Student Academic Partnerships by Staffs Union

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www.staffsunion.com/sap

sap@staffs.ac.uk

#sap

CONTENTS

The purpose and benefits of Student Academic Partnerships

Previous projects

Focus Group Methodology for the Careers Centre

Business School Student Feedback Survey

Careers Centre Communication

Why do some disabled students not engage with their non-medical helper support?

Hello Freshers

Crash Investigation Aid project

FX and Film Showcase

Mental Health First Aid

Accommodation Protocol

SEED animation

STARs animation

Disabled students project

Quotes

The Staffordshire Graduate

The purpose and benefits of Student Academic Partnerships

The Student Academic Partnerships scheme (SAP) sees students and academic staff working together in equal partnership. Individuals or small teams of students work with staff to strengthen the development of learning and teaching and the facilities of the University. The scheme helps foster and develop our learning community and places students at the heart of the University, working with staff, to develop new avenues in which to enhance the experience of university for us all. Through meaningful partnerships we aim to create a sense of ownership and pride in the University. The scheme gives students an opportunity to collaborate as partners, not assistants, with projects designed and delivered by students and staff collectively.

The importance of partnership work between students and staff; • Students take ownership of and become more responsible for their learning experience. • Staff can learn from students’ enthusiasm and knowledge, as well as gaining perspective on what things could be done to improve existing practices. • Students can benefit from staff expertise and support.

The benefits of getting involved with SAP for staff members are… • Being a key part of a project that will strengthen the faculty’s development of learning and teaching. • Strengthening relationships with students. • The sense of satisfaction upon completing a project and seeing findings or ideas implemented. • Inspiring others to support students in better, more innovative ways.

X1 Bus Transport Worker & Car Parking The benefits of getting involved with SAP for students are… • Being an active member of a project team working to strengthen the development of learning and teaching. • Flexible working hours. Students manage their own projects guided by their staff partners. • The sense of satisfaction upon completing a project and seeing findings or ideas implemented. • Enhanced employability skills.

Previous projects In the second year of the Student Academic Partnerships scheme, we continued to seek to integrate students into the teaching and research communities of faculties as a way to develop collaboration between students and staff. We’ve also combined the funding process with other student engagement initiatives that share the same ethos of staff and student partnerships. We invite staff and students to identify educational development projects in which a student(s) has the opportunity to contribute in an active role. This will provide students with the opportunity to enhance their skills. Funding and/or resources may be available to support projects that fall under the three streams of: • Student-Academic Partnerships (broad remit) • Student Academic Groups – Sustainability projects • Curicular Enrichment Projects combining multi-disciplines and multi-school/faculty activity. Examples of previous and current SAP projects can be found in the next section of this booklet.

Focus Group Methodology for the Careers Centre The Matrix Quality Standard is the unique quality standard for organisations to assess and measure their advice and support services, which ultimately supports individuals in their choice of career. The expectation of this project is to assess client views on their experience of the service in relation to the Matrix Quality Standard and the recommendations from previous Matrix Assessment November 2009. The student was working with members of the Careers Centre, to design the methodology and implementation of focus groups relating to the above criteria. Client Groups • • • •

Students (users and non-users) Graduates/Interns University Support Staff University Academics

It was proposed to facilitate three focus groups across both campuses six focus groups in total • Review of the recommendations from the November 2009 Accredita tion (all client groups) • Facilities of the Careers Centre its location, space and facilities – using the Matrix Quality Standard criteria as guidelines (all client groups) • Did you get what you want from the Careers Centre, did we meet your expectations and if not what would they be? (users only) • A video will be produced of the focus groups and interviews to be displayed on the Careers Centre website.

Business School Student Feedback Survey The Business School works hard to engage students with all student surveys, including National Student Survey (NSS), Student Viewfinder Survey (SVS) etc. During the 2010/11 survey cycle the Business School trailed University completion league tables with only 9% of students completing the survey. The aim of the project was to engage the student body in providing feedback through the suite of surveys above with the support of two Student Survey Champions (SSC). These SSC would provide lecture shout outs, meet with students and use the communal coffee space in the Brindley Building to advertise the surveys. Furthermore during the survey cycle they would be on hand to help students complete the survey.

Success!

