 Hello, thank you for joining us today. I'm here today with Karina Bossu and she's going to be sharing with you her presentation, sharing experiences of an online HEA fellowship scheme and its impacts on learning and teaching. So thank you very much and I'm just going to pass you over. Thank you Christina. Hi everyone, unfortunately I can't really see the chat box now but you know Christina will keep me updated with any questions and anything that you may have. So yeah, my name is Karina. I work at the Open University. Myself and my colleagues have run a little project to assess and evaluate our scheme. Most of you in the UK would be familiar with the HEA fellowship schemes and Advanced HE. It would be nice to know if we have anyone in the room that is actually not from the UK. Would we be able to find out Christina? Yeah, if anyone wants to share in the comments and let us know where they're from I'll be able to tell you. Ah, okay. Well, how about we then go with the flow and if people have questions or want more explanation about it then we will address those. So we will talk about the fellowship and the scheme which is applaud. We will talk about some numbers of applaud and the processes including the online teaching and the support that we give to candidates, what's in for the university staff, what's for the institutions, the impact this is bringing, an evaluation and still some challenges that remain. So for those who are not from the UK because I would assume that most people here would be familiar with that but the HEA fellowship it's about recognition of excellence in learning teaching. It's now international and it's also a demonstration of commitment to professional learning, to your learning teaching professional development. It is accredited by Advanced HE and it's not only here it's in many places in the world. Most institutions in the UK have or are members of the Advanced HE and they do have some form of scheme so most of them would have not all the roots but some support to accredited to recognition of HEA of the fellowships. And ours the Open University is applaud that's a really cute name was being given I don't take credit for that. It was some time ago it's about accrediting promoting professional learning and academic development at the Open University. It was first accredited in 2016 so we in finishing 2020 we are now in the second round of accreditation of this scheme. So to do that we then ran a little evaluation which I'm going to talk about in a while. So like I said it has been accredited so the current scheme has been accredited on the and we start on the 1st of September. We run it fully online even more now during the pandemic and now after because implementations have been made that will remain. It's not a thought program or module but we have now put some structure around it. It has a bit of a some characteristics of a module like a cohort for example so we have three cohorts per year. We offer to our colleagues at OEU. We only recognize three categories out of the four fellowships available. We have very similar set of paperwork that needs to be submitted similar to Advanced HG except that we add one that it's a mapping tool which is a document that candidates map their examples of practice and the main claim. And candidates are supported online by an individual mentor. We also have a website. We have resources and workshops that we run for each cohort. Who can register? We are open to all academic related which is the professional staff and associate lectures who are our tutors. As you can as you may know the Open University is a large institution is a very big institution and that also reflects the numbers of that we work with. For example just for you to understand like just associate lectures which our tutors we probably have over 8,000 associate lectures which work by time full time in many capacities. Here are the numbers of a plot from last year from last academic year which closed in 31st of July and in total we were able to accredited 135 colleagues and you know amongst these all categories including principal fellow we can't do it within the scheme but we can support and help them go through and submit via Advanced HE. Like I said we have it's a large scheme. We can have per panel around the last panel we had 53 submissions. 10% of that are written for further development so the majority gets through but it is it is a large scheme and to support that we need trained mentors and we have over 100. I just finished a mentor training this morning 12 more will be added to the team so we have over 100 trained mentors. We have the panels that we run in house as well with 25 trained assessors in cohort three that is now going. It started in August on the first of August we have 72 candidates and cohort four registrations we're close today and we have 127 candidates. It doesn't mean that everybody will submit but these are large numbers that we have to manage assess accept or reject a pair with a mentor and in providing them the support they need the workshops and everything so the admin work around that is quite heavy but again we managed that through a system that has recently been developed for the upload on top of the other resources we have which is you know the same thing as other institutions may have to support the online staff and students that they have why what's there for you know for individuals why would individuals be interested in getting a fellowship of the HA through the open university for example through online systems which is kind of can be a bit a bit distant it can be of isolating experience for some of them well it it recognizes their expertise in teaching it's also something that's recognized outside the UK now is you know it's recognized internationally it helps some candidates in their promotion and career progress it provides an opportunity to reflect on practice which many of us don't really have that opportunity in our daily practice it's really hard to find that these days opportunity to really reflect on anything um opportunity to discuss that with others during the workshop for example and with a mentor affirmation of their