of a learning resource. Future work will build on James’s previous experience, which includes the formation of a multi-academy trust, student placements within the education sector, research and conference presentations on whole school improvement through PE and a professional doctorate study that focusses on the dynamics of the creation and development of a Multi-Academy Trust.
James Capper
John is a Professor in the School of Law, Policing and Forensics. Here his role involves both teaching and research, and he is also Research Lead. He was originally awarded his Fellowship on 1st May 2006 and his initial project was entitled ‘Development of an online module for pathology and forensic pathology for UG/PG students and appropriate external (allied health) organisations’. As a Professor of Forensic Science Education he continues to focus strongly on the effective delivery and development of teaching, learning and assessment in the areas of sciences concerned with forensic science. This has a strong impact on the student learning experience, enthusing them to become deeper and more independent learners.
Professor John Cassella
Paul is course leader for the BA (Hons) Acting and Theatre Arts and the BA (Hons) Acting and Screen Performance and teaches across a variety of the modules. Paul’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship will focus on exploring the challenges and opportunities of students working as equal partners in practice-as-research (PAR) with academic staff. This will seek to answer key questions around PAR including: To what extent might PAR be used to engage students more fully across curricular modules? How might PAR methods be used to inform teaching practice? Is PAR a useful approach for embedding across an entire curriculum? Paul will also be looking to examine the issue of how students can work as authentic partners in research with staff and address the perceived problems of ethics and power dynamics which are known to arise in such circumstances. The essential aim of his Fellowship project is to harness the passion of the student for their subject, which is likely to have brought them to university to study it in the first place, as a means to increase their engagement and attainment over three years of degree level study.
Paul Christie
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A Staffordshire University graduate, Francesca is a lecturer, STEM Ambassador and Digital Champion in the School of Life Sciences and Education where she has been developing her own approach to facilitating learning: the Tech and Tactile Approach. Tech and Tactile includes technology, games, creations, problem based learning and formal lecture within a single session offering really innovative applied learning. Using the flipped classroom approach, Francesca ensures students can access the pre-recorded formal lecture flexibly and then engage with the tactile element in class to embed the learning. Inclusive aspects of the technology include setting up collaboration spaces for entire classes, oneto-one spaces, and small group spaces so students can work on the same task but in the comfort of their own homes and at a preferred study time.
Francesca Cornwall
The Fellowship enables Francesca to disseminate the Tech and Tactile Approach via delivery on the PgCHPE, and through CPD sessions. She will be capturing feedback on training and developing case studies based upon successful implementation of the approach. Technology is often associated with sedentary behaviours, and Fran intends to challenge this misconception and enlighten colleagues as to how technology can be creatively used when combined with tactile activities.
Working in Admissions and Recruitment as Step Up to HE Program Manager, Ashley’s seeks to create a holistic student and staff community environment of support, with students on the program having a single point of contact for any concerns - academic, pastoral or otherwise. This one stop-shop approach to support not only develops skills but also supports student retention and progression, positively impacting on the student experience. Ashley’s Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence project will be focused on carrying out primary research with a range of underrepresented groups in order to best understand the most effective initiatives and interventions to support success and achievement for harder-to-reach students. In addition, in order to support improvements and increase best practice knowledge across the wider academic community, Ashley will explore the power of creating a sense of belongingness amongst students via pre-degree study teaching and learning initiatives. He is particularly interested in the role that our Step Up to HE programme plays in improving retention and supporting student success and will share his work by disseminating his findings and exploring opportunities to embed his approach.
Ashley Cotton
Mani is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (HEA), and a Senior Lecturer in the School of Life Sciences and Education. She teaches on a range of undergraduate and postgraduate Psychology and Counselling awards and also supervises doctoral students on Psychology, Counselling and Clinical Psychology. As Teaching and Learning representative for Psychology, Mani organises training sessions for colleagues. She has also taught on HEA programmes for newly qualified HE lecturers, is a member of the Staffordshire University College of Observers and the Faculty BAME Advocate. Awarded in 2006, Mani’s Fellowship enabled her to focus on personal development planning which fed into changing the way personal tutorials were structured in Psychology. As a consequence, since 2006, the Psychology Department has run a continually evolving, structured, personal tutorial programme at all levels. Mani is currently working on including Staffordshire Graduate and employability within the curriculum. As part of her BAME role Mani is developing ways to use personal tutorials to increase student retention and engagement. Currently she is co-supervising a doctorate on traditional and nontraditional student attainment.
