1. #digitalstudent http://digitalstudent.jiscinvolve.org
Approaches to engaging students Sarah Knight, Head of change: Student experience, Jisc A
Birmingham
04/04/17
#digitalstudent

2. Questions for today’s session
What approaches to engaging students do you currently use within your organisation?
How are you (or how do you plan to) engage students in your project?
What works?
What resources can I use?
Approaches to engaging students

3. Where are you now?
Consultation
Opportunities are provided for students to express individual opinions, perspectives, experiences, ideas and concerns
Involvement
Opportunities are provided for students as individuals to take a more active role
Participation
Decisions are taken by students to take part or to take a more active role in a defined activity
Partnership
There is a collaboration between an institution or department or faculty and student, involving joint ownership and decision making over both the process and the outcome
NUS Student Engagement toolkit –
I would like you to pause and consider this model and consider where your university is is in relation to its current practices on engaging students in technology related projects and practices? Can you share an example with your neighbour?
Consider how much and how deep your practices are?

4. Working in partnership: a definition
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Working in partnership: a definition
08/11/2017
“Partnership is fundamentally about a relationship in which all involved – students, academics, professional services staff, senior managers, students’ unions and so on – are actively engaged in and stand to gain from the process of learning and working together.
Partnership is essentially a process of engagement, not a product.
It is a way of doing things, rather than an outcome in itself.”
Healey, M., Flint, A. and Harrington, K. (2014) Engagement through partnership: students as partners in learning and teaching in higher education. York, Higher Education Academy. Available at:
Working in partnership with students facilitates much more than effective engagement of students in the development of their digital environment. It can also prompt and support staff to develop their own digital capabilities and enhance their practice.
There is growing evidence that this approach is enabling  providers and universities to deliver more effective  student engagement activities and to engage their students in active dialogue about the digital aspects of their learning experiences as well as to explore the role of technology in supporting students’ studies and in preparing them for employment.
Approaches to engaging students

5. Students as partners
The 2014 UCISA Digital capabilities survey reports that 30% of respondents are working with students as change agents with another 46% of respondents ‘working towards’ this
The 2016 UCISA Digital capabilities survey reports that 43 % of respondents are working with students as change agents with another 38 % of respondents working towards this…
Champions, change agents, digital leaders, student fellows, student ambassadors, student partners, student researchers, co- designers, co-creators, co-developers, co-producers…
Approaches to engaging students

6. Got to www.menti.com enter code: 10 84 46
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Share your ideas
08/11/2017
Got to enter code:
How are you planning to engage students in your project? Eg consult, co-researchers, partners etc..
Write down your answers on post-it notes and stick up on the wall on flip charts also use mentimeter
Approaches to engaging students

7. Students want a say
Students welcome the opportunity to contribute and get involved from the start of a project
They respond well to digital engagement methods
Need experience of different groups represented – see the REACT project TSEP and SPARQs for resources and support
Students can get involved in different ways eg Hackathons, focus groups, researchers….
Can help change relationships between staff and students
Approaches to engaging students
Image by Kane Reinholdtsen from CC-0

8. Student engagement at University of Lincoln
“One of the things I got frustrated with is the project-based approach, when funded projects highlight best practice in an area but that when the funding stops the wonderful ideas just die. I wanted to make sure the learning from ‘Student as producer’ was embedded into core quality processes and the annual monitoring of programmes”
Professor Mary Stuart, vice chancellor, University of Lincoln,
An institutional approach to developing student engagement whereby each and every academic school and professional service is asked to work more collaboratively with students
Students on interview panels for staff
Each school and professional service takes its own approach to developing student engagement, as led by their Student Engagement Champion and example of one project is reformatting subject committees

9. Current practice?
Surveys for quantitative data – but carries risk of over surveying students
Qualitative techniques informative and actionable but also costliest: staff/student time, data analysis. Student co-researchers?
Student reps widely used and valued but course/academic reps may lack curriculum/digital focus and user group members may not be representative
Informal feedback via e.g. padlets, twitter walls, vox pops, social media - ad hoc, continuous improvement ethos, good fit with student digital uses but not comparable, longitudinal, representative, systematic etc
Data analytics: early days but clear opportunities e.g. to correlate different factors: is data available in forms that would allow for this yet? Who would be responsible?
Approaches to engaging students

