


Professor Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
Latest research and knowledge exchange news at Bournemouth University
Professor Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
Writing for publication in peer-reviewed journals is increasingly recognised as important for postgraduate students’ career development. To encourage PhD students to write and submit during their thesis research, more and more UK universities has formally started to accept PhD theses by publication, or a hybrid model of both academic papers and purposely written chapters in a PhD thesis. For example, both the University of Bath and Bournemouth University offer a hybrid thesis [1-2], whilst Bournemouth University offers separately the opportunity to submit a PhD by Publication. The paper included in such theses can be: (1) published; (2) accepted/published online first; (3) submitted; or (4) in final draft form for submission. Published papers, due to the nature of journal word limits are usually much shorter and less detailed than traditional PhD chapter. The specifically written chapters, of the Introduction, Discussion, Conclusion and Recommendations chapter, and occasionally a Methods chapter will provide the reader (read ‘the examiner’) with further insights into the background of the research and offer details the student had to omit from published papers due to word limit restrictions. Students may also opt to offer a short explanatory text before or after individual paper. The overall Discussion chapter should aim to fully contextualise and integrate all papers into the thesis.
It is easy to see that these new format theses may require some adjustment from UK academics examining them. Below I have listed some of the key issue a PhD examiner may want to consider in a PhD by Publication, such as the notion of integration and repetition, how the critique published papers, especially in quality peer-reviewed journals, and the nature and content of purposely written chapters.
Integration/duplication
Individual papers are free-standing, i.e. they must give enough information about the research question and methods to make sense to the reader. This means that four papers from the same study in a thesis may appear as both disjointed and repetitive at the same time. Moreover, details on background and methods are often minimal in papers presenting results. This offers the examiner an opportunity to ask questions such as:
It is worth looking at difference between the included papers. One of my former students included two qualitative papers, both originating from the same dataset (i.e. the same interviewees) but each paper presented the data analysed in a different way. The reviewers of the second paper had suggested a different approach to the analysis and the candidate had decided that it was worth the considerable amount of extra work. This was obviously a topic for debate in the viva.
Peer-reviewed journal articles
It can be daunting for a less experienced examiner to critique an included paper that has been peer-reviewed and published in a prestigious journal in one’s discipline. Perhaps a starting point could be to ask the candidate what the peer reviewers said when the manuscript was first submitted. Did you receive and conflicting comments from reviewers or the editor? The examiner may want to ask for further details of published paper, e.g. “I know you probably had word-length issues for paper X, but why didn’t you expand on the detailed analysis in the Discussion chapter you included in the thesis?” Interestingly, the University of Bath states that “Examiners are entitled to specify corrections to any part of the thesis… including parts submitted for publication, or already published” [1]. The latter does not mean changing the published paper, but perhaps adding a comment or explanation to the Discussion chapter or to the text introducing that particular paper.
In many discipline academic papers as co-authored, hence you would expect co-authored papers in a PhD by Publication. This offers to examiner the opportunity to ask about the candidate’s unique contribution to that paper. Occasionally, one of the included papers may not list the candidate as first author. If this is the case in one of the four or five included papers this is not problem per se, but worth asking the same question to the candidate: “What is your unique contribution to the paper?”
Another potential issue to look out for in a PhD by Publication is so-called salami-slicing [3], especially if the candidate has published several small parts of the thesis study in different small papers where a single paper would have been more appropriate.
Written chapters
The examiner may want to start by focusing on the candidate’s Introduction, Discussion, or Conclusion chapters. Or the overall Methods chapter if there is one. Typically, a PhD by Publication has an Introduction, four or more papers, an overarching Discussion perhaps a short Conclusion. What is often missing is a Methodology and Methods chapter. Since individual papers have only basic methods section of a few hundred words, there is little detail in each paper, let alone nuance in the methods. Often methodological issues and reflections are missed, as are more subtle aspects of research ethics. These are key topics to raise in the viva.
Professor Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH (Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health)
Acknowledgements: I would like to thank my colleague Dr. Ann Luce, Associate Professor in Journalism and Communication at Bournemouth University for her encouraging me to write this blog post.
