Centre Update January 2011

Welcome!

Contents

• Centre News
• Centre Events
• News from the HE Learning and Teaching Community
• Events from the HE Learning and Teaching Community

Centre News

Bioscience Education - Volume 16

Volume 16 of our journal Bioscience Education is now available with a range of research articles, descriptive accounts and short communications including:

• Podcasts and Mobile Assessment Enhance Student Learning Experience and Academic Performance
• Encouraging Use of Community-based Resources by Bioscience Students
• An Alternative Approach to Assessing Laboratory and Field Notebooks: The Data Retrieval Test

View and download articles from www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/journal/vol16/

Ethics in the Biosciences Briefing

The Centre is producing an "Ethics in the Biosciences Briefing" similar to the Assessment Briefing published in 2099/10 (available from www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/resources/briefings/assessment.aspx). The briefing will bring together resources and references for ethics in the biosciences. Are there any resources focusing on ethics and bioethics you would recommend for inclusion? These could be resources you have used in teaching, resources that have helped you develop your teaching or resources your students have found useful.

If you have any resources you would like to recommend for inclusion please send details to Katherine Clark on k.a.clark@leeds.ac.uk

Quick Reminder

Student Award

Our 2011 Student Award is open and we want to hear from students about "The pluses and minuses of maths on my bioscience course". Full details about the award are available from www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/funding/essay/award11.aspx

Deadline for entries: 8th April 2011. Please pass the message on to your students!

Centre Events

Effective Learning in the Biosciences 2011 - submission deadline extended to Friday 4th February

Thursday 30th June and Friday 1st July 2011, Edinburgh

For further information please visit the Conference website at www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/bioconf

The deadline for submissions has been extended to Friday 4th February. Submission guidelines and a submission form are available from www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/bioconf. Proposals will be evaluated against the criteria outlined in the submission guidelines (www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/bioconf/submissionguidelines.aspx) and presenters will be informed by email if their submission has been accepted by 28th February 2011.

We look forward to receiving your submissions.

Conference Registration is now open: www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/bioconf/registration.aspx

Teaching in the Biosciences: an introduction for postgraduates and postdoctoral fellows

Friday 25th February 2011, University of Ulster Jordanstown Campus

Postgraduates and Postdoctoral Fellows play an increasingly important role in supporting teaching in UK higher education. The UK Centre for Bioscience provides support and resources for teaching staff in UK higher education for the development of teaching, learning and assessment. This event is designed for Postgraduates and Postdoctoral Fellows with an interest in developing their teaching experience, giving them the opportunity to meet Centre staff and Bioscience Representatives and explore issues in Higher Education relevant to their careers.

Engaging bioscience students in practical work - Date for your diary

Thursday 7th April 2011, University of Bristol

Cancellation of Event

Bioscience Graduate Attributes for the 21st Century scheduled for Tuesday 8th February 2011, Edinburgh Napier University. The event has been cancelled due to low enrolment. If our cancelled event was of interest to you, you can make plans to attend a similar event on Thursday 16th June 2011 entitled: Graduates for the 21st Century: National Symposium Series Event 3 For more information please visit: www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/news/detail.asp?ctrID=115

News from the HE Learning and Teaching Community

Congratulations to Neil Morris, Institute of Membrane and Systems Biology at the University of Leeds, on being awarded the Physiological Society's Otto Hutter Physiology Teaching Prize for 2010.

The Physiological Society established this prize in 2009 to recognise an individual's contribution to teaching undergraduate physiology, further details are available at www.physoc.org/site/cms/contentviewarticle.asp?article=990

The National Teaching Fellowship Scheme (NTFS) aims to raise the profile of learning and teaching, recognise and celebrate individuals who make an outstanding impact on the student learning experience, and provide a national focus for institutional teaching and learning excellence schemes.

Up to 55 individual awards of £10,000 will be made in 2011 in recognition of individual excellence. The award is intended to support the National Teaching Fellow’s professional development in teaching and learning pedagogy. The nomination documents are available to download from www.heacademy.ac.uk/ourwork/professional/ntfs/individual where you will find further details of the scheme, the nomination requirements and the application pack.
Deadline for submissions: 12 noon on Wednesday 23rd March 2011

Change Academy 2011: Call for proposals

It is clear that higher education is facing a challenging future, with reduced public funding, an increased focus on enhancing the student learning experience and an even greater emphasis on organisational effectiveness. Change Academy is your opportunity to approach these challenges in an imaginative and creative way. A year-long process, Change Academy includes specific development opportunities for nominated team leaders, an ongoing support network and a four-day residential. It provides a creative environment in which the whole team can focus on planning and developing strategies for lasting change.

