SRESCon2019

SRES provides a flexible, accessible (online), platform that I can apply to work with multiple user groups (students, academics, clinical educators, and external site supervisors) and integrate with other tools in a myriad of ways.

• To efficiently deliver individualised feedback to students following practical exercises (clinical simulation) and vivas
• To identify students who may require support with developing practical skills throughout the semester, and provide timely notification to the academic staff who can guide the student to support before they fail a barrier exam
• To coordinate and deliver a combined student self-assessment and educator assessment experience. (And in many other ways that have in common enhancing student learning by efficiently collecting, coordinating, and acting on information in units of study that have multiple learning activities outside classroom settings.)

Students get more frequent, individualised, and consistent feedback. Staff are able to work together in a more coordinated fashion with an organised and manageable workflow. Students can be encouraged to reflect and act specifically on individualised feedback while maintaining a manageable workload on staff.

We present a case study of the extended use of SRES through the development of a ‘collaborative intervention model’ in a cross-departmental collaborative effort. This model promotes early intervention across 2 core postgraduate units within a single programme. We discuss the framework of the model, the findings and its impact on academic achievement as well mental and emotional well-being of students.

SRES was first implemented at the University of Melbourne (Faculty of Science), in November 2016. To ensure a sustainable and smooth implementation process, training was provided by the lead developer from Sydney to the academic developer at Melbourne. A train-the-trainers model approach was used to train the academics at Melbourne who expressed an interest to pilot the platform to support student engagement but also aid academics to teach.

Following from over two years of data collection, in 2018, we reviewed how academic staff were using SRES in the Science Faculty. We present some of our findings relating to SRES as both a feedback tool and an intervention tool drawing from interviews with staff as well as student responses to questionnaires. In general, staff found SRES to be a highly effective tool for promoting students’ sense of belonging in large class cohorts but required a much more thoughtful approach from the academic to be used as an intervention tool.

SRES is one of the most helpful tools to personalize teaching and learning at any scale – and to grow professionally as an educator.

Amongst other things, we use SRES to provide personalised feedback to 800+ students each semester, and to streamline our unit administration.

We receive many e-mails from students who thank us for the feedback (both anonymously and from student accounts); best of all – we see changes in students individually and on a team/class level.

I use SRES to ‘smarten up’ the use of my time as a lecturer and coordinator by taking attendance and providing students with assessment feedback. I also use it to try and connect with students individually when it is not always possible face to face in a large scale elective. Also, to welcome students to a course and wrap up at the conclusion as well.

It helps to solve:

• student dissatisfaction with quantity of assessment feedback
• providing personalised feedback
• feeling of being unknown in a large group
• feeling that effort in assessments is underappreciated by educators
• keeping communication ongoing
• identifying students at risk of AF grades early on in semester
• taking attendance for 20-35 concurrent tutorials when paper based rolls would make tutors cry.

Using previous stats from assessment feedback provided directly to SRES, >60% of students appreciate personalised assessment feedback. Taking attendance in tutorials using this system is congruent with students’ love of using technology and they adapt to it very quickly without grisling.

I use SRES in my medium-sized civil engineering cohort to help my teaching team (tutors, demonstrators, lab staff) get to know our students and engage with them as individuals. I ask my students to introduce themselves via a SRES portal, posing questions about their studies and a miscellaneous “fun” question to get to know what they are beyond their identities as civil engineers in training. Using SRES to also track attendance, comments from the teaching staff and performance data from Canvas means that my teaching team and I can gain a holistic view of how students are progressing in the course and provide targeted advice via emails or in class.

This talk shows two ways SRES has improved the student experience in WRIT1001: Academic essays, a unit enrolling up to 600 students each semester. First, online rolls are connected to a Canvas survey to streamline attendance tracking and connect tutors with information about student motivation and goals. This builds rapport between students and teachers while allowing the coordinator to quickly identify and reach out to ‘at risk’ students. Second, speedgrader rubrics are used to fast-track marking and tailor feedback delivered to students via SRES-filtered email. This saves time for casual markers working to near-unachievable marking rates of 4500 words/hour while maintaining the delivery of personalised feedback. The positive responses from students, even when receiving negative feedback about attendance or assessment, shows that SRES is capable of efficiently and effectively connecting students with feedback.

SRES is a powerful took that helps students and helps the Faculty of Medicine and Health manage their new ‘learning advisor’ process. It is used to help students to understand their progress and reflect on this. Then after discussions with their learning advisor, they can reflect further and plan their future learning.

I use SRES mostly for the simple features – communication/attendance/feedback, but I find ways it can be unexpectedly useful.

Most recently we abused the ‘feedback’ feature at the end of emails to poll students – far fewer clicks for them than going to a survey / webpage. Worked very well!

Students definitely appreciate the efforts of personalising communication and feedback, for staff it takes time and energy, but always worth it for the reach you get.