The RAISE conference (Researching, Advancing & Inspiring Student Engagement) is an annual event hosted by the RAISE network - “a worldwide network of students and staff in Higher Education who work or have an interest in the research and promotion of student engagement”. This year the conference took place in Leicester, UK, with a focus on “Equity in Attainment & Student Success”. The conference program was packed with presentations, workshops and campfire storytelling providing inputs and perspectives from a diverse range of staff, students and student organizations. iEarth participated with a presentation highlighting an iEarth seed funding project on student course evaluation and a workshop on an inclusive teaching approach for structuring student preparations and discussions in class explored in a collaboration between iEarth and the HK-dir-funded CoCreatingGFI project at the Geophysical Institute, UiB.

‍

‍

Robert Kordts and student co-researcher Eirun Gandrud presented an iEarth seed project on using Teaching Analysis Polls (TAP, Hawelka, 2019). TAP is a mid-semester method that generates open-ended qualitative, yet quantified feedback from students to instructors in different course formats, for collaborative course improvement. This was a true hybrid presentation, with Robert participating online and Eirun on stage at the conference hall. Robert and Eirun has explored this method repeatedly in selected courses at the Geophysical Institute, UiB, together with Mahaut de Vareilles, student Anne Digranes Årvik, Mirjam Glessmer, and Kjersti Daae.  The TAP results indicate that students are generally in favor of active learning methods employed by the instructors, and all course instructors receiving TAP-based feedback were very positive about them.

‍

‍

Catherine Bovill and Kjersti Daae gave a workshop based on a novel teaching approach initially called “the doughnut round” (Fleiszer et al., 1997).  Cathy, Kjersti, and Mirjam Glessmer have lately been exploring the potential of this teaching approach in different learning environments in three countries, with a special focus on inclusive teaching and co-creation. They have renamed the method “the ReADi round” (Glessmer et al., 2024). In short, the participants prepared for the workshop by reading a short paper and coming up with 1-2 questions about its context. During the workshop, the participants asked each other their questions in a structured way and continued discussing both the paper and the teaching approach.  The participants engaged in a lively discussion that continued in coffee breaks throughout the conference.

‍

‍

References:

Mirjam S. Glessmer, Catherine Bovill, and Kjersti Daae. 2024. Adapting a teaching method to fit purpose and context. Oceanography, https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2024.603.

Fleiszer, D., Fleiszer, T. & Russell, R. (1997) Doughnut Rounds: A self- directed learning approach to teaching critical care in surgery, Medical Teacher, 19:3, 190-193.

Hawelka, B. (2019). Coding Manual for Teaching Analysis Polls. Centre for University and Academic Teaching, Regensburg. https://www.uni-regensburg.de/assets/zentrum-hochschul-wissenschaftsdidaktik/forschung/manual-tap-2019.pdf

‍