I’m a Producer! Staying involved in Lincoln’s Student as Producer

One of the things I always enjoyed talking about as Vice-President of the Students’ Union was Student as Producer at the University of Lincoln and the positive buzz it has created around involving students more in their learning. I have tried to make the most of the concept and advocate its extension beyond just bringing together staff and students in the classroom to creating a stronger partnership in the leadership of the university – something that was in essence a part of the project but I wanted to ensure its prominence – which I think I’ve achieved along with colleagues.

Student as Producer from University of Lincoln on Vimeo.

Upon returning to study this year, I pondered what I might like to get involved in. The decision was quite simple in the end, I couldn’t find a reason to not try and be involved in Student as Producer – after all it’s a project I firmly believe in and want to see succeed!

Things have been going well since then, I’ve been on the panel of a Guardian Higher Education Network web-chat in which Student as Producer was responded to positively, more at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/2011/oct/11/student-engagement-live-chat

And it was highlighted again in the best bits: http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/2011/oct/26/student-engagement-tips

We’re now in the process of bringing together a group of creative students to help students become interested in and inspired by Student as Producer, with the aim of motivating them to constructively challenge their tutors to develop the course in a way that better aligns with the Student as Producer principles. Working throughout the year we will build awareness and create what we hope to be hundreds of conversations on campus about the exciting prospects that Student as Producer brings – starting with I’m a Producer Day towards the end of this month. Anybody interested in helping to promote Student as Producer can drop me an email to dderricott@lincoln.ac.uk

Some related Twitter folk you might enjoy:
@studentproducer – Student as Producer’s Official Twitter Feed
@mikeneary – Professor Mike Neary, Project Director
@wezwells – Wez Wells, my partner in crime on this work
@GdnHigherEd – The Guardian’s Higher Education Network
and of course if you aren’t already: @danderricott

‘Student unions should play a starring role in student engagement’s new fame’ – by #qualitygeek @wheelybarrow

There are many people having their say in the student movement on this and that, with a whole bunch of special groups and campaigns for certain segments of the student population. I proudly self-define as a #qualitygeek.

#qualitygeeks could be best defined as a higher education folk who are interested in student engagement in quality assurance & enhancement. They are active on Twitter in boldly defending the reputation and honour of fellow #qualitygeeks. There is even talk of a hostile takeover of the National Union of Students and rebranding as the ‘National Union of Quality Geeks’ or #nuqg in 140-character dominated environments.

One of my favourite #qualitygeeks, Matthew Barrow / @wheelybarrow has been blogging away on the Guardian’s Higher Education Network – and I think it’s well worht a read… http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/2011/oct/31/student-engagement-through-student-unions

Delighted to return to the QAA Student Sounding Board

Good news! After really enjoying being a member of QAA‘s Student Sounding Board last year, my application to remain a member for a second year has been successful.

The Student Sounding Board advises QAA’s staff, Chief Executive and Board of Directors on the student perspective in quality policy discussions and helps to shape policy and process in a way that puts students firmly at the heart.

On another – but related – note, I’ve been quoted in a QAA press release announcing a major investment in supporting student engagement in quality which is great! (albeit I don’t hold the post detailed)… http://www.qaa.ac.uk/Newsroom/PressReleases/Pages/quality-matters-2011.aspx

I’m an engaged European student now

Of course I have always been a student in / from Europe and have tended to be ‘engaged’ but admittedly I have never referred to myself as a European student. That is all changing though as I embark upon the latest and one of the most exciting pieces of work in the Higher Education sector.

Following a successful nomination from the National Union of Students UK to the European Students’ Union (ESU), I am a member of the ESU’s Expert Pool on Quality Assurance and as tends to happen, that opened another door.

Those who follow me attentively on Twitter and my Facebook friends will know that I recently travelled to Istanbul in Turkey for a few days. That was because through the ESU I was selected to be a member of the European University Association’s (EUA) Institutional Evaluation Programme (IEP).

