 So, Barry, in a nutshell, what is your research about? Yes, so my research was looking to see if there were patterns or there were rules that particular genders tended to take on in particular activities within the group work setting, in the sciences in particular, and both formal and informal settings within the sciences space. So formally, group work tends to take place in the labs, so students will conduct group work in particular experiments, for example, and then following on from that then there might be some sort of write up associated with that as well. So within those formalized settings in the lab and also then in the report writing element, did particular genders take on particular tasks regularly and consistently within that? And then also in formal spaces as well, true track with students, did they notice themselves when they were just walking in groups, studying in groups, for example, informally, did particular genders take on particular tasks within those spaces as well? So the idea behind this, I suppose, is if we can identify the patterns, we can maybe try to understand those patterns, and then if we can understand those patterns, we might be able to take a look at trying to develop a set of considerations for people just to think about, you know, from a staff perspective, but also from a student perspective about how they might make the learning spaces, whether they're formal or informal, a little bit more equitable, a little bit more balanced, a little bit more fair for all the genders and none, so that everyone gets a fair chance to learn in a space in the place that they feel they can do best in. Well, that's interesting. I mean, there are many interesting and pressing issues and problems in science education. So what prompted you to choose this topic for your fellowship research? Yeah, for me, it was kind of a trifle, I suppose. Firstly, I've been teaching labs for quite a long time now over a decade now in different institutions in Ireland at different levels on different programs. So kind of a wide range of experiences. And I suppose going back a little bit further in time, I was one of those students once I sat at lab benches in a group doing group work as part of my undergraduate qualification. I sat in very frustrating group right up sessions after a lab pulling my hair when I had hair out. And I maybe developed a worldview around my personal experience. So from looking from the top bench, looking down at the students as an academic and also from sitting at the lab benches, looking up at the academic, I kind of experienced both of those. And then more recently, I suppose for me, as I continue my professional development throughout my career, I've gotten involved in things such as a tennis one within our university. And that's really opened my eyes to appreciate other people's perspectives. So we're looking at the same thing, but we might be experiencing it totally differently based on my gender or my worldview or my skin color. So it really got me thinking about, I need to think about things a lot differently. It's not just what I see through my own eyes, my own lenses that I put in front of my eyes. I need to think about what do other people experience and how does that affect their learning? So, true for all, I suppose, my own, when I was a student, when I was an academic and then the things that I'm doing now at the moment around the university have really got me thinking about what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. And maybe I could do it a little bit better. And maybe it's just not me. So maybe I can help others if I can do a little bit of research and find the evidence, maybe then we can start a conversation and raise awareness. That's great motivation. And I always find it fascinating that our research tends to be prompted by our own personal experiences. But why does this topic matter to other people who learn and teach and lead across the higher education community? Yeah, like I am one of those people in that community. We all are, I suppose, anyone who's listened to this podcast probably has an interest in the community. And for me, it's two perennially challenging topics, group work and then gender and put them together and you got a real perfect storm. So there's lots of things in there to try and unpick lots of things in there to try and understand and even if all they achieve out with this is a little bit more of an awareness amongst more staff and more students about the possibilities, even the considerations if they don't get enacted in every classroom in every lab every week. It doesn't really matter. It just means that people have started thinking about these things and started talking about these things that's not been swept under the carpet anymore. And no, really, the considerations are all about developing an equitable environment for the most productive learning for staff and for students. So it's a win-win for everybody if you can get it right. So for the learners, this group work activity that we ask students to take part in regularly is quite divisive. Students either love it or hate it. It's marmite. Some students really get out in groups. They really love it. They really enjoy the social side of it. And some students just hate it. They can't deal with the need to work with other people. They're lone wolves almost and perform better as a lone wolf. So within this project, it was definitely co-created with students as partners all the way through from an initial idea all the way through to project execution and the considerations that are coming out of it are all molded by the students that were involved, various different students of different types got involved in this. So it's a student voice loud and proud is where it's coming from for the teachers then. It's practice. You know, this will hopefully inform and shape what a staff member will do in a classroom environment, in a lab environment. And it's not just in sciences. You know, you could think of an engineering design lab. You can think of an architecture studio. You could see how this practical side of learning can be transformed if you consider a few very simple considerations and just think about them and say, have I done this as good as I could do and just know what to think about. And from the leaders perspective, you know, it's all about the agency of the student and the authenticity of the research that it is grounded in the student voice. So it's a way to connect the leaders to the learners. So sometimes there's a bit of a divorce between those at the top of the totem pole and those at the bottom of the totem pole. So hopefully this is a connector that will allow that voice to raise up and be heard to those up at the top. And really, if we listen across all those levels, there's something for everybody and everybody should benefit from all of it. I love the way you talk about involving students and not only are you listening to the student voice, but you're getting them involved in designing the research as well, which I think is a really good thing to do. Now, how gender and group work are both really hot topics in higher education research so much so that I know there's been previous research in both those areas. So what do we already know about this topic from previous literature? We know