Engaging the First Year: Laying the Foundations of Personal and Professional Development

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Engaging the First Year Laying the Foundations
of Personal and Professional Development

• Ian Smith
• ia.smith_at_napier.ac.uk

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Further Information

• Smith, I (2006, April) Empowering the learner
  through enhanced engagement informed by
  reflective practice. Paper presented to The First
  Year Experience In Continuing Education ESCalate,
  University of Stirling ISBN 978-1-905788-41-5
• Smith, I (2007, August) Engaging the First Year
  Laying the Foundations of Personal Professional
  Development. Short paper presented to 8th Annual
  Conference of the Higher Education Academy for
  Information and Computer Sciences, University of
  Southampton
• http//www.ed.napier.ac.uk/staffconference/june200
  6/posters/smith.pdf
• http//www.ed.napier.ac.uk/staffconference/june200
  7/posters/smith.pdf
• http//www.napier.ac.uk/confidentfutures/whatis.as
  px

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Referenced Material

• (2004) 'One in seven students to drop out' ,
  BBC, UK Available at http//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/e
  ducation/3703468.stm
• (2004) Consultation on the Effective Learning
  Framework an Implementation Model for Personal
  Development Planning in Scottish HE. Joint
  Working Group (JWG) of the Scottish Advisory
  Committee for Credit and Access, Universities
  Scotland, UK
• Bowen, E. Price, T. Lloyd, S.  Thomas, S. (2005)
  Improving the Quantity and Quality of Attendance
  to Improve Student Retention Journal of Further
  and Higher Education, Volume 29, Number 4, pp.
  375-385
• Hill, P. Platooning the first year - encouraging
  social cohesion among an intake of 700
  undergraduates. Paper presented at Innovations in
  Supporting the First Year Experience, Higher
  Education Academy, Edinburgh, UK
• Smith, E.M. Beggs, B.J. (2004) The Triple C
  model for optimisation of student retention in
  Engineering Education??EE2004 Innovation, Good
  Practice and Research in Engineering Education
  University of Wolverhampton, UK
• Smith, E.M. Beggs, B.J. Robinson, A. Middleton,
  W. (2003) Personal Development Planning for
  Student Retention and Progression in Engineering,
  PROGRESS Project Strategy Guide PDP for
  Progression in Engineering, University of Hull,
  UK. Available from http//www.hull.ac.uk/engprogre
  ss/Prog3Papers/PDPGuide.pdf

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CO13003 Professional Development
(Smith, 2007)
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Professional Development module
Effective Learning Framework
Academic
How does my course help my employability ?
How do I learn ?
Self Review
Career
Personal
What are my career skills ?
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The Graduates Journey
Academic
Physical Space
Virtual Space
Social
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Engagement

• What do we mean by engagement ?
• Metric(s) ?
• One-way process ?
• Tutor - Student v Student - Student ?
• Academic v Social ?
• Physical Space v Virtual Space ?
• Asynchronous v Synchronous ?

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Context

• Planned Innovations for First Year in 2006/07
• Confident Futures
• Technology-Assisted Tracking System (Tracker)
• ePortfolio
• Vertical-Peer Learning
• Additional Electives
• Enhanced Induction
• CO13003 Professional Development module

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Induction

• Need to address
• Social Integration
• Academic Support
• Academic and Regulatory Structures
• Data Quality Management
• Leadership and Management
• Action Plan
• Programme Suite Specific
• Computing, Information Systems, Interactive Media
  Design
• Schedule
• the first five minutes
• day minus 7 till .
• reiterate

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Day 1 Morning - Icebreaking - 30 minute group
activities

• Low-cost prizes given for a range of categories
  (e.g. best, fastest, smallest, noisiest etc)
• Big Bubble Contest (Noisy and competitive)
• Bubble blowing
• Photograph taken on own mobile telephone
• Bluetooth photograph to tutors laptop
• Displayed on data projector
• 30 Grams of Rice (Quiet but messy)
• Given 100 grams rice plus containers,squared
  paper etc
• Devise a method to estimate 30 grams
• Area, volume, counting etc
• Things Beginning with (Quiet)
• Given a picture with many different objects
• Asked to find as many objects as possible
  beginning with the letter
• Egg Catcher (Noisy, chaotic and messy)
• Given access to scrap materials (think Scrapheap
  Challenge)
• Make egg catcher
• Egg dropped from 12 feet above