10. Resources to use and adapt to your context
Approaches to engaging students

11. Viewpoints: a framework/process to support change
Approaches to engaging students

12. Viewpoints cards Available from http://bit.ly/jisc-partnership
Approaches to engaging students

13. Developing successful student staff partnerships
Benefits of student-staff partnerships
Quick start
Viewpoints implementation framework, resources and guidance:
partnership setup
partnership implementation
capabilities, development and accreditation
sustaining and embedding partnerships based on evaluation of impact
Case studies
Webinars
Other agency initiatives
Online guide available from:
Approaches to engaging students

14. Focus group process Learner profile Focus group process Card sort
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Focus group process
08/11/2017
Tools to support you:
Learner profile
Focus group process
Card sort
Approaches to engaging students

15. Card sort activity and learner profile
Approaches to engaging students

16. Digital students are different posters
Approaches to engaging students

17. Enhancing the digital student experience postcards
Available to download from:
Approaches to engaging students

18. Starting conversations
The tools are starting points for discussions between staff and students about what is working in the digital learning environment and what you can work together to improve.
They can be used in student-staff liaison meetings or your students’ unions can use the tool to facilitate a discussion with course representatives to identify good practice and areas for enhancement
Approaches to engaging students

19. Benchmarking the student digital experience
Jisc, NUS and TSEP
Approaches to engaging students

20. How to use the tool?
You can use the tool at a number of different levels: course, department, service area (eg. library/learning resources) or whole institution
Read each of the principles and decide which of the boxes best describes your current situation
Then look at the next box to the right and decide what to work towards next
You may find once you look at the tool that you can find other points of good practice and new ideas for change
Approaches to engaging students

21. Hearing the learner voice
Digital learner stories and videos available from
Approaches to engaging students

22. Student digital experience tracker
Find out more:
The Student digital experience tracker enables colleges, skills providers and universities to:
gather evidence from students about their digital experience, and benchmark their data against other institutions
make better informed decisions about the digital environment
target resources for improving digital provision
plan other research, data gathering and student engagement around digital issues
demonstrate quality enhancement and student engagement to external bodies and to students themselves
Approaches to engaging students

23. Update from open pilot March 2017
New questions with stronger focus on learning experience
New question sets (HE, FE, Skills and Online learners) available from
Some optional and one customisable question
New guidance including FAQs, Guides and CoP
140 providers signed up: over 80 launched and collecting data: 11 international universities from SA to NZ
Surveys closed on 31st March: access to sector benchmarking data on 4th April: briefings available May
New opportunities: working with other data sources; more customisation options; snapshot case studies; sector intelligence; BOS
Approaches to engaging students

24. Share your ideas Discuss:
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Share your ideas
08/11/2017
Discuss:
How could you use these resources in your project?
With students and/or staff?
Make notes on the flip chart
Tweet with #digitalstudent
Add to the Padlet -
Approaches to engaging students

25. Change Agents’ Network Conference 2017
CAN2017
Change Agents’ Network
Conference 2017
Driving curriculum innovation through student-staff partnerships 
Thursday 20—Friday 21 April 2017
University of Exeter, Streatham Campus
Register by noon 7th April  
Join CAN network
Approaches to engaging students

26. Find out more
The Student Engagement Partnership –
REACT project –
RAISE Network – supporting student engagement -
Jisc Digital Student project –
Jisc Student digital experience tracker -
Jisc NUS TSEP Benchmarking the student digital experience –
Enhancing the student digital experience -
Developing successful student staff partnerships -
Change agents’ network –
Case studies of institutional practice -
Approaches to engaging students

27. Find out more… Digital Student project
#digitalstudent
Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under CC-BY-NC-ND
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Approaches to engaging students