Dr P. Mani Das Gupta
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Tim is a Paramedic Lecturer based at our Centre of Excellence in Stafford. He joined the University in 2016 and teaches a variety of subjects pertaining to paramedic practice, with a focus on Biological Sciences and Clinical Skills. Tim has a keen interest in producing videos and digital resources to enhance student learning. Tim’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship will focus on the production of supplementary digital learning materials. He aims to produce a database of materials, including live-action videos, animations, and interactive documents, which can be used across courses as the basis for further teaching. These materials will be targeted at common areas of cross-over between courses to allow for increased inter-professional learning and teaching.
Tim Davies
A School digital champion and Microsoft Innovative Education Expert, Neil is a lecturer in the School of Health and Social Care. He has been working with Microsoft and Digital services in the piloting the use of Microsoft Teams as a potential replacement/supplement to the existing VLE. Positive impacts identified to date include the Teams facility to communicate and collaborate with all students onsite or on placement – increasing student engagement and satisfaction. Teams allows students to access information tailored to them more readily and promotes the use of multiple teaching approaches to staff. The Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence Fellowship will allow Neil to expand the pilot of Microsoft Teams, in particular sharing, and developing Teams skills to improve the student experience. Another significant benefit of Teams is the centralisation of data in terms of course management. Neil is keen to work with colleagues to explore these elements further from an academic perspective.
Neil Davis
Alan is a Professor in the School of Computing and Digital Technologies where he takes on the role of Head of Postgraduate Research Studies. He also manages the Masters by Research Programme and teaches research methods. Alan’s Fellowship was awarded in 2007. This allowed him time to develop and introduce a framework for Research-informed teaching. In turn, this led to the successful development of two research methods modules, three journal publications and informed teaching and mentoring. Alan continues to synthesise teaching and research in order to enhance the student experience within this own area. Recently he has been responsible for the delivery of a £230,000 Erasmus project based on research into learning and teaching in a European Partnership.
Dr Alan Eardley
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John works within the School of Life Sciences and Education. Course Leader for the online MSc in Applied Sport and Exercise Science and also has responsibility for delivering school staff development within the area of technology supported learning. Having been awarded his Fellowship in 2005, John’s project involved developing an automated online student module evaluation system, with the control of the process at the hands of module leaders. The approach also allowed module leaders to seamlessly enter key data from these evaluations into their Module Reports in a simple and consistent manner, in turn facilitating Course Leaders with an effective and efficient method of collating data for annual monitoring.
John Erskine
John’s continuing interests are in technology supported learning. He is interested in the selective use of new and emerging technologies (mostly WEB 2.0 applications) to improve the student learning experience via appropriate pedagogical approaches. John is especially (though not exclusively) interested in the application of such technology to online settings to deliver a richer and more immersive learning experience.
Jacky is an Associate Professor of Exercise Physiology, within the School of Life Sciences and Education. Originally awarded a Fellowship in 2008, she has made a significant contribution to teaching excellence through the provision on extracurricular activities to improve students’ experiences, job prospects, research activities, and applied practice. For example, she founded Peak Condition, a student-led sport science support service and runs an annual careers event for females in sport and exercise.
Dr Jacky Forsyth
Her main research driver is around promoting, raising awareness and advancing understanding of the key influences which impact women in sport and exercise. She is co-founder and Vice Chair of the Women in Sport and Exercise Academic Network (WiSEAN), co-author of the book, The Exercising Female: Science and its Application, has regularly published peer-reviewed research articles, and has been successful in obtaining external research funding, all of which impact on and ensure connection with academic, medical, sport and public communities. Jacky’s particular area of research is on the interaction between bone health, sex hormones and exercise. She has also recently started up Staffordshire University Women’s Academic Network (SUWAN).