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Day 1 - Lunchtime - Forming Personal Tutorial
Groups

• The students were given 15 minutes to form
  themselves into groups of 5 or 6 using a set of
  rules to minimise risks of social isolation (e.g.
  a group could not include a sole member of either
  gender, a group could not have only one under 18
  year old etc).
• Each group was instructed to complete an urban
  orienteering task, have lunch and be back by a
  specified time.
• At the end of this session the students had
  bonded into self-selected groups and discovered
  their way around the campus.

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CO13003 Professional Development Delivery

• Blended Learning
• Paperless
• Four F2F learning events per week
• Focused learner questions (FLQs)
• Experts Specialists used when possible
• On-line learning
• Learning activities
• Discussions
• Blogs
• ePortfolio (low-tech version)
• Directed Study
• On-line Assessment
• Deadline Sunday, 2359
• On-line Feedback

Students really like vista . and on line
submission
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CO13003 Professional Development Communication

• F2F
• Class
• By appointment
• Corridor
• Napier e-mail
• end of week summary on Saturday
• Vista e-mail
• end of week summary on Saturday (copy)
• Vista announcements
• Vista discussions
• Vista chat
• Skype (video conferencing)

Oh ! .. the personal voting system
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CO13003 Professional Development Tasks

• 250 word pen picture digital photograph (week
  1)
• 300 word self-reflection "What type of learner am
  I and what implications does this have for my
  university studies? (week 2)
• 300 word self-reflection "How am I hoping my
  course will help me achieve my current
  aspirations ? (week 3)
• With reference to the recommended template,
  develop a current curriculum vitae (CV) as word
  document. (week 4)
• Develop a personal Blog and make at least one
  entry per week over a four week period. (week 9)

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CO13003 Professional Development Assignments

• 750-800 word self-report titled "A first
  destination after graduation ?" to incorporate a
  job specification with essential and desirable
  requirements. In doing so, consider your personal
  and professional development requirements. (20
  marks) (week 5)
• Personal Development Plan, 500 word Reflective
  Report, Portfolio of Artifacts (40 marks) (week
  12)
• As part of your Personal Tutorial Group you are
  required to develop and give a ten-minute
  presentation on the theme Video Games in
  Contemporary Societyusing PowerPoint (40 marks)
  (week 13)
• the  grading criteria for this assignment will be
  agreed by the class in your tutorial session in
  week 11

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Measuring Engagement
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Measuring Engagement ?

• Students registered attendance on Tracker
• Lecture
• Tutorial
• All
• At least one
• Students submitted Task 1 by end of week 1
• Students received feedback on Task 1 by end of
  week 2
• Students submitted four Tasks and an Assignment
  by end of week 5

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Measuring Engagement ?

• Class of 135 students
• logged 10543 virtual environment sessions during
  the semester
• 18 general discussion topics 25 group
  discussion topics
• generated 694 messages (only 15 by the module
  leader)
• combined reading total of 174120 times

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Measuring Engagement ?
M Merit, PPass, FFail, NANon-Attender Compari
son of Professional Development Module Results
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Measuring Engagement ?

• Initial analysis of the overall student
  performance of the First Year 2006/07 (first
  diet)
• 76 of students successfully completing all
  modules
• further 5 carrying a single non-completion

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Measuring Engagement ?

• By the end of Week 2
• Social Committee formed
• By the end of week 3
• Five programme representatives elected
• By the end of Week 5
• New Napier Anime Society (October 24, November 7)
• Invited to give a guest presentation
• LAN Party (November 3)
• LumpSucker Gig Advertised (November 21)
• Four students registered interest in Getting
  involved in working with Napier
• New semester 2 elective (C)
• 23 students - all passed, 18 merits
• Semester 2
• Feedback from lecturers perceived the students to
  be more outgoing and confident in comparison to
  previous years.