References:
The ‘Coasts for Kids’ series comprise 5 short videos explaining coastal processes and management targeted at primary school kids (age 6+). Important concepts in coastal processes, including effects of sea-level rise, are explained in episodes 1, 2 and 3. Human impacts are presented in Episode 4 and management actions in Episode 5. The episodes are narrated by children. This fantastic work was led by Irene Delgado-Fernandez, a coastal geomorphologist at Edge Hill University, and involved collaboration between kids and their families, coastal scientists from around the world, teachers, community artists, coastal managers and illustrators. I was very lucky to be part of the team, it was a great experience.
All the work was done with some (small!) funding from Edge Hill with support from Sefton Council and the Southport Eco-Centre. A trailer and all the videos are available on the Coasts For Kids YouTube Channel and can be used and shared by anyone. Soon the videos will be available to download. There has been quite a good reaction so far and many organisations are sharing the videos on their websites. You can follow via twitter @IreneDelgadoFe2 – a hashtag has not been used yet but #Coasts4Kids seems a good one to use.
We hope this will be a great resource for teachers. Any feedback and help to disseminate this are welcome.
Feel free to disseminate:
Play-list: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXgQva8tPStrhjCl3AiaayBAwMCh2x-xL
Trailer: https://youtu.be/or6OfnlNcls
Episode 1 – What is the Coast?: https://youtu.be/aFQk5MUzdyY
Episode 2 – Our coasts like moving: https://youtu.be/iANu7_4FUdc
Episode 3 – Our coasts are connected: https://youtu.be/F75AWKMmHqk
Episode 4 – How do people affect the coast?: https://youtu.be/mKxuAIRQcBw
Episode 5 – We need to plan!: https://youtu.be/mo5S0lKH1Vk
And just a three days ago Emerald Publishing published a chapter on external examining in The Role of External Examining in Higher Education: Challenges and Best Practices. The chapter ‘Acting as External Examiners in the UK: Going Beyond Quality Assurance’ [2] is co-authored by Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) and FHSS Visiting Facutly Prof. Padam Simkhada (University of Huddersfield) and Dr. Amudha Poobalan (University of Aberdeen).
References:
The general effects of lockdown on healthy individuals range from a general annoyance to a major limiting factor in life, especially in lockdown affects someone livelihood and/or mental health. These effects have been well documented in the media. At a societal level these effects are more mixed, first and foremost, there is positive outcome in terms of a reduced spread of the infectious disease COVID-19. Further positive effects include a reduction in air pollution, water pollution levels (in Venice), traffic jams, but also fewer break-ins (as more people are at home for more of the time). Whilst negative effects include not only economic decline, but also a lack of opportunity to travel for work or leisure, children missing education and people avoiding health care professionals for screening and treatment of diseases other then COVID-19. We have also learnt that lockdown affects different groups in society differently, some quite unexpectedly. For example, AbilityNet highlighted that “For students living with physical impairments and long-term health conditions, the benefits of studying from home and avoiding the exhausting experience of accessing face-to-face learning has left them with more energy to apply to their studies” [1]. Even before the first lockdown universities in the UK had been pro-active in their response to the pandemic [2]. One of the practical responses was to move to webinars, online teaching, marking and meetings. Before March most university academics don’t much about Zoom, Teams, Jitsi Meet or Google Meet, and today most academics will have used most of these platforms (and several others) for research meetings, webinars and conferences.
Our second example is a project to support midwifery education in Nepal. The Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) in collaboration with Dalarna University in Sweden and University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust produced a draft Bridging Course for nursing lecturers in Nepal who are currently teaching midwifery and maternity care. This project is funded by GIZ (Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit). As part of this project BU offers academics at NAMS (National Academy of Medical Sciences) in Kathmandu support in their professional and pedagogic development.
Following the lockdown and seeing the success of online teaching of BU’s students earlier in 2020 we decided to try out online teaching with midwifery lecturers at NAMS. Since many people in Nepal only have a one-day weekend (Saturday) Sunday is usually a working day and due to time difference early Sunday morning are ideal times for webinars. To date online sessions in Kathmandu have been delivered by Juliet Wood, Michelle Irving, Edwin van Teijlingen and CMMPH Visiting Faculty Jillian Ireland (Professional Midwifery Advocate in Poole). The sessions proved very popular with 30 to 40 people regularly attending online from Nepal.