Ashley is a Senior Lecturer in Sport and Exercise. As an experienced teaching practitioner he is dedicated to ensuring that all his students have the best possible learning experience. He adopts a multidisciplinary approach to sports education and facilitates the learning of students to develop subject specific knowledge through innovative and dynamic teaching practice. Ashley routinely embeds research and scholarly activity into his practice, with the aim of increasing engagement, improving retention and ultimately student satisfaction. Awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2016, Ashley’s project will focus on monitoring the student transition from school/college to HE. As part of this he will concentrate on increasing the engagement and retention of students as they begin their degree course. In particular, Ashley’s project will be conducted on the thoughts, feelings and experiences of sport and exercise students transitioning from Level 3 to Level 4. This insight will be invaluable in helping the colleagues in different disciplinary areas of the University to further develop strategies to improve retention and increase student satisfaction.
Ashley Gill
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Claire is a Principal Lecturer in Forensic Science within the School of Law, Policing and Forensics. Her teaching responsibilities allow her to integrate her expertise in trace evidence including fibres, hair and glass. In addition, Claire is a module leader for a variety of modules including Forensic Science Methods of Crime Detection, Methods of Crime Detection and Personal Development Planning. Awarded her Fellowship in 2010, Claire is currently contributing to staff development by focusing on systems such as peer observation. In conjunction with the Higher Education Academy and the Forensic Science Society, she is also investigating the potential for integrating multiple-choice questioning techniques within selected areas of the forensic science curriculum. Claire continues to be interested in assessment and she has carried out a number of action research projects and larger funded projects. She is the coordinator of the University’s Forensic and Police Employers forum, and also a member of The Criminal Practitioner Interest Group which consists of local law firms and Staffordshire University’s Law and Forensic Departments.
Dr Claire Gwinnett
A Staffordshire University graduate and lecturer in the School of Health and Social Care, Ruth is always looking for ways to improve and capture student voice with the School, creating a shared vision and partnership between students and staff. In 2016 Ruth developed and led a peer-education project at the Shrewsbury Campus, Centre for Excellence in Healthcare Education and expanding this to Stafford campus earlier this year. The project trains 3rd year student nurses to facilitate the learning of 1st year students. Ruth has now trained 6 members of academic and technical staff to support the project and has trained 19 peer-educators to teach a range of student-led clinical skills and simulation sessions. The Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence Fellowship will enable Ruth to continue the training of staff to support similar projects in peer-education. Building a culture of partnership with our students and creating opportunity for sharing practices and collaborative working that is sustainable. Ruth will expand the project beyond nursing, influencing teaching practices in other disciplines and disseminate through publication and contribution to the REF 2020.
Ruth Handley
Tim is a Senior Lecturer in Geography within the School of Creative Arts and Engineering. He is the Course Leader for BSc. Geography and his responsibilities centre around the day to day management of the Physical Geography awards, with a particular concern for the geography within the Mountain leadership award. Tim was awarded his Fellowship in 2007 and his initial focus was on an evaluation of the Research informed Teaching (RiT) project in the University. This highlighted a disparity in interpretation of RiT in different disciplines and a need to focus on a more complete understanding of what the University means by RiT. Since his Fellowship, Tim has continued to undertake collaborative research with students and also promote the RiT agenda within all courses. Tim is part of a larger team of staff involved in this activity, keen to engage students in research informed teaching through a variety of diverse curriculum opportunities.
Tim Harris
In addition to his faculty role, Tim has recently been appointed as the Research Informed Teaching Officer for the University.
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Duncan is a Senior Lecturer in Education within the School of Life Sciences and Education. He has also co-authored four successful education books on teacher training and learning support. Duncan is currently studying on the Education Doctorate, focusing on the Staffordshire Graduate Attributes. Awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2016, Duncan’s project will focus on building international connections through joint student projects, thus enabling their development of the ‘Global Citizen’ Graduate Attribute. Following an Erasmus visit to Finland in 2015, Duncan has piloted several collaborative projects between English and Finnish learners. His Teaching Excellence Fellowship aims to build on these by creating a generic international collaborative assessment which may be adopted by colleagues across the University. As an expert in activity-based learning, Duncan will also be part of a cross-University group helping other colleagues to further develop their teaching through integrating new technologies into their practice.
