Educators
How this might be useful for you?
You could use this model in teaching in two ways:
Applied research works really well as standalone assessment. You are most welcome to ‘drop’ the model into your taught unit. Jen has piloted this concept on different courses, at different levels for over ten years. We have a wealth of supporting documents and experience that we would be happy to share – just drop her a line.
If you already have great ideas for Projects, please complete the contact form and a member of our team will get back to you.
Our database can be inspiration for dissertations or coursework
If you have a student struggling to think of a dissertation topic, or they are finding it hard to focus an assignment, they are most welcome to draw ideas from our projects. We ask students to ‘sign up’ to a project so that we can ensure their commitment to ethical research and to gauge an idea of demand, but this does not commitment them to the project; we don’t follow up, they can change their minds and so forth. Once marked by you as normal, if students achieve 65% or more on their assignment and send their work into the University Living Lab we will close the feedback loop with the organisation. Over time, we will return evidence of impact back to the student researcher. It can take time to receive the feedback from organisations. This, in itself, is a ‘real-world’ experience for students – not everybody returns feedback as quickly as academics do!
Students love the assessment style
It is perhaps more challenging than a standard essay to begin with, but we would argue that assessment that makes students think is a good thing! This model enhances students’ employability and their experience through authentic assessment whilst affecting change for sustainable development – what’s not to like?