With challenges to delivering face-to-face lectures and tutorials at universities, online teaching and webinars have opened a whole set of new opportunities to internationalise our education.
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
References
Congratulations!
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
Reference:
The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) have released a new opportunity for research colleagues:
In April POST ran a survey of experts on the COVID-19 outbreak expert database that resulted in the publication of syntheses about the future effects of COVID-19 in different policy areas. From this survey POST developed Parliament’s first Areas of Research Interest (ARIs) which are lists of policy issues or questions that policymakers are particularly interested in.
Currently only the ARIs which are linked in some way to Covid have been released. However, they are not all health based and touch on a range of themes from crime, economics, inequalities, trade, supply chains, mental health, education, sustainability across several sectors, and so on. Do take the time to look through the full question list to see if it touches upon your research area.
Alongside the publication of the ARIs is an invitation to experts to add current or future research relevant to the topics to a repository that Parliament may use to inform future policy making and Parliamentary work. Research with relevant research across any of the disciplines are invited to submit their work.
BU colleagues are strongly encouraged to take advantage of this rare opportunity to present their research to policy makers. The Policy team is here if you need any help. If you’re ready to go please do respond to the call directly, afterwards please let both the Policy team and your faculty’s Impact Officer know that you have responded.
Congratulations to Bournemouth University researchers Adam Spacey, Orlanda Harvey and Chloe Casey on the acceptance of their research paper ‘Postgraduate researchers’ experiences of accessing participants via gatekeepers: ‘Wading through treacle!’’ [1] The study is partly based on their experiences as postgraduate researchers interacting with gatekeepers which they used to design an online questionnaire for postgraduate researchers. The results of the survey highlighted that postgraduate researchers face a range of challenges when using gatekeepers to access participants for studies, and that there is a negative emotional impact arising when challenges are faced. Thematic analysis revealed six themes (1) Access to participants; (2) Relationships; (3) Perceptions of research; (4) Context for gatekeepers; (5) Emotional impact; and (6) Mechanisms to address challenges. This paper is forthcoming in the Journal of Further and Higher Education (published by Taylor & Francis).
Well done!
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH)
Reference:
Congratulations to the Bournemouth authors who published the paper ‘Donning the ‘Slow Professor’: A Feminist Action Research Project’ earlier this month [1]. This paper was published in the journal Radical Teacher. The paper argues that the corporatisation of Higher Education has introduced new performance measurements as well as an acceleration of academic tasks creating working environments characterised by speed, pressure and stress. This paper discusses findings from a qualitative, feminist participatory action research (PAR) study undertaken by an interdisciplinary team of women academics at a modern, corporate university in England. The study illuminates how corporatized HE erodes faculty autonomy, degrades learning environments, damages professional satisfaction and health. Strategies for resistance and liberation developed through the PAR process are discussed.
The writing collective for this paper comprised: Sara Ashencaen Crabtree, Ann Hemingway, Sue Sudbury, Anne Quinney, Maggie Hutchings, Luciana Esteves, Shelley Thompson, Helen Jacey, Anita Diaz, Peri Bradley, Jenny Hall, Michele Board, Anna Feigenbaum, Lorraine Brown, Vanessa Heaslip, and Liz Norton.
Reference: Ashencaen Crabtree, S., Hemingway, A., Sudbury, S., Quinney, A., Hutchings, M., Esteves, L., Thompson, S., Jacey, H., Diaz, A., Bradley, P., Hall, J., Board, M., Feigenbaum, A., Brown, L., Heaslip, V., Norton, L. (2020) Donning the ‘Slow Professor’: A Feminist Action Research Project , Radical Teacher, Vol. 116
Congratulations to Dr. Luisa Cescutti-Butler and Prof. Sue Way in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) on the publication of their latest research article. This new paper called ‘The experience of student midwives being taught newborn infant physical examination (NIPE) as an extracurricular activity at a university in the UK: A descriptive survey study’ has been accepted by Nurse Education in Practice [1]. The paper went online pre-publication earlier this week.