Duncan Hindmarch
A Staffordshire University graduate, Gavin is a paramedic lecturer in the School of Health and Social Care. He is passionate about using technology to improve student engagement, in particular utilising video technology to improve the student experience in the clinical practice setting. He is keen to explore the use of VR and Go Pro video technology to further develop his ideas. The Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence Fellowship will enable Gavin to work with colleagues to disseminate and develop his ideas. He is keen to trial some ideas through a proposed new online human factors course – potentially to be available across the University. He also plans to set up a virtual ideas bank for TEFs, for example using podcasts, drawing together different subjects, learning innovation and pedagogy.
Gavin Johnson
Eleanor is an Academic Skills Tutor Librarian. She has been demonstrating and training others to utilise emerging technologies and innovate teaching practice to establish and encourage interaction and group collaboration, helping to enhance the information skills/literacy skills of a wide range of learners, from Step Up Students to Postgraduate support. Eleanor has developed teaching, learning and assessment practices to promote cross-university liaison and external shared practice, via Teachmeets and other events. Through proactivity, engagement, feedback, discussion and debate, Information Professionals can help students find information, reliable resources, reference more accurately and achieve better grades.
Eleanor Johnston
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Angela is a Chartered Marketer, Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and Head of Department for Staffordshire Business School. Her passion for digital marketing and “all things digital” has led to the incorporation of multiple digital initiatives into teaching and learning, designed to both enhance the student learning experience and ensure inclusivity to accommodate a variety of student needs. Angela’s digital enthusiasm extends to the identification and development of innovative forms of assessment, designed to prepare business students for the digital environment that their careers will unfold within. Angela’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship focuses on a variety of activities, created to engage both academics and students in digital activities. Workshops have been delivered across the university to provide hands-on experience for fellow academics on the subjects of how to engage students by incorporating social media into module delivery and incorporating webinars into course delivery to enhance student engagement. The use of social media competitions to further engage students and profile the university in a positive, brilliant and friendly light has also been part of Angela’s Fellowship activity.
Angela Lawrence
Dr. Lisa Mansell is a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing within the School of Creative Arts and Engineering. Alongside her teaching role, Lisa writes and publishes poetry that crosses interdisciplinary boundaries and recently published some poems, ‘Wedgwood’s Glazes’ in dialogue with glaze chemistry in a special issue of Interdisciplinary Science Reviews. She also publishes academic papers on other interdisciplinary figures in literature, music and the arts. Lisa was awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2015, and her project will develop her research on creative writing as a collaborative and integrative methodology for research in other disciplines. The central theme of the practice is adaptation, and follows on from her previous research on the adaptation of traditional academic work into creative forms as a way of crystallising critical incidents in student research.
Dr Lisa Mansell
Graham Mansfield is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Computing and Digital Technologies. He is the Course Manager for Software Engineering as well as being an academic misconduct adjudicator and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. During his 27 years of lecturing, Graham has had many roles that focus on delivering the best student experience possible. Graham’s desire to continually improve the student learning experience has led to his experimentation with different teaching and learning strategies in line with the university’s push for innovative teaching. Although the culture of innovation in teaching is gaining momentum in the University, there seems not to be much discussion about the effect that these innovations have on students’ learning. Graham’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship was awarded in 2015, and his project, which includes establishing a cross-faculty working group, will explore ways for lecturers to determine the impact of their teaching on student learning.
Graham Mansfield
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Robert is Associate Professor (Acting and Directing) within the School of Creative Arts and Engineering, teaching across all undergraduate levels through to Doctoral candidates. He is also a Senior Fellow of the HEA and his book ‘Inside the Rehearsal Room’ will be published by Bloomsbury 2020/21. In addition, Robert continues to direct and write in a freelance capacity for theatres across the UK and into Europe, most recently for Selladoor Worldwide. Having been awarded the Fellowship in 2012, Robert embarked on a series of projects both inside and outside of the university examining creative learning and teaching strategies. This included external conference delivery, teaching observations, plus delivery of workshops and provocation papers within the academy. He also undertakes this through his work as an external examiner at other HEI’s plus as Academic Link Tutor for the University. Robert is interested in how innovative and creative teaching and learning can be embedded from curriculum design and planning (bridging real world approaches to the curriculum), teaching strategies and authentic assessment design.