professional identity and also it's an opportunity to join a bigger community of colleagues around the UK and internationally now what's seen for the institutions why would they encourage more and more people to register or to get their HA fellowship and that's one of the things we are dealing with right now is that obviously you can see that there is an opportunity for it creates opportunity for colleagues to engage in professional development and reflective practice more engagement with the scholarship and this really is the case of applause so people are aware more aware of the scholarship of learning and teaching and also we create not only a database of examples of good practice but awareness of teaching principles of practice but again I put the last one there in in bold because that's what driving at the moment the demand for us to increase our capacity which we don't have at the moment is that the sector is pushing for a greater number of recognition because that then says in their mind it could be true could be not not true but it says that then you know the large number of fellowships institutional have better teaching they could deliver so it is kind of an excellence target for institutions so excellence in teaching sorry and is now reporting we are now reporting our TEF all the institutions are doing that so we're reporting our teaching our excellence framework the number of HTA recognition so that has created that in other factors has created a demand and increasing numbers for HTA recognition so in preparation for the accreditation of applause which happened last year we ran a little evaluation of the scheme to find out what was going on if people were happy and how we can improve so we sent this survey to 400 over 400 participants and they were all completed so they have been all successful fellows of the HTA 107 responded to our survey and these were the results 81% had a positive experience as believe that they you know applaud has had a positive impact on their practice which is great they were happy and the positive about the support they received because like I said mentees candidates have an individual mentor and we have you know workshops and websites and resources that can help them some indicated that they now have a better understanding of the UK PSF which is very good others feel more confident in their role as teachers and supporters of learning which is fantastic to hear there has been also a more confident candidate said that they were more confident to undertake the scholarship of learning teaching and in general they had they have had a positive change to their practice which is fantastic results we were pleased to see those however we also received good feedback to implement some changes and what we could improve in future offerings of this scheme so some candidates then said that they were having difficulty so it wasn't good for everybody time commitment was a problem so time available for them to commit to develop a claim was really one of the issues and some of them found that the web the website was a bit tricky so it was a bit hard to find information there others needed more clarity about the format of their application and some had problems with their mentors which you might imagine that you know it could happen once you are managing a large scheme lots of mentors and candidates active at the same time so we had all difficulties there but it was really good to know and we have tried to address some of those those challenges there some areas for improvement are the website obviously we have revised the website not sure if it's still provide the clarity because the content is heavy but it needs to be there that content needs to be there we have others believe that we need more guidance and examples there for candidates and simplify the map into which we tried we still need to evaluate how successful that was and for those who left some comments we put it here for you to have a look that one candidate mentioned that we should bring the scheme more line with other HAA schemes accredited schemes which we have because we had a set a contextualized UK PSF code upload principles so we now have I originally used the original UK PSF and others also asked for a clear time frame you know better structure around the delivery of the scheme and that's what we try to do as well so we implemented cohorts in this new accreditation of the scheme we also undertook some interviews and in the interviews we got some of the elements of the survey being confirmed and others were not really expected which is always good when you run a little evaluation so one of our candidates said that you know she realized he or she realized that we're working in a team an larger team and engage everybody that you would have an impact on student experience through upload another one has mentioned that has helped in future job interviews because the reflection on practice helped he or she be more confident and prepare for what was about to come and the bottom one there is also an evidence that a reflective practice practice we do not always have time for that it's something that helps us all to improve our practice and think about the things that we do and why we're doing this way yes so we were pleased to hear that people have benefit from engaging in this type of recognition because yes it's recognition of practice but is also has it has an element of professional development there which we are very pleased to continue and to know so the new scheme now the current scheme is has now three cohorts per year it's more structured we have a greater engagement with faculties and it seems like it's having positive impact on candidates mentors and reviewers so the feedback we received from them it's mostly positive we also have increased completion rate which was really good so we moved from 20 to 30 to 70 to 80 percent of completion by having a structured and you know more workshops dedicated workshops for each cohort we have high attendance at the workshops which is really good reviewers have commented that their submissions are now stronger so we are also getting better approval right I meant to like the