The EUA is an organisation that brings together universities from across Europe for numerous reasons, but specifically one of the things they offer to members is access to the IEP.

IEP is described as being ‘designed to ensure that higher education institutions gain maximum benefit from a comprehensive evaluation conducted by a team of experienced European higher education leaders. The intention is for these evaluations to support the participating institutions in the continuing development of their strategic management and internal quality culture.’

You could compare it to a QAA Institutional Review in the UK and my impression is that it is most useful in those countries without such well developed national frameworks and regulation for quality assurance – hence a low take up in the UK. I imagine a QAA review is quite enough for most Heads of Quality to contend with.

The teams that conduct evaluations are made up mostly of current or former Rectors / Vice-Chancellors from a plethora of countries, as well as a student member with experience of institutional, national or international quality, and the teams are coordinated by somebody with appropriate experience, i.e. a former Head of Quality.

Istanbul was the annual gathering of evaluators and a chance to learn that I’m of to the Czech Republic in March for my first evaluation, which I am really looking forward to it – I think it will be a tremendous learning experience as well an opportunity to share my own experience and perspective.

As part of a wider effort to embrace, understand and appreciate the European context of HE quality – the Student as Producer project is supporting me to attend a conference in November (for which I’m especially grateful).

I’m both discovering and applying, which is the approach I’m most suited to when it comes to learning. It’s all very exciting.

Students’ Unions and Youth Councils: appealing relationship not inconvenient nuisance!

When I was elected as a Trustee of the British Youth Council I talked up the concept of local campaigning coalitions (apologies for the ‘C’ word) particularly between Students’ Unions in universities & colleges and local Youth Councils (and their Members of Youth Parliament) which would pull influence, ideas and resources together – but how feasible is such a partnership.

Is Students' Union campaigning stuck with this image?

Working with the other half might initially be daunting for both sides, with the age difference potentially being vast and the student/locals divide that exists in some areas. The media were ‘kind enough’ to portray the sideshow violence at student demonstrations much more than the mass peaceful protest – the subsequent misconceptions could easily deter anybody from wanting to work with a Students’ Union. Youth Councils are sometimes not as well known as other representative groups and committing to a project with them or relying on them might be cause for concern in terms of potential risk.

Once you look past these barriers (which are all perceptions / in the mind), you see a whole host of common issues that provide a platform for collaboration and at the moment they mostly revolve around government policy. The abolition of EMA as we knew it and the slashing of provision for careers advice are fundamental problems being faced by 14-19 year olds at the minute and they are so critical to young people making the right decisions about higher education right down to the essential dilemma of whether it the right option full stop.

Fees of up to £9,000p/a (yes, that old chestnut of course) are terribly off-putting for potential students and have caused absolute outcry amongst the current student movement. The solidarity and united efforts were inspirational in late 2010, but we did not exploit the possibilities of collaboration enough.

Student integration and volunteering in the community is something student leaders talk about a lot and some Students’ Unions are progressing well in this area, but how many are working with Youth Councils who often have the listening ear of local government leaders and change-makers?

These are some of the topical issues that could bring us together and there are more. My argument is that our similarities are real and far greater than our, often misperceived, differences. We are facing both current attacks to education and ongoing cohesion problems that could be much better tackled through more united efforts and exploiting those natural linkages. Plus, I bet that Students’ Unions that have recently written a new strategic plan identified partnership working and relationships as important!

Call me ideological, but I like to think we should embody some sense of collectivism (unions / unity / united and all that jazz) and these are important issues that profoundly affect the opportunities of the next generation of students.

I want to produce guidance for Students’ Unions and Youth Councils (with NUS, who BYC work well with nationally) on what the other is and where the obvious (and not so obvious) synergies are. I would b very grateful if you could comment on this blog post with any thoughts about the validity and potential of such partnerships, any examples of good practice, suggested content / format of any guidance etc. There are exciting possibilities ahead, don’t let them pass us by.

The challenge of focussing on representation post-2012

Expectations of Students’ Unions are set to change drastically if developments at Lincoln resemble a trend more widely, as I expect they do.