Robert Marsden
Louis Martin is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Authority (HEA), and a Senior Lecturer in the School of Law, Policing and Forensics. He teaches criminal law and criminal justice at undergraduate level. Louis is one of the university’s BAME advocate and as part of his BAME role Louis is exploring ways to use reduce the attainment gap between students from different backgrounds. Louis’ Teaching Excellence Fellowship plan is designed to enhance skills for graduate employment by providing teaching to improve subject specific academic English. Having developed a new undergraduate module called the Language of Law, Louis’ Fellowship will focus on exploring how the core of this could be transferable to other discipline areas. This will therefore involve engaging in collaborative work with study-skills staff and academics in other schools in the use of subject specific academic English.
Louis Martin
Vicki is a Learning and Information Services Manager, based in the library. She has strategic responsibility for collection management, research publishing and support, and digital resources. She was awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship 2016, her project focused on the development of student digital leadership skills, within the context of digital capabilities. The project included an exploration of the concept of digital leadership and the identification of digital core competencies that students would need to acquire to evidence this. Vicki also developed a prototype generic module template for the development of digital leadership skills that could be embedded in a range of disciplines. Additionally, she created an online guide for students providing resources to aid the development of digital leadership skills, which has now been repurposed in some of the library’s online guidance.
Vicky McGarvey
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Stephen is currently a Visiting Research Fellow within the Faculty of Computing, Engineering and Sciences where he was previously Senior Lecturer in Cell Biology from 1993 to 2013. His research interests are both educational and biological and have led to the publication of more than forty journal articles and book chapters. Stephen was awarded his Fellowship in 2005, and pursued an empirical study on the difference between students’ usage and tutors’ intentions for coursework feedback. The findings from this study suggested that tutors need to provide more guidance to students in the use of feedback in order to make the meaning of their written words more explicit.
Dr Stephen Merry
Stephen’s current educational research interests include student assessment practices, the contribution of communities of practice, social networks and workplaces to support students’ learning, and the use of mp3 audio files to deliver feedback to students. His work on these diverse yet often linked topics has resulted in a number of collaborative studies, leading to presentations at national and international meetings.
Stuart is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Computing and Digital Technologies and is a Course Leader for the Undergraduate Animation, Stop Motion Animation and Puppet Making courses – the focuses of which are character performance, story-telling, ideas generation and communication. Joining the University in 2012 with a strong background in the Animation feature film and VFX industries Stuart’s film credits include Tim Burton’s ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’, ‘Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire’, ’10,000BC’, ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian’ and Aardman Animations ‘The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists’. Awarded the Fellowship in 2014, Stuart continues to develop and research the benefits of the ‘Creative Intervention’ workshop model that focuses on a more personalised learning experience for students and staff. The workshop aims are to engage learners in a new, often surprising way, enhancing their experiences by creating memorable, collaborative, creative, social engagement between staff and students.
Stuart Messinger
The off-curriculum workshops differ from ‘traditional’ teaching methods and explore the creative capitol to be gained from a programme of skills-based activities that take a consciously back-to-basics approach.
A lecturer in the School of Life Sciences and Education, Sandra strives to innovate and keep abreast of developments in teaching effectiveness and learner engagement. A huge advocate of the move away from traditional approaches of teacher centred learning to problem based and student-centred learning, she continually applies this approach to her own practice. Sandra uses innovative, technology based approaches to teach policy via physical timelines and games such as Kahoot for formative assessment. Utilising evidence-based practice in her own teaching, she is proactive in encouraging her own students to do the same in their teaching practice. During her Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence Project, Sandra plans to develop her practice by undertaking case study research to explore perceptions of teaching excellence and she will research views of academics and students within Staffordshire University with the aim of contributing knowledge to the teaching and learning innovation agenda within, and outside of, the University community. Sandra will also support and mentor staff to pilot innovative pedagogy to promote student engagement.
Sandra Murray
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A lecturer in the Business School, Tolu is passionate about improving engagement and learning through the use of the Flipped Classroom. Requiring students to access video resources prior to class as preparation, Tolu has increased one of his module’s student pass rate this year by 10% to 97 %. In another module, the average student grade has increased from 52% to 65%. Moving from 2 hour lecture/1 hour tutorial to weekly prep videos/1 hour flipped classroom/1 hour lecture/1 hour tutorial, Tolu has intentionally shifted instruction to a learner-centred model in which class time explores topics in greater depth and creates meaningful learning opportunities. Receiving the Staffordshire University Teaching Excellence Fellowship will allow Tolu to disseminate his practice across the University Schools and Services through workshops, seminars and activities. He also plans to launch and publish a bi-monthly bulletin where staff and students share learning tips.