Congratulations
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
Last week FHSS’s Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen held a workshop on ‘academic publishing and writing’ with BU Visiting Professor Padam Simkhada. This event took place at Tribhuvan University, Nepal’s oldest and largest university. The capacity building workshop was organised by HEAN and the Health and Population Education Department at the Central Department of Education at Tribhuvan University. The local charity Green Tara Nepal acted as a facilitator. Bournemouth University has been collaborating with Green Tara Nepal for over a decade!
This capacity building workshop is part of Bournemouth University’s GCRF-funded project called “Sheetal Asthitva” covering India and Nepal. Sheetal Asthitva is the brain child of Dr. Shanti Shanker in the Department of Psychology.
It’s our last update until the New Year – we give you the Queen’s speech (not that one, the one at the State opening) and the OfS annual review, to get you ready for what will be coming in the New Year. At the time of writing MPs are expected to pass the second reading of the EU Withdrawal Agreement Bill, paving the way for the more detailed third reading stage in January.
Happy Christmas and a happy new year to all our readers, and thank you for your patience in what has been a very interesting year!
You can read the Queen’s Speech here along with the PM’s introduction and briefing notes about all the legislation etc. The Executive Summary in this briefing document sets out the legislative programme clearly.
This Queen’s Speech will deliver Brexit on 31 January and allow the Government to deliver on people’s priorities and unleash the country’s potential. The Government’s first priority is to deliver Brexit on 31 January and to negotiate an ambitious free trade agreement with the EU that benefits the whole country This Queen’s Speech sets out how we will seize the opportunities created by Brexit:
You will remember that “The Home Secretary has commissioned the Migration Advisory Committee (the MAC) to consider points-based systems, including the Australian immigration system and other international comparators. The MAC is due to report in January 2020.”
And this from the more detailed briefing:
Our new single system will allocate points on a range of criteria in three broad categories and it will be focused on skills and talents, not nationality:
Although it isn’t mentioned in the briefing, this was the October 2019 briefing on graduate employment rights
The Speech sets out a number of proposals to invest in and support our public services:
This is from the more detailed briefing on education
The Speech sets out a variety of measures to support workers and families:
The Speech reaffirms our commitment to strengthening the criminal justice system, ensuring it keeps people safe:
The Speech sets out how we will improve our infrastructure and level up opportunity across the country:
The detailed note says:
To build on our world-leading excellence in science and deliver solutions to some of the world’s greatest challenges we are:
This Queen’s Speech deepens our commitment to safeguarding the natural environment for future generations:
The Government will continue to work to strengthen the bonds between the different parts of the UK and to safeguard its constitution and democratic processes:
The Speech confirms our determination to celebrate and support the work of our courageous armed forces and to retain and enhance the UK’s global status and reach as we leave the EU:
We have mentioned the government’s promises on research funding above. Wonkhe have done some analysis
The Office for Students have issued an annual review which defends their approach to date and sets out some continuing and new frontiers for intervention in the sector. The headline lets you know what is coming: England’s universities world class, but pockets of poor provision letting students down.
Before we get stuck into the detail, there is some analysis of this and the OfS board papers from Wonkhe – Jim Dickinson on plans for student protection:
And David Kernohan on the OfS board papers – he has a whole advent calendar full of points (26) but we’ve pulled out a few
So back to the Review. Nicola Dandridge says:
The blog summarises the areas of focus:
In the main document, there are some interesting points:
Registration:
And the process has not been without challenges:
And what does the future hold:
On 20th December, Nicola Dandridge published a blog with similar themes:
From Wonkhe: The Home Office has published statistics on individuals referred to and supported through the Prevent programme for April 2018 to March 2019. Of 1,887 cases reported by the education sector (the largest single sector in terms of referrals), only 324 linked explicitly to Islamic extremism – 530 cases specified right wing extremism. David Kernohan asks if we should be thinking again.
In an announcement trailed in the Conservative manifesto the government has confirmed the reintroduction of maintenance support for nursing (and other healthcare) under=graduates, with more details to follow in the New Year.
Students will receive at least £5,000 a year, with up to £3,000 further funding available for eligible students, including for:
This means that some students could be eligible for up to £8,000 per year, with everyone getting at least £5,000. The funding will be available from next year. Further details on who can access the support will be available in early 2020.
The funding will not have to be repaid by recipients. Students will also be able to continue to access funding for tuition and maintenance loans from the Student Loans Company.