To find out more, please contact the Change Academy team (01904 717500 or change@heacademy.ac.uk) or visit our website at www.heacademy.ac.uk/changeacademy, which includes video commentaries from 2010 participants. If you would like to discuss potential change project ideas with one of the programme directors, please contact Steve Outram on steve.outram@heacademy.ac.uk(07976 132804) or Lesly Huxley on lesly.huxley@lfhe.ac.uk (07977 457949).
Deadline for proposals: Thursday 3rd March 2011

JISC TechDis Subject Library Survey – experiences in obtaining alternative formats

Do you have experience of working with publishers to source or produce accessible texts for your students? JISC TechDis are seeking to produce a summary of publisher responsiveness to requests for alternative and / or accessible texts on a subject by subject basis. The summary aims to:

1. Advise subject communities on the best publishers in their subject areas in terms of: a) providing texts in accessible format at source (e.g. accessible e-book platforms); or b) supporting requests for alternative formats of hard copy books.
2. Provide early feedback to publishers commended for their accessibility awareness.
3. Identify problem publishers. These will be approached (in partnership with intermediaries and peers within the industry) to give them feedback, make them aware of the issues and point them to advice and guidance from the Right to Read Alliance and the publishing industry.

Further details can be downloaded from www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/ftp/surveys/techdissurvey.pdf. The survey should take no more than 5 minutes to complete and is available from www.surveymonkey.com/s/NYCL9HW

SCORE Short-term Fellowship Call - Open Educational Resources Development Opportunity

Applications for short-term fellowships in Open Educational Resources (OER) are invited by The Support Centre for Open Resources in Education (SCORE). Short-term fellowships are designed to provide foundational knowledge in the production and use of OER to those with little or no prior experience. The Fellowship consists of distance learning elements and a one week intensive residential course in Milton Keynes. Priority will be given to applicants from STEM subject areas. Further details can be found at www8.open.ac.uk/score/short-term-fellowship-april-2011
Deadline for applications: Thursday 24th February 2011

Events from the HE Learning and Teaching Community

"More Effective..." Workshops Series
Various dates and venues in 2011

A series of workshops organised by the UK Physical Sciences Centre around the theme of doing things more effectively. The aim of these workshops is to make the student learning experience more effective in a rapidly changing Higher Education environment. Workshops include:

• More Effective Tutorials / Workshops
• More Effective Assessment and Feedback
• More Effective Transition to HE

Further details are available from www.heacademy.ac.uk/physsci/events/forthcoming/centre

Engaging Students in Sustainable Development for the 21st Century
22nd February 2011, University of Leeds Student Union

This one day event will enable delegates to find out what students are thinking and doing with regard to sustainable development, the aims of the day being to:

• promote the role of students as pioneers and change agents for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) issues in the HE sector;
• examine the contribution that students make to ESD in HE in both informal and formal learning situations, and through volunteering in the community;
• showcase student activity in sustainable development, relating especially to ESD; and
• explore ways in which HE policy and practice can better engage with students around questions of ESD.

eLearning in Health 2011: Collaboration, sharing and sustainability in the current environment - Call for submissions
Monday 27th and Tuesday 28th June 2011, Aston Conference Centre, Birmingham

Organised by the Higher Education Academy subject centres for Health Sciences & Practice (HSAP) and Medicine, Dentistry and Veterinary Medicine (MEDEV), the conference focuses on the enhancement of learning in health through technology, for example, by using technology to enhance assessment and feedback, use/share openly accessible online teaching materials (OER) and support those with learning difficulties. Within the selected themes we invite applications to: facilitate a workshop; give a trigger presentation; or present a poster (electronic or printed).

A full list of themes and the details of the call for contributions is available from www.health.heacademy.ac.uk/ea/elh/
Deadline for submissions: Monday 28th February 2011

19th Improving Student Learning Symposium: Improving Student Learning Using Learning Technology 10 years on – Call for papers
Monday 5th to Wednesday 7th September 2011, University of Leeds

The major aim of this symposium, hosted by the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development (OCSLD), is to bring together those who are primarily researchers into learning in higher education, learning technologists responsible for supporting the development of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in teaching and learning, and teachers in higher education who are interested in improving their practice.

Potential themes for this symposium have been grouped under the following four questions:

• How do students learn using learning technologies (LTs)?
• How can course design using LTs assist student learning?
• How can we research student learning using LTs?
• How can we successfully innovate/disseminate the use of LTs?

For more details about the conference, and details on how to submit a paper, please visit www.brookes.ac.uk/services/ocsld/isl/isl2011/
Deadline for submissions: Monday 28th February 2011

Problem-based Learning Symposium 
Monday 28th and Tuesday 29th November 2011, Coventry University

This is the third in a series of successful conferences with participation by delegates from around the world and explores the use of problem-based and project-based learning in all disciplines. The conference aims to bring together researchers studying all aspects of the learning process in problem based and project based learning, and those involved in the implementation of these approaches across the disciplines.
Further details can be found at www.coventry.ac.uk/pbl2011

Best wishes from all at the Centre
heabioscience@leeds.ac.uk