Dr Tolurewaju Olarewaju
Paul is a Senior Lecturer in Biology within the School of Life Sciences and Education and is module co-ordinator for a range of taught and problem based learning modules including Fundamentals of Physiology, Drugs and the Human Body, Work Placement, Neurology and two postgraduate modules, Critical Reflective practice and a generic Negotiated module. Paul is also a dedicated and effective personal tutor and, in addition, he co-ordinates the Peer Observation of Teaching process within the School of Life Sciences and was recently part of the team which re-organised this process. He is a keen advocate of staff development, leading and promoting a number of different events both within the School and the wider University community. Paul was awarded his Fellowship in 2002 pursuing a number of learning and teaching projects on self and peer-assessment. His current research interests continue to be related to assessment and student learning, influencing his own professional practice in both his module design where he likes to place an emphasis on enquiry based/ problem based learning and in his delivery of external workshops.
Paul Orsmond
Lauren currently works within the school of Health and Social Care as a Midwifery Lecturer. Her role includes leading several midwifery undergraduate and postgraduate modules and she has interests in patient safety, leadership and inter-professional working. Lauren is well known for her interest in digital technologies and is a Digital Champion in her area. Her Teaching Excellence Fellowship will focus on supporting staff to extend their digital skills, particularly in using Microsoft and Adobe software to develop simulation with technology.
Lauren Philp
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Alison’s role is leading the Academic Skills Team. The post involves her working with academic skills tutors and information consultants who are qualified teachers, librarians and information professionals. Awarded a Fellowship in 2005, Alison focussed on the development of an information literacy strategy for the University. This Fellowship was then extended and allowed her to embed the strategy within Law and Business Schools as a pilot model. Alison’s continuing interest is in information and digital literacies. Her interest focuses on exploring how we can best ensure that students acquire the best skills to improve their learning experience.
Alison Pope
Dr Jim Pugh is Head of Education within the School of Life Sciences and Education. Jim has led numerous awards, both on and off campus and coordinated numerous validations. Jim led the department to be judged as OFSTED Good in all areas of Initial Teacher Education (2017). He has held several partnership Programme Advisor roles nationally and internationally. In addition, Jim has previously held the post of Academic Student Experience and Recruitment Manager across the Faculty of Business, Education and Law. Jim’s Fellowship focused upon improving approaches to active learning across the School of Life Sciences and Education. He is a passionate about embedding shared experiences and engaged learning activities within his own teaching. Working with colleagues Jim’s Fellowship enabled staff to explore and develop their approaches to learning and teaching using active learning strategies.
Dr Jim Pugh
Jaswinder is one of the Learning Technologists (TEF) within the Academic Development Unit. Her role involves facilitating the design and development of Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) in all program areas. Through her role, Jas is instrumental in enabling academic staff to embed effective TEL in their teaching and learning practices to enhance the students’ learning experiences. In order to facilitate effective solutions, Jas works collaboratively with all levels of academic staff, School SMTs, Digital Solutions and other members of the TEL Team in ADU. She is interested in designing methods and approaches of using technology effectively to deliver Learner-centred Flexible Learning that would allow all stakeholders to make a paradigm shift from teacher-focused learning to learnercentred approaches.
Jaswinder Sahota
Through her Teaching Excellence Fellowship, Jas developed and disseminated a ‘TSL Helpkit’. She has built on this to become a sustainable resource to improve TEL across the university.
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Mark is the Associate Dean - Students within the School of Life Sciences and Education. He is responsible for a fully distance learning undergraduate course, a blended- learning based course and a range of CPD courses. Mark is also responsible for establishing a unique advice based accreditation for a national advice related organisation. Awarded his Fellowship in 2005, Mark’s project focused on developing and enhancing the experience of distance learning students and the creation of a learning community by private social networking sites. The project proved successful and, as a result, the social networking site established in 2004/5 continues to support online distance learning students. Mark’s sustained interest in improving learning and teaching has also led to him gaining research-informed teaching bids in order to investigate the role and function of social networking sites to support and encourage students. His current research interests are focussed on the further development of technology enhanced learning, and this has also led to him studying for a PhD in this area.