Alex Darby and Wanda Groenewald were appointed as SSCs after being

interviewed. They clearly had enthusiasm to work with the academic team and to make a difference within the University. Both were from business awards and were outgoing and keen to engage with the student body. Alex and Wanda worked well with the Business School reception team. Operations Manager, Helen Ascroft and her team supported Alex and Wanda by lending them equipment (such as laptops), space and time. Furthermore timetables of large lectures were located to anticipate when most students would be around and could therefore be targeted effectively. A clear increase in all surveys was seen during the cycle when the SSCs were employed. SVS participation grew from 9% to 33%. There was also an increase in the NSS completion rates too taking the participation rates to over 50%. â&#x20AC;&#x153;The initial project was brilliant, working with Wanda, Jim Pugh and Helen Ascroft along with other staff at the business school was very insightful brainstorming ideas and collaborating a plan to encourage more students to fill in the survey. Not only did we see results of a very large increase but the support and thanks we received from the business school was a good feeling and much appreciated.â&#x20AC;? Alex Darby Reflecting upon the SAP project the recommendations have been made to sustain good practice and they were shared with the new Student Survey Management Group.

Careers Centre Communication

I have been working within the university, researching into the services offered and developing this into a campaign that appeals to students, and also informs them of the services offered. I began the project by researching into:• • • • • •

The services provided by the Careers Centre Current branding UNITEMPS Other universities’ Careers Centre branding Social media Target audience.

I produced ideas and worked on concepts and plans of how to promote the change in location of the Careers Centre.

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I began with an induction into the marketing team. I was able to meet all of the friendly staff, seeing what everyone does and I also took a health and safety assessment. After a meeting with Georgina Kelly about the structure of the team I was allocated a desk and continued with the assignment. I was able to continue in the graphics studios and became involved with the projects they were working on as well as contributing to my own. During working within this environment the ideas and imagery for the poster developed to the final heart design, these appeal as a professional campaign but are also artwork that may be appreciated and kept around. The idea progressed into a pull up banner suitable for events such as; Graduation, open days and employment events. The design has also been used on a beer mat. These were given out during Welcome Week to raise awareness to new students, and as they have a purpose will stay around the halls of residences and student spaces. During the summer of 2012 the merchandise I worked on has been used at events around the university. The posters have been displayed around suitable areas and the beer mats have been given out, and scattered on tables in the student spaces. Since I have completed the project I have been offered a three month contract working as a design studio assistant within the university. I am very happy with this outcome as it will help me gain many valuable skills that I can use as I complete my final year and progress towards finding a full time design job. Annie Crooks

Why do some disabled students not engage with their non-medical helper support?

Many of our disabled students are offered human support as part of the recommendations in their Assessment of Study Related Needs. This is often an agreed amount of Specialist Tuition or Mentoring, normally evenly distributed across the academic year. For a variety of reasons, including disability-related reasons, a significant minority of these students fail to engage fully with this support. As much of the support is in place to help the student to learn coping and organisational strategies, there are a significant number of students who are failing to reach their full potential or who may be at risk of withdrawing. This project would help to encourage these students to actively engage with their support. After significant research done by the student leading on the project, the following recommendations have been made: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Develop and promote information on non-medical helper support Improve initial contact between students and support workers Widen support worker availability Improve the quality of non-medical helper support Contact students who are not engaging with their non-medical helper support

Hello Freshers “Hello Freshers” was one of the first SAP projects. It’s a website aimed to help new students make contact with flatmates and course mates before they arrive at University. It’s an exciting opportunity for new students each year to find their own answers to lots of questions, such as: • • • • •

What’s university life going to be like? How am I going to cope with living away from home? What’s my accommodation like? Who am I going to be living with? What’s my course like, who’s going to be on my course with me and how will I make new friends?

And to start enjoying university life straight away! To get started students need to visit www.hellofreshers.co.uk and click the name of their allocated accommodation at the top of the page. They’ll be able to view details of the students they’ll be sharing with, floor plans of their accommodation and even profile pictures of students living there.

Crash Investigation Aid Project Introduction & Aims: The aim of this project was to create two highly realistic aircraft crash simulations for two different incidents which occurred in the real world. The simulations constructed allow for the complete flying of the aircraft during the failure sequence allowing the student to experience the effects of pilot inputs into a failing aircraft and the associated outcomes on the fate of the aircraft. Background Knowledge: X-Plane uses a completely different method called blade element theory. Blade element theory is a mathematical process which involves converting crucial aircraft surfaces into many elements and then converting these elements into accelerations, predicting how the aircraft should fly in its current aerodynamic state. Experiment Design: Upon completing the aircraft benchmarks and establishing the accuracy of the flight model, two real world air incidents were selected for reconstruction within X-Plane, these were the crash of US Air 1549 (duel engine failure & subsequent ditching on the Hudson River), and BA 38, dual engine failure on approach to Heathrow. To ensure the recreations of these two flights were as accurate as possible, the data used to recreate them was extracted from the official accident reports for the incidents. BA Flight 38 US Air Flight 1549 Fair Testing: In order to ensure the data extracted was as accurate as possible, all experiments were conducted with much focus on fair testing. The simulator is now used in the School of Engineering and students are able to use it and learn from it.

