Reppery

Yeah, this was another one of those meetings with the rediculously long names!

The JfBTL brings together the Directors of Teaching and Learning for all departments and schools in the Faculty of Life Sciences and Faculty of Science. It’s job it to look at ways of improving teaching and learning facilities and delivery across all of the applicable courses.

Most of the meeting would not be applicable to students, but there was one point I raised that I believe merits further discussion, and it’s probably something that every student has complained about or at least experienced before: lots of coursework being set at the same time and only being handed back weeks after the deadline.

It was bought to my attention by some StARs (and it happened to me too) that some lecturers were taking an inordinate amount of time to mark and return coursework (even after taking into account their other commitments, such as research, teaching and personal tutor work). Also, it seems that there is a general lack of co-ordination with regards to coursework being handed out at the same time.

The arguments coming back from the other members were generally sympathetic, although there were a couple of dissenting voices who believed that surprise setting of work and lack of co-ordination would prepare students for the world of work! The general feeling was that more could be done to inform students of relevant coursework deadlines, content and deadlines for feedback in the first weeks of a module. The board resolved to promote this to lecturers, although it stopped short of making it compulsory.

On the issue of staggering work, several members said that due to the university policy of allowing mix-and-match modules from different schools within the two faculties, it would be impractical to co-ordinate between so many module combinations and lecturers. However, most members agreed that more could be done to make the situation better, and that work on this was already being carried out.

Finally, regarding the handing back of work and feedback, the point was raised that timely feedback is now a university rule and that lectures not giving out feedback on time are actually flouting this rule. Therefore, any of you who know about lecturers that do this are recommended to see your Senior Tutor or Director of Teaching and Learning for your school to report it. If you could also contact me and tell me about it, it would be great since concrete examples are what I need to be able to show the board that this practise is ongoing.