With much more emphasis on the student being ‘in the driving seat’, higher-profile student satisfaction ratings through the Key Information Sets (KIS) and an unavoidable shift even further towards a consumer mentality – the University of Lincoln have given clear signals that its relationship with its SU is critically important.

At this point it might be worth indicating that Lincoln tries to be ahead of the game in terms of student engagement anyway and is pushing this agenda from a number of angles, though I would argue the fundamentals of this shift are transferable to any institution in a more market-driven HE sector.

A closer and more productive relationship is an encouraging objective for Students’ Union to hear about from their parent institution, but can students really rely on their representative body to cut the mustard?

Leaps and bounds have been made in many Unions over the last few years to refocus on representation and academic engagement, but I am still not convinced that the argument has been won within Unions to really plough genuine strategic effort into beefing up the impact of the student voice.

For this can mean tough choices, do Unions take a slice of money from sports teams to invest in staff support for research, policy, representation co-ordination, communications and project management? No they don’t because sports and societies usually accounts for the greatest proportion of students who participate in their Union and as such they have the loudest voice in the boardroom.

Is there the managerial expertise and experience of delivering representative results for the membership or are Unions managed by those with backgrounds in delivering student services and commercial operations? Unions are underpinned by, often excellent, teams of permanent staff who provide support to elected officials and are tasked with implementing strategy.

Unions who are going to try and be one of the big boys on the university executive or try and shape outcomes for students rather than just ask the university to come up with some need to be coherently managed by people with an intricate understanding of the student experience inside and outside of the classroom, and they must be fluent in the power of effective representation and communications functions to deliver joined-up results.

The types of talent needed in staff teams are one of a number of challenges facing Unions as they evolve in ‘the new era’ of funding. For those who disagree and think Unions will be fine to just stay as they are, I say you are sadly mistaken and will miss out on the opportunity to shape the role of Unions post-2012.

Operation Authentic Student Engagement

I imagine student engagement is high on the agenda for many Higher Education managers at the moment, especially with the student-centred approach to quality in the QAA’s new institutional review method. But will a regulatory, managerial, top-down approach to embedding students as more than just consumers be an effective approach?

Tokenistic listening exercises are the easy, and I fear all too common, option taken by staff on the ground so that they can tick another box at the end of another form to conform to another centrally imposed policy. This means the real value of students engaging as partners in their learning; the design of their curriculum; the management of their course; and the leadership of their institution is missed and so much potential disappears into the abyss. All because it’s often forced and imposed, rather than the case being made for the benefits of engaging those who understand the learning process better than anybody else.

Of course this is not the case everywhere. I am fortunate to have been working as a champion of student engagement at the University of Lincoln over the last year in my role as Vice-President of the Students’ Union and on the whole we’ve managed to avoid tokenism. But, if we are to truly achieve the culture we talk of so much where students are partners and we reengineer the nexus between teacher and learner, we are only at the beginning of the journey and we are yet to fully conceptualise where our path might take us.

Student as Producer is the notion which Lincoln is gripped by currently and with great reason too. We are dismissing the passive learning that has emerged in HE as the norm and pushing relentlessly towards research-engaged-teaching across all undergraduate disciplines where students are exposed to discovery and risk rather than prescribed learning outcomes. This is real engagement of students in their learning and it’s terribly exciting for a proud geek like me.

Student as Producer is one of the roads we will travel on our journey to students becoming partners across all areas of their university, but it is just one of the roads, there are more which at the moment are less clear and their destination is still unknown.

Much contemplation about what to do to keep myself busy during my final year of study has occurred recently. Well, this is it! I’m going to use every platform I can to carry on encouraging the University of Lincoln and hopefully other institutions too, to be pioneering in the ways that they engage students and most importantly to be genuine and always doing it for the right reasons. My ultimate goal is to have the time to develop groundbreaking solutions too. This is Operation Authentic Student Engagement and it begins now.