instructor of cohort because we have then registration date starting date and submission date not that we didn't have a submission date but it was candidates could then decided to submit next time and next time and next time but now if they decided to change they have to register again um it's but challenges still remain we have more capacity more demand than capacity so it could be that we created a problem that wasn't there who knows but by blocking into cohorts we created demand but I'm I I believe that demand it's pushed by institutional policies and other things other factors as well we have a gender inequality in the scheme unfortunately we have more female colleagues completing and engaging in the scheme including mentoring and reviewing than our male colleagues our system is still being developed it's taking longer much longer than we expected but probably no new in higher education and we are still planning a new evaluation of this first year of the new scheme which is start 1st of September 2020 so if you want I will say if you wanted I will say if you wanted to have a look go on the website but it is it's behind network firewall sorry but you can contact me through my email or the upload email and we could have a chat if you want to know more but also would be nice to hear what you think if you have any questions about the scheme and how we run it the equipment we use the technology we use um that's all for me now and I would like to hear more from you and continue this discussion Christina can I stop sharing so I can see um things there sorry yes you can stop sharing we've got one question that's come through already for you so I've just brought that on screen um do you support any learning technologies or other learning non non-teaching staff of the upload program if so does their feedback differ from staff with teaching responsibilities yes so we we include more thanks for the question we include um basically everyone engaged in supporting learning and teaching so the library colleagues uh the learning design colleagues the curriculum manager the staff tutors I guess this is a bit of OU language for you but we do sometimes they are not focused on technology they are not working directly with technology but because OU is a distance education everything that we do we tend to involve technology so the learning design that we would have it would be you know involve it would be involving technology in any way shape or form because that's how students will receive the material that's how students will engage with tutors students will engage with lectures so yeah so everybody around that in supporting students and academics because my role is being an academic developer so I'm a senior lecturer academic professional development so the work that I do supporting others is recognizing sorry recognized sorry so you help a lot of different organizations and people as well yeah so within my institution it's all within my institution because the upload is kind of the system is kind of tailored to the institution and what we can and we can't deliver and that's why advanced HE tends to you know let institution have their own accredited scheme because it is to match to the institution needs but everything that we do including panels it is it is it is using technology and now we have a new submission system so candidates now can submit through a system and from that system we then send it to reviewers we allocate reviewers for that. I've got another question pop up from Mark who trains students to use learning technologies at the open university? We have a range a range of support for students Mark thanks for the question well there is there are several well the first their first point of contact is that their tutors but there are also resources on the internet and as the register they are they are given a kit a toolkit of things that will be used during the teaching and they will go through this if they have any problems they go to their tutors that is the first point of contact but there is a lot of IT support for the candidates as well so normally they are kind of aware what what technology are going to be used because they will receive this pack of resources and that we will also mention what they will need to know and what will be used with them because each faculty uses a different technology or different uh tends to you know have some the bulk of it it's standard but they do have other options if they want to use in addition or to the standard technology we've got what just some more time it's like more time if anyone's got any further questions just see if anyone pops any more questions in the chat we've got one minute left until we've ended our session so thank you all for joining us today it's been excellent the koreen has done an excellent presentation been really interesting it's hard not to know who is here it was great to carry on the conversation though on discord we've got our resources channel that a lot of people are sharing resources in so if you wanted to put your slides on there people can carry on the conversation and ask questions um Moira's just said it would be interesting to know more about how to how applaud supports non-teaching staff on gaining HEA accreditation because the HEA scheme itself is quite focused on teaching activities yes so that is a struggle I have with some colleagues because if they feel first Moira and they are not very confident about you know applying for a fellowship because they read all the vocabulary there and the resources that advanced HE provide and they feel like oh I don't have this teaching that's not what I do um practice tutors it's another in nursing it's another issue so it will be really good I'm happy to share resources and and and and and strategies that I use to help and build the confidence of these non-teaching colleagues that support learning and you know do so much to help our students perfect thanks Karina we've just come to the end of our time slot so I'm just going to say thank you very much it'd be great if you could share those resources with everyone yes definitely thanks everyone thanks for joining me today and thanks Christine