Educational Enhancement Sabbatical Leave Scheme – First recipient announced
The Exchange is pleased to announce that Liz Gee, Associate Dean in the Fashion Business School (FBS) at London College of Fashion (LCF) has been awarded the first Educational Enhancement Sabbatical under the new 2019/20 scheme.
Liz will be using her sabbatical to extend and maximise the benefit of an FBS intervention to improve student attainment via tutorials, with the creation of a Personal Tutorial Framework.
“The UAL Career Pathway project ensures that sabbatical opportunities are available for staff on teaching, knowledge exchange and research pathways. This new scheme underlines our commitment to the career development for staff across all three pathways.
The Exchange review board were impressed with the thought and detail included in Liz’s proposal. We’re delighted to support this ambitious project and look forward to seeing the outcomes later in the year.”
Susan Orr, Dean of Learning, Teaching and Enhancement and Head of the Exchange
Improving student feedback literacy and tutorial engagement
Liz’s proposal stems from the awarding gap observed in her school, particularly for International students. When coupled with free text NSS comments reminding us that even on large courses students deserve to be known individually, it is clear that the personal tutorial has an ever more important role to play in our pedagogy.
Liz has identified dual opportunities to enhance student feedback literacy and improve engagement with tutorials in the FBS; indirectly expecting positive impact on course satisfaction scores, degree attainment and employability outcomes for students.
Project covering 1,500 Fashion Business School students at London College of Fashion
In previous years undergraduate students have not taken up the existing FBS provision, where optional tutorials could be requested from Year Tutors. This year additional Academic Development Fund (ADF) resource has allowed the FBS to instead allocate a Personal Tutor to every undergraduate. This is an ambitious project involving every FBS undergraduate student (c1,500) alongside over 70% academic staff as Personal Tutors.
Intended Sabbatical output is a Personal Tutorial Framework
The primary purpose of the project is to extend existing work to create a Personal Tutorial Framework for all undergraduate years alongside devising support material for staff and students. This Framework and the associated materials can then be used across all FBS courses, including those which are large and highly international, and will be available for adaptation and wider use across all relevant courses at UAL.
Alongside practical outputs it is intended to conduct empirical research to analyse the efficacy of the intervention for student outcomes to allow a cost/benefit analysis.
Where can I find out more?
Liz will be disseminating the results of her research from Autumn 2020. If you are interested or would like to get involved please contact Liz directly: l.gee@fashion.arts.ac.uk
UAL staff can search “Educational Enhancement” on Canvas for more information about this sabbatical scheme.
For any other queries please contact recognition@arts.ac.uk.