The day of the election, twitter was full of pictures of long queues of students at University polling stations waiting to vote. Students were encouraged by the Labour party to vote tactically. HEPI have a blog about the impact and David Kernohan of Wonkhe did some more intensive analysis.
Nick Hillman says:
David asks:
UCAS issued more data about the 2019 admissions cycle. There were headlines about unconditional offers (they went up) with some faux outrage associated with it (the bit Ministerial assault on conditional unconditionals came too late for any institution to change its policy for 2019.
From the UCAS reports – main report
All very interesting stuff for the OfS when doing their review of admissions.
To subscribe to the weekly policy update simply email policy@bournemouth.ac.uk
JANE FORSTER | SARAH CARTER
Policy Advisor Policy & Public Affairs Officer
Follow: @PolicyBU on Twitter | policy@bournemouth.ac.uk
It’s a full moon on polling day and the results will be announced on Friday the 13th! Superstitions aside we’re issuing your policy update early this week before the election outcomes are announced so you can focus on all the educational news. Fear not, we’ll bring you all the election fall out and early outcome scenarios in a post-election special edition.
We’re not including the myriad of speeches and party declarations this week. However, worth a short mention is the Education Policy Institute (EPI) who have (like many others) analysed the five main parties’ manifestos, compared them against EPI costings, and considered what the impact would be from an independent perspective. They conclusions don’t paint the rosiest of futures for the education sector:
Natalie Perera, Executive Director and Head of Research at the Education Policy Institute, said:
A NUS General Election survey with healthcare students found that 68% of students (with a loan) are more likely to vote for a party because they plan to bring back maintenance grants post-election. Claire Sosienski Smith, NUS Vice President (Higher Education) also mentioned the NUS Homes Fit for Study Report which said 1 in 6 students are unable to keep up with their rent payments. She said “we know that a student finance system based on individual debt is fundamentally flawed.” This was reinforced by the recent General Election survey with 2 out of 3 students stating they did not have enough money left to pay for everything once they had paid their rent and 43% rely on their bank overdraft. Healthcare students particularly raised issues of having to fund placement expenses up front, inadequate hardship funding systems and paramedics who are unable to access reimbursement for placements.
Also hitting the news this week are the health care courses at risk due to the bursary removal recruitment crisis – podiatry, radiotherapy, prosthetics, orthoptics, and mental health and learning disability nursing. BU’s Steve Tee, Executive Dean of HSS, is quoted in the article:
There is an interesting article on Wonkhe by Mark Corver of dataHE. Sarah was lucky enough to hear him speak at Wonkfest and explain how claims about grade inflation rely on inaccurately data. The data modelling actually suggests grade deflation –a double whammy for students. The article is a little technical but worth a read to understand why the Government’s claims are being refuted. It also has a high number of comments at the bottom of the article showing how engaging it is (and as Wonkhe only publish the ‘most interesting’ comments we can imagine there was a lot more chatter than published). Some excerpts to get you started:
Clear Accessible Finance Information throughout the Student Lifecycle
In June UUK and NEON published The Financial Concerns of Students. They said that the available information on tuition fees and the student loan system in England is often inaccessible and unclear, and that students want more information on how universities spend tuition fee income. The main findings were:
Since the report NEON and UUK ran a student finance information advisory group consisting of sector experts from nationwide leading organisations who work with prospective and current students to communicate student finance information. This week the group published Improving the provision of information on student finance and have proposed a Student Finance National Education Programme which recommends how to ensure student finance is more understandable and accessible for all (including family members). In summary:
Wonkhe have a blog on the topic: How we communicate student finance needs a re-think.
Accommodation
Wonkhe report that Commercial Estates specialist Cushman and Wakefield have reported on the level of private student accommodation. Key points:
The Times covers the report in the (very short!) Students struggling to find affordable accommodation.
Research Professional also covered the report in their own way highlighting concerns over absence of affordable student rooms stating that private student accommodation blocks are becoming more luxurious but affordable options remain scarce.
Eva Crossan Jory, vice-president for welfare at NUS echoed this and called for rent controls to stop prices spiralling further. “This is the latest report to confirm the increasing cost of accommodation has created a real affordability problem for students,” she said, adding that “reform is urgently required.”
