Manchester Metropolitan University's invited talk at ALT/AoC Large Scale Curriculum Redesign at Lakeside, Aston 2012/05/23. Slides cover the rationale for and process of undergraduate curriculum redesign, which was introduced in concert with new administrative systems and processes, new quality procedures and a new VLE

1. Transforming the undergraduate
curriculum at MMU
Birmingham | May 2012
Professor Mark Stubbs
Head of Learning & Research Technologies
m.stubbs@mmu.ac.uk http://twitter.com/thestubbs
http://slideshare.net/markstubbs
Thursday, May 17, 2012 1

2. An interesting place to work!
• Large, popular, multi-campus university
– 37,000+ students | 1,000+ courses | consolidating from 7 sites
• Pursuing an ambitious transformation initiative
– New Buildings, New Curriculum, New Admin Processes & Systems,
New Learning & Mobile Tech, New Quality Processes…

3. Student Experience: mixed?
And how do I assure you
you find the parts of it are
student excellent !
experience?
Learning
Learning
Environment
Environment
Corporate Systems
Admin Systems 3

4. Student Experience: varied?
37,000+ students
1,000 + courses
1,500+ tutors
7 sites
4

5. Student Experience: declining?

6. Doing something about it…
In the current climate
Diminishing unit of resource
Everything depends on everything else
We are large and risk averse

7. “Who dares wins”
 In the current climate
?
vc Diminishing unit of resource
θ
Everything depends on everything else
We are large and risk averse

8. EQAL
In the current climate
• A coordinated strike for step-change improvement Diminishing unit of resource
New Curriculum Everything depends on everything else
• designing new units, … We are large and risk averse
New Admin Systems & Processes
• personal timetabling, …
New Virtual Learning Environment
• Moodle & myMMU web/mobile, …
New QA & QE Processes
• facilitating curriculum transformation

9. MISSION:

10. Cut-down Unit (module) web form

11. Flow of new curriculum definitions
Custom Agresso
Tables Students

12. Getting the experience back
Learning
Environment
Admin Systems
New Systems,
Processes & VLE
Admin Systems

13. This work is licensed under a Attribution-
NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence
Wrapping the institution around the learner
13

14. This work is licensed under a Attribution-
NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence
Wrapping the institution around the learner
Student ID
Timetable
14

15. This work is licensed under a Attribution-
NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence
Wrapping the institution around the learner
Student ID (+ Unit code)
Hand-in dates / extensions / marks
Personalised submission sheet
15

16. This work is licensed under a Attribution-
NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence
Wrapping the institution around the learner
Unit code
Resource list
Relevant resource
16

17. This work is licensed under a Attribution-
NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence
Wrapping the institution around the learner
Unit code
Past exam papers
Past exam paper
17

18. EQAL priorities for next cycle
• Communication, communication, communication
• CeLT as critical friend in module redesign
• Getting data earlier for timetabling
• New L5 live Sep 2012
• New L6 live Sep 2013

19. Find out more about…
• Our initial drive for responsive curricula
– http://jiscdesignstudio.pbworks.com/w/page/29224166/Supporting%20Resp
onsive%20Curricula%20%28SRC%29%20project
– http://www.celt.mmu.ac.uk/src/
• MMU’s EQAL curriculum transformation
– http://www.celt.mmu.ac.uk/eqal/index.php
• Our review of learning technologies
– http://lrt.mmu.ac.uk/ltreview
• How we built our integrated VLE
– http://lrt.mmu.ac.uk/w2c
• Where we’re going next with Assessment & Feedback
– http://lrt.mmu.ac.uk/traffic/

20. Student feedback
• Institutional Student Survey
– Nov 2011: 10,716 left 58,000+ comments
– Mar 2012: 7,106 left 33,000+ comments
– All data tagged with module / course codes
• Module/Course leaders see their anonymised feedback
– Statistical analysis ranked predictors of overall
satisfaction
1. Course organisation
2. Building confidence
3. Teaching quality (explanation, feedback, advice)
4. Learning resources
5. Age

21. In the coming year…
• Continuous Monitoring & Improvement
– Presenting module & prog leaders with BI data & capturing plans
for improvement / modification
• Resource utilisation
• Student engagement
• Student satisfaction
• Student success
• New Mobile Strategy for 2013
– More personalised, more self-service, more location-aware
– Institutional tech which complements personal tech