Mark Savage
Laura is the Course Leader for the Forensic Investigation degrees, which link forensic techniques to investigative strategies. In addition to her Course Leader responsibilities, Laura teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate students in the fields of forensic biology, data handling, personal development planning and the planning and undertaking of research projects. She also undertakes research, predominantly in the field of biological evidence interpretation, including DNA analysis, the identification and interpretation of body fluids and sexual offence examinations. Laura’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship will research the benefits of implementing an ‘Escape Room’ initiative to support traditional teaching methods within the School of Law, Policing and Forensics. This project will examine the feasibility of students designing, planning and working together to create an ‘Escape Room’ experience for other students to complete. The ‘Escape Room’ will be an immersive, problemsolving exercise that requires students to work together as a team, answering course related questions to escape from the room.
Dr Laura Walton-Williams
Nia is a Senior Lecturer in Games Design, where she teaches undergraduate and postgraduate modules on Gameplay Design, Narrative, Production, Games Business issues and Marketing. She leads both BSc (Hons) Gameplay Design and Production and BA (Hons) Games Studies and is passionate about the field of teaching games design, especially in reference to creativity and fun. She also teaches employability skills and social media skills to the Games Design students. Awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2016, Nia’s project will centre on developing the use and reflective practices when using social media. She is also keen to grow the research community within the University and will produce a series of best practice guides for staff to cultivate their own educational social media presences.
Nia Wearn
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John is Associate Dean (Students) in the School of Law, Policing and Forensics and has a keen interest in all aspects of the student journey and experience, from their first interactions with us right through to their lives beyond graduation. He is an organic chemist, regularly teaches on our forensic science and pharmaceutical science degrees, and carries out research in chemical and analytical aspects of forensic science. John is a key contributor to several national initiatives, including the development of degree apprenticeships as entry routes into policing careers and the evaluation of online assessment methodologies as tools for the measurement of ‘learning gain’. John’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship will focus on the design, implementation and evaluation of a pilot study that will enable students to assess their competence in a selected transferrable skill, plan their development and track progress in an interactive online learning environment.
Dr John Wheeler
Philip is a Senior Lecturer in Computer Science, AI and Robotics. Besides teaching he helps to co-ordinate Teaching and Learning within the Computing Department and he is keenly interested in his enterprise work and is involved in Knowledge Transfer Partnerships with local businesses. Philip was awarded a Teaching Excellence Fellowship in 2016. His project has focused on the student experience, particularly in looking at ways to enhance student feedback, to increase student engagement, and to increase student retention. Philip is passionate about students actively participating in their own learning development and in developing ways to elicit the student voice.
Philip Windridge
Janet is a Senior Lecturer within the School of Creative Arts and Engineering, and the Course Leader for Geography and the Environment. In this role she has oversight of the development and delivery of all the undergraduate and postgraduate courses delivered by the school, as well as leading on curriculum design and development. In addition to this Janet is currently the Staffordshire University lead on the development of a dual on-line Masters in Sustainable Smart Cities with the University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA.
Dr Janet Wright
Awarded in 2015, Janet’s Teaching Excellence Fellowship will focus on enhancing technology supported learning within Geography and the Environment. There will be two strands to her Fellowship work. She will work with her colleagues within the school to further embed mobile technologies into the delivery of undergraduate Geography awards. Key elements of this strand include: exploring current use, and barriers to the use, of mobile technologies by both staff and students to support learning; and a cross-platform comparison of the use of mobile technologies for educational purposes. The second strand will focus on the development of more stimulating learning environments for students studying on-line postgraduate courses in sustainability.
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National Teaching Fellowships The National Teaching Fellowship scheme is an annual competition sponsored by the Higher Education Academy. It aims to raise the profile of learning and teaching by recognising and rewarding individuals who make an outstanding contribution through impacting significantly on the student learning experience. The University is proud to support and promote the innovative approach they make to learning and teaching.
