I recently had the pleasure of co-presenting a paper at the Change Agents Network annual conference ‘The Evolving Landscape of Staff-Student Partnership’ at the Open University with four undergraduate Change Makers students.
The full title of our paper was: Designing for Authentic Co-Production: Negotiation, Integrity and Risk in the Classroom.
As the students were mid-exams during the week of the conference, we made a film of their contribution to the paper which I introduced at the conference. The film was made in the penultimate week of their modules, so they didn’t yet know how well their final essays/projects were going to turn out!
In my introduction, I described how the Change Makers modules are designed, and the various opportunities there are for students to make authentic decisions that drive and personalise the delivery of the modules and the direction of their own work.
I then introduced the students and let them do the rest of the talking. From left to right on the screen, they are:
Peter Gobbett (3rd Year MSci Chemistry) and Fi-Fi Henry (3rd Year MEng Materials with Nuclear Engineering) who both took Lessons From History; and Matthew Fennell (2nd Year MEng Computing) and Samuel Shepherd (2nd Year BSc Biology) who both took Building Happiness.
We decided to create their ‘presentation’ as a conversation – with the two students from each module sharing and comparing their experiences in the classroom.
The audience really enjoyed the student’s presentation, and were impressed by their thoughtfulness.
My thanks to all four students who took the time to create this fantastic presentation.