HEPI have released a wide range of content this week. Their policy note (prepared by colleagues at Exeter University) on Social Mobility has particularly been picked up by the media. The note begins by stating
Interestingly they state that if the number of degree places at the selective institution remains static (i.e. doesn’t grow) the number of places for advantaged pupils would need to fall by as much as 10,000, which is one-third of current annual intakes [to meet social mobility targets]. To meet the targets highly selective universities would need to double their places over the next 20 years to ensure all young people access the same participation rates as the most advantaged students. An extra 19,400 18-year old students from the least advantaged areas would need to enrol each year at highly-selective universities to equal the current participation rate of 18-year olds from the most advantaged areas.
Other recommendations:
On Contextual Admissions the report states:
Later the policy note acknowledges how university league tables have ‘chilling effects’ on universities’ efforts to promote social mobility. But rankings are here to stay.
Instead the policy note authors suggest that social mobility rankings could bring balance to the importance placed on current attainment based ranks.
On the place lottery:
The policy note concludes:
The Times takes up the HEPI report arguing for most selective universities to allocate places to all those meeting the A level grade criteria threshold by lottery (with a fall back place at another University for students who do not ‘win’ the lottery).
HEPI have also published a reply to the paper on their website by Tim Blackman, VC of the Open University.
Meanwhile Prospect Magazine takes a differing tack arguing that education is no longer a path out of the social mobility trap and that a greater focus on creating better jobs is a solution.
Finally Wonkhe have a new blog on the transformative experience of HE for care leavers.
Student Minds have created the University Mental Health Charter – a set of principles to ensure student and staff mental health becomes a UK wide university priority. The principles will inform the Charter Award Scheme which will be developed during 2020 to recognise universities promoting with excellent mental health practices. This summary contains the key recommendations under various topics such as transitioning to university, learning and assessment, support services, managing risks, residential accommodation, and proactive interventions. There is a timeline highlighting the next steps as the Charter Award Scheme is developed and piloted. The Scheme is due to launch in Winter 2020.
Student Minds highlight that the Charter has drawn on all the current evidence, research and sector context to ensure its real world validity for the university sector. It states it isn’t intended to be definitive and encourages institutions to combine the elements to fit the local context. Future work will review the Charter and refresh it as new evidence emerges with a major review every 3-5 years. In conclusion Student Minds state:
Mark Fudge, Chair of the University and Colleges Division for the British Association of Counselling, responded to the Charter’s publication:
Universities UK has published a public poll (data available here). British adults were interviewed on their attitudes towards the immigration of university staff coming into the UK. Had there not been a purdah period for the General Election the timing of this poll would have hit whilst the Migration Advisory Committee considers how to implement a points-based immigration system and a salary threshold for international staff. Key points:
Alistair Jarvis, Chief Executive of Universities UK, commented on the findings:
Wonkhe reported that a linked report from Universities Scotland had similar attitudinal findings with 78% of Scottish adults agreeing that the immigration system should support the entry of academics and support staff. The National covers the Scottish perspective.
Political untruths: Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price published a new draft law on Thursday that would make deliberate lying by politicians a criminal offence. The bill states “It shall be an offence for an elected representative acting in their capacity, or an agent acting on their behalf, to make or publish a statement they know to be misleading, false or deceptive in a material particular”. Adam was interviewed by Sky News highlighting how Parliament had changed: “Unfortunately we are normalising a dishonesty, we used to have conventions, social mores and norms etc. you know people used to resign in parliament if they mislead”. Adam said the push for the lying law was triggered by the misleading and false information such as Conservative HQ rebranding their twitter account to appear to be a fact checking service alongside other politicians Brexit claims which the EU have refuted.
Student Vote denied: The Independent report on the c.200 Cardiff Halls students who registered to vote but were not informed their application was incomplete and have been denied the vote. The student quoted in the article selected her address from a pre-filled drop down list but later discovered it had not registered her because it did not contain her room number. NUS called for Cardiff Council to resolve this unacceptable outcome. The Council said they had not been able to contact the c.200 people who supplied the incomplete addresses to register them in time.
Gamification: A Wonkhe article considers whether gaming could be a positive outreach method (alongside more traditional current efforts) in Simulation games: can gaming break barriers to university?
