April 22, 2015, by Teaching at Nottingham

Students as Change Agents: Promoting Collaborative Working at The University of Nottingham

Carina Neil: “I think that staff are used to collaborating with colleagues, but might not be quite sure what students have to offer. Of course, there are already lots of examples of staff working closely with students and doing some great work together, however the Students as Change Agents programme promotes a more widespread culture of partnership working and in particular gives support to students who have ideas about improving teaching and learning.”

“Staff have a bigger view of regulations, professional bodies’ requirements, university requirements, but still accept the fact that students can feed into this, shaping and redirecting the way things are done. There’s more openness to the idea that there’s perhaps more than one way to do things.”

“We’ve got students who are keen to review and develop existing curricula, tailoring new content  and activities to better suit student needs and others who are passionate to explore the benefits of  lecture recording. There are also opportunities for students to collaborate on re-designing assessment methods  and to research student engagement and study patterns to recommend ways of improving their learning experience. “

“Students as Change Agents is an integral part of the Teaching Transformation Programme, engaging students in the teaching enhancement process and providing a framework for recognition of students’ contributions.”

“Students are interested and encouraged that the university wants to do more than just listen to their views,  that it wants to actively give them the chance to bring about change in their learning experience. There are also many staff who want to work with students on development projects and are keen to ensure that the student perspective gets embedded in their programmes. It’s clear that there’s openness for collaboration.”

Carina Neil, Student Engagement Co-Ordinator

More information on the Students as Change Agents programme can be found here.

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