eSTEeM launches its sixth call for innovation and scholarship projects

30th May 2014

We are inviting Open University colleagues to express an interest in forming part of a small team (between 2-5 people) researching in one of the following strategically important areas for the Science and MCT faculties.

1. Online/onscreen teaching and learning - objective measures of the factors that make onscreen working effective for learners.

2. Evaluation of the effectiveness of the OpenScience Laboratory - using the existing analytics platform to produce valuable insights for the next generation of Open Laboratory assets.

3. Student perception of support team interventions - students in Q world stand to benefit from coordinated interventions by student support teams and evaluation of good practice.

4. Group tutorials for teaching and learning - building evidence to inform the design of group and cohort level teaching strategies.

5. Investigation and quantification of student engagement with module materials – applying analytics based tools to feedback on the learning design process.

6. Student perception of assessment – for example formative, summative, thresholded; what do students understand by these differing terms and how do they respond to them?

The project itself will be further refined once the team is assembled and in coordination with the eSTEeM directorate.

The estimated duration of these projects is around 12 months with each team member expected to commit a minimum of 10 days. Interested colleagues may assemble their own teams, nominating a project lead, or indicate which team they would like to form part of. Once you have chosen your preferred strategic area please contact esteem@open.ac.uk who will send you the appropriate project submission form which includes some further details about the project area. The deadline for submissions is 17:00 on Monday 30th June 2014.

If we are to be innovative we must always welcome new ideas. Therefore, if you are interested in proposing a project which lies outside the listed priorities please contact us at esteem@open.ac.uk to discuss your ideas and establish eligibility.

We hope eSTEeM can support you in taking forward a high quality scholarship project based in the STEM faculties.

Image: Andy Hendry