Case Study: Dr Hazel Farrell of Waterford Institute of Technology gives an overview of how she uses low stakes, weekly quizzes to inform her teaching practice and identify students that may be experiencing difficulty
The core aim of this website is to support educators in social policy and the social professions to enhance their digital skills, thereby facilitating the development of technology-enhanced teaching and learning practices within our disciplines.
At the core of the project, was the recruitment of staff as Digital Champions in each of the partner institutes. These staff have become champions for the improvement of digital literacy skills within their academic discipline, their department and ultimately across the Southern Cluster. The project documents the journey these champions took and provides a map for others who wish to follow in their footsteps.
ATLAS is a bespoke mapping tool and consultation pack developed to support educational developers in interpreting the PD framework within the context of existing accredited provision in their institution, with a view to examining and addressing specific staff professional development needs.
The SPEEDS project sought to expand social policy educators’ digital capacities and improve their confidence in integrating digital skills into curricula. Social policy educators were partnered with learning technologists within each of the partner institutions as they implemented the National Professional Development Framework, with a particular focus on enhancing digital skills. A spiky profile tool was developed to map the digital skills of participating educators, and group and individual training was provided as needed. Educators were transformed into ‘Digital Champions’ whose journeys were documented throughout the process. This provided a map for others who wish to follow in their footsteps.
This study was conceived as part of a broader effort on the part of the Institute to understand with greater clarity the profile of the student body and specifically to identify factors that may negatively impact on student retention and progression. The institution also sought to build a more robust evidence base on which to plan proactive initiatives designed to address retention and progression issues at institutional, department, course and module level. In particular, they recognised the need for a more evidence-based understanding of the retention and progression challenges at module and programme level in order to inform more effective and targeted deployment of resources by faculty and by central services at the earliest possible stage in the programme lifecycle.