FX and Film Showcase The FX and Film Showcase website was a joint project proposed by an individual student and supported by a single lead staff member from the Faculty of Creative Arts and Technology (FACT), with aims of improving the promotion of the department and its courses, students and staff. The scope of this project was to establish a hub for showcasing and celebrating the work of our students and staff, focussing on courses in film, television, visual effects, animation and games art. The project was set up to give a student the chance to work with academic staff to create all of the initial set up for the website, including some content, all page layouts and various graphics to be created for the purpose of the site. This would then allow the website to be handed over to staff members to maintain. The project has been a success. The site is complete and has been populated with enough content to be useful and interesting to any user coming to view it. There have been careful steps taken to ensure the needs of the target audiences have been accommodated for. Plus structural steps have been taken to ensure the site can be understood by new developers coming to improve the site and its contents. There are several areas that could be built upon to improve the usefulness of the site. Integrating new social media features, such as access to a Faculty-run LinkedIn account, could provide students with easier access to industry contacts and networking opportunities. It could also be expanded to include the film courses from the Stoke campus. It is also essential to have a steady and strong base from which to expand, this will take time as staff build and expand on the information available. The site will be handed over and no doubt things will change. Features will improve and content developed. This is all good news as it will grow and expand alongside the learning of the students and the development of their work. It will be great to see profiles being added to the Student and Staff sections, as this will really help to bring some character to the people that make Staffordshire University what it is. www.staffs.ac.uk/schools/art_and_design/fxfilmtech/

Mental Health First Aid The guide was developed through a project led by a student, Lewis Lay, working with both the Enabling Centre and the Students’ Union. This guide is for you, whoever you are, whether you think you have or don’t have a mental health difficulty. This guide was developed to help you, not just whilst you’re at Staffordshire University, but also to enable you and give you the skills to cope with things in your daily life and future experiences afterwards. The aims of this guide are: • To give information about certain mental health topics • To give information on the support that is out there (both on campus and from external groups) • To give some general advice on some aspects of life that market research showed were particular sources of stress for students • And finally to provide a self-help guide on relevant topics. 55% of individuals with a mental health problem do not seek help due to stigma in the community that they’re in. Research shows that through educating people on areas like mental health, this stigma can be significantly reduced. The self-help section allows those of you who may not yet feel ready to seek assistance to try and improve your general psychological wellbeing. The section will give you a quick port of call if or when you wish to seek further help and was one of the main motivators for creating this guide.

Accommodation Protocol

The purpose of this project is to put protocols in place that will improve the quality of the student experience in relation to University accommodation. To have better accommodation with better standards and in good condition including trustworthy landlords! It ensures that students are safe, well informed and supported when finding accommodation if problems arise.

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SEED animation In the first couple of weeks we collaborated with the project leader, Klaudia to discuss the ideas we had for the project. This included what the desired outcomes were. To help further the ideas we created concept sketches and colour schemes including some stills of how the final project could look. We also discussed the things that needed to be included such as logos, time and information. We used 2D traditional method; which meant drawing each frame out individually, which took a lot of time. This also included the time used to â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;line testâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; the frames to make sure it looked as it should. For the backgrounds we took a trip to both campuses to source our own original images as references. To complete the animation on time, we decided to split the content of the work into two sections; before the handshake and after, with Rebecca taking the former part. The colouring, backgrounds, handshake, stalk growing and credits were done by me (Vanessa), with another member of the BA Animation course drawing some butterflies for us to use. By the second week we had already digitally coloured the majority of the frames. We had several meetings throughout the weeks to keep in contact with the project leader to ensure the project was staying on track. After the main body of the animation was coloured we then proceeded to find a typeface for the information that would be included. After many different styles, we decided that a mix of typefaces made it more appealing. We did have to change the content of the information a few times until it read better. For the music we asked a fellow student to compose a piece of music that would fit the style of the animation. He decided that a piano piece would complement it well. At the end of the third week the project finally came to a close on time, and we were happy with the animation we had created, as was Klaudia. Vanessa Hill & Rebecca Mansfield, student partners