an awful lot and we know very little all at the same time, if that makes sense. There's been a lot of research, you know, in the last decades in particular, focusing around gender representation, trying to balance the gender representation, but also maximizing the benefit of having a mixed gender society, you know, in terms of innovation, creativity, productivity, particularly in complex science systems. It's a really other benefit to have a mixed gender set up there. Now, there's still issues and, you know, they've been categorized as opposed into access, not the pedagogy, the nature and culture science as well as identity. You know, and these are all seen as still barriers, despite lots of research being carried out, lots of policy being put in place, lots of awareness raising being put in place. We still haven't quite turned the corner, I don't think, but at least the conversations are happening more regularly, more fluidly now than they were in the past. From a pedagogical perspective, lots of research has been done on this, and really, if you're to sum it up in a nutshell, it would be if you create an inclusive learning environment, it benefits everybody. So, you know, there is no losers, there's a rising tide, all the balls will rise up. So an inclusive learning environment is a good thing to have. And with that, then, you can develop a sense of identity, you know, for scientists in particular, this is quite important, and a sense of belonging within the scientific community. So in Ireland, we have, you can't see it, you can't be it as a phrase for, you know, trying to encourage girls to get into sport. So if you can't see a female black scientist in, you know, common culture or, you know, in a textbook, how is that going to motivate you as a young black scientist to see what you could be? So it's about raising awareness and it's about developing a sense of identity. From the group book perspective, group book has been researched for as long as group book has been in existence, I think, and you can look back through the literature and there's, there's, there's eons of, of information there in the peer-reviewed databases. And, you know, it's a really good thing for active learning. It's, you know, great for collaboration, great for communication development, you know, just the softer skills of social identity development and developing your belonging and discipline. So again, it feeds back into this idea of belonging and identity. But with group work, there's a massive risk of marginalization of those within the group. And that marginalization can be broken down on, you know, many different factors, gender, socioeconomic background. So the intersectionality is really important here, I suppose, and trying to unpick that intersectionality is, is, is quite tricky. And then I suppose with group work, you know, group work for learning is, is, is kind of understandable very easily, you know, you get together, you discuss and you chat and you figure things out. Group work for assessment is really where the, the rubber hits the road as the saying goes. And, you know, around that is assessment, how do you fairly assess within a group when you have three or four or five students working together? How do you fairly assess those three or four or five students on all aspects of the group work? So the process as well as the product, you know, social skill development, if you are looking at that as an important learning outcome. So really for me, what came out of reviewing the literature is this idea of a need to support both staff and students in this particular aspect. So group work and group work with mixed genders, if you have a mixed gender class environment, how can you support both the staff and the students to maximize their, their teaching or their learning depending on what they are? So really, if you can figure out a way to optimize that, it benefits everybody, both the staff and the students. So the literature is there. There's loads of evidence there. And really what I'm trying to do in this case is to put an Irish higher education perspective on that international awareness that we have in the literature. So we know lots. But we don't know everything is what I'm trying to say. Indeed. I mean, everything you said just demonstrates what a challenging area this is to research. So how did you go about your research? Yeah. So I took a mixed methods approach and the mixed method approaches where you kind of combine number data with word data. So qualitative and quantitative. So the number data came from an online survey that was posted through social media, through social networks that I have within universities in Ireland. And targeted primary science students, both when word got out other students said, well, could we take part as well? So I now had two research populations, the non, as I categorize them, the non science students and then the science students were the broad disciplines within the sciences and the physical and life sciences. So the survey was was was the primary quantitative data collection method and then qualitative data collection was collected through and semi-search interviews. So I interviewed five purposely sampled students and the gender breakdown was one he, him, six she, her. And then we had a design thinking workshop where again we brought the students back in a different cohort of students back in again. And we had staff in the design workshop as well. And we kind of probed and asked questions around the tricky areas that emerged from the quantitative data and the qualitative data before that were issues lay around how to best carry out group work in a mixed gender setting and then asked the participants in the design thinking workshop, well, how might we do this better? So how might we deal with conflict better? How might we raise awareness of the benefit of having a mixed gender group? So the design thinking workshop was the kind of the point of the pyramid where all the data underneath was informing what was discussed at the design thinking workshop. And yeah, it allowed for frank conversations around very pointed things as opposed to just a generalized chat. We went in and we had an hour. We had four things to talk about and we got both a staff perspective and a student perspective. And I kind of stood back and let them bounce off each other and out of that then the considerations came, you know, what what practical things can we do to help in those four, four key areas around conflict gender representation in the curriculum? How to deal with assessment as well as learning in the group and then how to raise awareness of the benefit of having a mixed gender group. So people will actually seek a mixed gender group because it's better to have a mixed gender group than not. So collectively, numbers and words kind of came together and then, you know, the task was was to decipher those words and numbers and make sense of them. And with the students all along the way, they helped me understand, you know, from their experience in the trenches, what's it like as opposed to me with my rose-sinted view of student life? You know, they were telling me really the raw version and with that then with that kind of authenticity and agency it allowed me to kind of put a little bit of synthesis on their words to