System Working: NHS Digital has published a briefing on workforce challenges in the NHS:
To subscribe to the weekly policy update simply email policy@bournemouth.ac.uk
JANE FORSTER | SARAH CARTER
Policy Advisor Policy & Public Affairs Officer
Follow: @PolicyBU on Twitter | policy@bournemouth.ac.uk
Denyse King from the Centre of Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal (CMMPH) recently presented her CILVRS Project at a Parliamentary event. The CILVRS Project is a Virtual Reality Learning Environment (VRLE) to improve healthcare education. Denyse presented this at the Further Education for Leadership symposium on Ed-Tech at Parliament on July 17th 2019. She introduced a VRLE on ‘safeguarding’ to share with delegates there who then experienced the VRLE through immersion with Oculus Quest headsets. The response from symposium delegates to the VRLE was overwhelmingly positive and with excellent discussions regarding the possible content of future VRLEs. Denyse has written this VRLE content as part of her role as a lecturer in midwifery. This was subsequently built to her specifications by a company called Daden Ltd. The VRLE are designed to be profession generic and topic specific, which ensures that the majority of healthcare students can use each VRLE. Denyse King is sitting on the far right of the table of experts for the Further Education Trust for Leadership (photo).
VRLEs offer healthcare students access learning materials in ways which enhance their student experience. Use of VRLE mean Bournemouth University can offer students clinical experiences which cannot otherwise be guaranteed as routine part of their healthcare education. In addition to this, Continuous Practice Development (CPD) is a requirement of the Nursing and Midwifery Council [1-2] and the World Health Organization (WHO) [3] have highlighted that learners globally have limited access to Higher Education. The WHO also state that educators internationally lack skills and necessary equipment as well as a lack of access to practical skills teaching. Therefore, VRLE also have a place in offering realistic clinical experiences for CPD nationally and internationally. One example of the latter would be through Bournemouth University a close working relationships in Nepal: (1) where midwifery students can also benefit; or (2) in the development of CPD in nursing and midwifery in Nepal as recently presented on the BU Research Blog (click here).
The response from symposium delegates to the VRLE was overwhelmingly positive and with excellent discussions regarding the possible content of future VRLEs. Denyse is very active in this field. She has created a VRLE for urinalysis training as well as three VRLE related to safeguarding (which are nearly complete) as part of the CILVRS Project. She is developing further VRLEs I: two for perinatal mental health which I am creating in collaboration with University of Newcastle (Australia), Solent NHS Trust and Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust. Some of this is being trialled within the BU midwifery programme in the forth coming year 2019/2020, and this exciting work is part of her doctorate research: Towards more holistic clinical practice: exploring the impact of virtual reality learning environments on healthcare education.
Congratulations!
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
References:
Bournemouth University facilitated a Strategic planning meeting to develop a Continuing Professional Development (CPD) Framework for Nepal last week in Kathmandu. The planning meeting was held on 30th July 2019 at the Institute of Medicine IOM Maharajgunj Nursing Campus. Midwifery is not formally recognised in Nepal, i.e. as a profession separate from nursing, therefore when refer to nursing CPD in this blog we mean both ‘nurses’ and ‘nurse-midwives’.
Bournemouth University is collaborating in this project with Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) in the UK, the IOM Nursing Campus, the Nursing Association of Nepal (NAN), MIDSON, the Nepal Nursing Council (NNC) and several other key stakeholders in Nepal to support nursing regulatory bodies to establish mandatory CPD and/or post-registration training programmes relevant to their current practice in nursing.
The Bournemouth team (led by Dr. Bibha Simkhada with Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen and Dr.Pramod Regmi) argued that CPD offers nurses the opportunity to maintain, improve and broaden knowledge, expertise and develop their personal and professional qualities to enhance practice and career development. Nepal has had limited process and progress in ensuring CPD for nurses and the uptake of post-registration education and training programmes or CPD tends to be ad hoc. Generally, CPD in Nepal remains under-developed as showing evidence of having received CPD is not currently a requirement of nurses when they re-register every five year.
Congratulations to Prof. Jonathan Parker on the publication of his article ‘Descent or dissent? A future of social work education in the UK post-Brexit‘ in the European Journal of Social Work. In true European style the journal also gives the title in Italian: Discesa o dissenso? Il futuro dell’istruzione nel settore dei servizi sociali nel Regno Unito dopo la Brexit.