Liz is an Associate Professor in the School of Health and Social Care, researching in a range of areas, from post-natal depression to service user and carer involvement. She also does a range of teaching on peri-natal mental health, research methodology, evidence based practice and critical appraisal skills. Awarded her Fellowship in 2006, Liz’s initial project focused on developing and enhancing service user and carer involvement in health and social care education, and in the wider University. This project has led to a number of wider initiatives including internal and national conference presentations, academic publications and toolkits on involving service users and carers in Higher Education and the NHS.
Dr Liz Boath
In 2007, Liz’s keen interest on service user and carer involvement in learning, teaching and interdisciplinary education led to her being awarded a National Teaching Fellowship. She used this to further embed links, networks and toolkits across other Higher Education establishments and the NHS. This focus also attracted additional funding to more extensively explore students’ and carers’ views of service users’ involvement. Liz is now investigating ways to improve student retention rates and ways to enhance that health and wellbeing of academic staff and students.
Mike is an Emeritus Professor of Enterprise Education. Working collaboratively with senior managers from the University, he now offers advice and guidance about the implementation and impact of the Staffordshire Graduate and related Enterprise initiatives. This has been built on his extensive experience over a number of years developing enterprise programmes delivered both on and offcampus, including local, regional and international collaborations. Mike’s work with external partners has ranged from Stoke City Council to the EU, and his sustained focus on the development of enterprise programmes has impacted on 100s if not 1000s of student learning experiences. Mike was awarded a University Fellowship in 2001, being one of the original recipients of this accolade. Through his wide-reaching institutional, regional and national work on enterprise education, Mike then became a National Teaching Fellow in 2009.
Professor Mike Clements
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As Associate Professor of Creative Academic Practice, Alke works within the School of Computing and Digital Technologies to facilitate and champion learning opportunities that are student-centred and experiential, visual and accessible. She also shares them widely within the university, nationally and internationally. For example, Alke has been instrumental in organising and facilitating a series of workshops in conjunction with Writing PAD (the network of Writing Purposefully in/ through/for Art and Design) and funded by the HEA that showcases the challenges and opportunities of writing in creative practice. This allowed a network of learning and teaching professionals to form, who now share best practice – and collaborate in new developments in learning and teaching.
Dr Alke Groppel-Wegener
The visual and hands-on learning and teaching strategies she uses are part of the innovative and creative approach Alke has developed under the umbrella term of ‘tactile academia’, which is based on the exploration of the links between academic and creative practice. And it is all for the purpose of making academic conventions accessible to students, effectively done by utilising visual analogies and metaphors, and incorporating object-based learning, thinking-through-making and exploratory writing tasks.
Bernard is an Emeritus Professor of Social Work Education and Spirituality within the Faculty of Health Sciences. In this capacity, he offers support to academic colleagues in the programme area of Social Work and Advice Studies, especially for developing their writing and publications profile. Always eager to find innovative ways to stimulate student learning, Bernard is currently developing the use of labyrinths as a pedagogic tool to foster reflective practice, creativity, and mindfulness. As a keen advocate of the University Teaching Excellence Fellowship scheme, Bernard supports many colleagues to advance their practice through this process of recognition. Originally awarded his own University Fellowship in 2000, Bernard produced a DVD on the use of large-group role-play. He then went on to gain a National Teaching Fellowship in 2004, and his project explored ways in which issues to do with religion and spirituality can be incorporated into the social work curriculum. In 2013 Bernard was given a further accolade in recognition of his outstanding leadership and contributions to learning and teaching by gaining a prestigious Principal Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy.
Professor Bernard R Moss
Fiona was awarded a National Teaching Fellowship in January 2017. She has been a full-time lecturer in Geography at Staffordshire University since 1994 and was conferred Professor of Physical Geography in 2008 on the basis of excellence in research and in learning and teaching. She is an international expert on glacier outburst floods, with over 25 years’ field research experience. Fiona also works on natural hazards, risk and resilience and is a driven and imaginative educator with an accumulation of expertise in student and life-long learning. The interdependencies between her research and her teaching lie at the heart of her work. Indeed her excellence and her claim for a National Teaching Fellowship have been grounded in her passion for this synergistic relationship between research and teaching. Keen to push the boundaries of her subject and its teaching, over the last twenty years Fiona has consistently demonstrated excellence in research and scholarship, innovative pedagogy and the support for student learning. This excellence has enhanced both her personal reputation in the field of physical geography and that of Staffordshire University.
Professor Fiona Tweed
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