Seed animation

STARs animation Student Academic Representatives (STARs) are here to ensure the student voice is heard. They are the vital link between the students, the University and the Studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Union. STARs listen to students on their course; collecting their views and opinions, and attend meetings to discuss the views of the students with relevant academic staff, to achieve a positive outcome. At the start of each academic year, elections are held to recruit STARs to represent their cohort. This was an exciting opportunity for a student to work with the Studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Union to produce a STARs animation film, which explored the importance of student representation and feedback. The film is being used for recruitment purposes and promoting the STARs scheme. STARs animation

Disabled students project Caroline Butterwick, Student Partner

As a disabled person, there are a range of barriers which I come across every day. I am partially sighted, and my guess is that you can already picture how that impairment affects me, perhaps best summed up as â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;not seeing too good = bumping into things.â&#x20AC;&#x2122; The purpose of this project was to gather students views about accessibility on campus at Staffordshire University. From that role and from my own experiences as a disabled student, I was already aware of many specific access issues and the impact of these on those who face them. I realised the need for this project partly from my understanding that there are so many specific access issues which need resolving, and also because I know that the people who are best qualified to say what access issues there are, are those who are directly affected. Reading through the survey results and case studies, there were many access issues mentioned which came as no surprise. I now also know about specific access issues at Staffordshire University which I had no idea about before. Many of the recommendations I have made in this report reflect the need to be flexible, based on understanding that different people will face different barriers.

If Staffordshire University is to truly enhance its accessibility, then the appreciation of individual experiences is essential. Of course, there are many specific changes which will make the campus more accessible. These will benefit not only the current students, staff and visitors who have experienced these issues, but those who come to Staffordshire University in the years to come. The report therefore features many of these specific recommendations too. This report outlines many of the issues that were raised in the survey, with a particular focus on those which appeared as common themes. It then outlines proposed resolutions to these. There are clearly many barriers faced by disabled people at Staffordshire University, yet there are tangible changes that can remove these. Some of these changes could be done within a matter of days. Marking step-edges, and gritting pavements more when icy weather is predicted, as just two examples, can, while involving some planning, be realistically put in place in the near future. Many of the access issues are long-term, and will always require review; maintenance being an obvious example. Taking accessibility seriously can be the difference between someone staying at University, and someone dropping out. The increasing number of disabled students who are choosing to study at Staffordshire University shows the value of accessibility for student recruitment. Making the University more accessible will not only benefit in helping to attract more of these students, but to ensure that they stay. Caroline Butterwick, Student Partner

Quotes “The experience from doing the project has been very positive. It has developed my leadership and project management skills and it has allowed me to widen my search for employment.” Kimberly Bond, Student Partner “The project not only helped me on my course, but also significantly improved my research skills, which I believe helped me to get my current job as a membership research intern.” Lewis Lay, Student Partner “Due to workload, I would have been unable to research whether there was a demand for this service from the student body without help from a SAP student partner.” Joanne Herward, Service Partner “The SAP project was very flexible and worked well around education. Jo Herward (Service partner) and other Students’ Union staff were extremely supportive.” Scott Allcock, Student Partner “The SAP project helped me to develop my project management skills. It made me understand the planning process much more as well as developing networking skills.” Paul Green, Student Partner

“The ideas that students can come up with when they have appropriate tools are amazing. The Crash Investigation Aid is a new and innovative project that gives our students a real advantage. Without the funding from the SAP scheme the outcomes could not have been achieved.” Martin Fiddler, Academic Partner “The Student Academic Partnership project has built confidence in me, my skills and the quality of work I produce. I am now using the animation in my portfolio which I believe will enhance my employability.” Sam Munro, Student Partner

“Being part of a Student Academic Partnership has been a rewarding experience. The work I have produced provides me with a sense of pride, and a feeling of giving something back to the University and our department, which I would not necessarily have experienced in my role as a student. Taking part in this project has been a great opportunity to expand my knowledge in a subject that I would previously not have considered. Although it is unrelated to my chosen field, I am sure it will aid me along my career path through the new experiences it has allowed me to explore. I would recommend the SAP experience to any student wishing to develop professional skills in the real world.” Jessica Oldland, Student Partner

The Staffordshire Graduate The Staffordshire Graduate is our commitment, both to potential students and prospective employers, that everyone graduating from Staffordshire University will possess more than academic knowledge. They’ll have an understanding of the real world and how they can have an impact on it. As a graduate of Staffordshire University you’ll have the key skills of employability, enterprise and entrepreneurship - and the ability to stand out in the job market. As a student you’ll get a whole lot more from University than just an understanding of your subject, you’ll leave with a set of attributes that prospective employers not only look for but will value and respect.