The Conference ended with the PM’s speech, in which she declared the end of austerity and tried to fight back on Brexit. This came after a predictably colourful speech from Boris Johnson calling for the party to be more positive – and #chuckchequers. Neither talked about HE.
Education was on the agenda at the conference, though. Damien Hinds gave a speech mainly focusing on schools. He listed three key imperatives (all Ps):
And to deal with these challenges, he said that the plan was to focus on:
He also talked about character, workplace skills and extra-curricular activities.
Level 4 and 5 qualifications have been discussed a lot recently – see the August report by Professor Dave Phoenix, VC of South Bank University has written for HEPI “Filling in the biggest skills gap: Increasing learning at Levels 4 and 5”.
The DfE are conducting a review of classroom-based, level 4 & 5 technical education launched in October 2017 (interim findings here) which will inform the ongoing Review of Post-18 Education.
A new £8 million funding competition will enable virtual, augmented and mixed reality experiences – also known as immersive content – to be created faster and more efficiently by UK content creators. The competition is part of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund’s audience of the future programme. Up to £33 million is available to develop new products and services that exploit immersive technologies. Funding is provided by UK Research and Innovation through Innovate UK.
Also while the Conservative Party Conference was going on, announcements were made about future immigration rules post Brexit.
From Dods: a White Paper outlining how the system will work to be published in the autumn, ahead of legislation next year. The proposals largely mirror the recommendations of the Migration Advisory Committee from September, and offer no preferential treatment for EEA citizens coming to the country. Notably, there is a commitment under the new system not to cap the number of student visas. (there is currently no such cap)
Under the proposals:
Theresa May said:
And meanwhile, at the conference, the Home Secretary announced a new “British values” test for those applying for UK citizenship, which will be “significantly tougher” than the current test, which he said was like a pub quiz, and would be accompanied by strengthened English language tests.
The Office for Students (OfS) has published new analysis of degree apprenticeships.
30 per cent of degree apprenticeship entrants come from areas underrepresented in higher education, slightly higher than the proportion entering similar full-time higher education courses (26 per cent).
The Office for Students (OfS), has launched its first Challenge Competition, inviting providers to develop and implement projects to identify ways of supporting the transition to highly skilled employment and improving outcomes for graduates who seek employment in their home region.
The OfS intends to support a range of projects that will deliver innovative approaches for graduates and particular student groups, to contribute to improved outcomes and local prosperity. Through this process we want to identify:
Providers with successful bids will be expected to form a network to share, discuss and disseminate key information among themselves and with the OfS, strategic partners, and the wider sector as required.
From Wonkhe: ONS has released its annual estimates of the value of the UK’s “human capital” – and if you like to promote higher education on the basis of pay premia, it’s not great news for the sector. The headline news is that back in 2004 the average premium for “first and other degrees” was 41%, but by 2017, it had reduced to 24%. The same has happened for “masters and doctorates” – where the pay premia has declined from 69% in 2004 to 48% in 2017. Although the premia for graduates is still significant, the downward trend will provide ammo to those who argue that “too many people are going to university”, ONS says that “one explanation for this could be a large increase in the proportion of the population with a university degree”.
On Wonhke, David Kernohan wrote on 30th September about learning gain “Plenty ventured, but what was gained?”.
The learning gain projects were expected to lead to discussions about a new TEF metric for learning gain – or at least to a set of tools and methodologies that providers would over time start to adopt to support their TEF submissions –because learning gain is an important element of the TEF, but one that it is not currently reflected in the metrics.
And so on 2nd October, Yvonne Hawkins of the OfS responded, also on Wonkhe:
So what are the next steps as set out by the OfS? They are “committed to developing a proxy measure for learning gain”. And it “will form part of a set of seven key performance measures to help us demonstrate progress against our student experience objective”. And how will they get there? There will be evaluations of the projects that did go ahead, and then there will be a conference, and recommendations to the OfS board in March 2019 about the next phase of work.
So watch this space….
Another week another article on free speech by the Minister– this time on Research Professional to coincide with the Conservative Party Conference.
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