Professional Development Event

Final Year Projects: Maximising the Learning

Thursday 13th May 2010
Newcastle University

This event offered a further opportunity to hear from Martin Luck, author of the learning and teaching practice guide on final year projects. An insight in to a variety of alternative final year projects in the biosciences was presented by way of case studies enabling delegates to consider and discuss how to maximise student learning from research projects. Issues arising from these presentations were then taken forward to the facilitated discussion session to try and address the questions arising from provision of such projects. Further examples of good practice and ideas associated with final year projects were explored and discussed during the swapshop session.

A travel bursary was awarded to Kelly Moule. In return she has provided a report on the day.
Delegate report by Kelly Moule, University of Bristol.

Programme

10.00	Registration; Tea and Coffee
10.20	Welcome and Introduction to the day Katherine Clark, UK Centre for Bioscience
10.30	Keynote: Alternative projects: ten tests for validity Martin Luck, University of Nottingham
	Case studies of alternative Final Year Project provision
11.00	Can you tell what it is yet? An investigative approach to final year group project work Debbie Bevitt, University of Newcastle
11.30	Refreshments
11.45	Science and Society in schools; an alternative to laboratory based final year Research projects. David Lewis and Clare Steen, University of Leeds
12.15	ELP for final year students: a guide to e-learning projects Carol Wakeford, University of Manchester
12.45	Analyses in biology: An alternative approach to traditional laboratory or field based research projects Helen James, University of East Anglia
13.15	Lunch
14.00	Facilitated group discussion on current issues surrounding student research projects led by Graham Scott, University of Hull and Jon Scott, University of Leicester
15.00	Refreshments
15.15	Swapshop session: Survey projects as an alternative to wet lab projects David Lewis, University of Leeds Undergraduate Ambassador Scheme (UAS) as final year research projects: a win-win solution Phil Langton, University of Bristol School-based projects: student collaboration with secondary schools to develop lesson materials for biology. Bioinformatics projects:collaborative departmental projects with drop-in workshops Andrew Bates, University of Liverpool Alternative projects: ensuring parity between project types Richard Bevan, Newcastle University
16.15	Reflections on the day and close Kelly Moule, University of Bristol