bring it together and then we came up with those four considerations. That sounds like a really rich design. So what are the key initial findings from your research? So the initial key findings were surprising for me for a start. I kind of came in thinking, oh, we're going to have lots of debate, lots of discussion, lots of argument, but the trends kind of came out and were kind of kind of aligned, just independent of whether there were science or non-science students, first of all. So a big thumbs up for group learning. That was a big trend. Students really enjoyed the group learning. A big thumbs down for group assessment. So it was almost like two populations and the two populations spread, you know, one really positive, one really negative that in terms of assessment, the assessment was seen as not as positive as the learning because of all these issues we discussed before, you know, the fairness of assessment, the laggard in the group, you know, how to deal with conflict. So all these things that are in the literature and raised their heads again, I suppose, in this research. From the quantitative point of view, most of the students that took part in the survey were honor's degree, most of them were in university setting. The responses were across all the years and most of the students, you know, 98% of the students were full-time students. So within that, there is a certain story to be told and there's a certain story not being told. So we have, you know, part-time students, you know, students who come along, take a couple modules, take a break, come back again. So we're not hearing their voice. So really the voice we're hearing here is of a particular type of student. And from the qualitative data then, the big things that came out then were, you know, clumping together into kind of teams where the roles carried out, the skills carried out and the mixed gender group work itself and then the lack of gender patterns as opposed to gender patterns. So the key thing that came out of the interviews and then the design thing in the workshop was gender doesn't seem to be as much as an issue for the students today as what I perceive it to be or what I experienced when I was in undergraduate days. And we kind of explored that a little bit more and there's a big emphasis being put on mixed gender schools at second level and primary level as a way of kind of breaking the mould that students don't see gender as a thing. The students have issues with other students in terms of group work but it's not based on gender, it's based on skills or ability or commitment. So if the student is not pulling their weight independent of gender, that student is not seen to be a very productive group member. So for me, you know, it was an interesting find in itself to realise that the students of our today are really savvy around gender and really able to speak up for themselves. You know, I asked a few questions. If this happened, what would you do? And every single student respond, I'd speak up, I'd say, look, this isn't appropriate. So they're articulate, they're aware and they're very happy to work together in a mixed gender group. Only problem is when students don't pull their weight and that is independent of gender. So for me, the big findings and there's a little bit more of work to be done in terms of digging out all the information out of the data that reflects so far, but that's a big thing that, you know, learning is good, assessment isn't so good. And then gender isn't the big issue that I initially thought it was. That's really interesting, encouraging in many ways, but I think it uncovers some other interesting questions as well. So you said that result surprised you. Was there anything else that surprised you in your research that you want to talk about? Yeah, the big surprise was that that lack of a pattern now within within the kind of self reported self efficacy in group work function, there was there was five areas at the genders. There was a statistically significant difference in the gender responses. Everything else, you know, 20 odd questions were all pretty much didn't matter whether he, her, she or he, him, she, her, you were kind of given the same response. And so the ones that did differentiate them were, you know, group work function, problem solving and analysis. Now, that's how to say he, him were better than she, her. It's just that there was a difference in their responses. You know, leadership output in a group, they were all pretty much in the same thing. And there were certain trends, mega trends, I suppose, where all the genders said the same thing. And one of the biggest trends was ability to deal with conflict. They're really struggled with conflict, how to resolve conflict. I think the big problem lies when we chat a little bit more in discussion groups. They were kind of saying, I'm going to be working with these guys for the next four years or three years or two years. I don't want to be kind of rocking the boat in second year. And then I'm working with this person again and in four chair. But I don't know how to deal with doing that. And then in an equitable, fair, transparent, I get my point across way and not annoyed at other person. And that was the same for both genders. And it was really low in terms of self efficacy. Like they were well, well below the average for all the genders. So there's a need to help students develop those skills. You know, we can't just throw them in the groups, say, away you go, figure it out. We need to help them to solve those issues when they do arise because they will arise. And that was part of the designing and workshop. How can we do that? And, you know, some of the suggestions came back around allowing the students to space in the place to talk about the process issues, as opposed to the group work issue, you know, the deliverable, the report, whatever it is, take that aside and get them to talk about what how are we going to do group work? You know, what was our formula going to be? Are we going to have a contract that we're going to do certain things? We're going to meet on certain days. So the process, as well as the kind of thing they're going to produce are differentiated. And then they can discuss issues over here in the kind of process chat that won't affect their ability to write up or get a good mark because the mark and the process seem to be intertwined. And that's where tensions really come flare up because everyone wants a good mark. But sometimes the tensions kind of can fray a little bit there at the edges. So separating those two out was a suggestion from the students themselves. If we could just have someone to help us understand what we should do because we're new to this, you know, you guys as academics probably know a bit better, help us to develop our process and then let us add the group work activity, but we need to figure out how to do it properly first. So yeah, the lack of a pattern and then when there was a pattern, it was a very obvious pattern. It was like a sore thumb sticking up. It was very obvious that students were crying out for help in certain areas. And that conflict resolution obviously has big implications for life beyond university as well. 100%. Yeah, it's more than just getting the report in on time and getting a good mark. It's a bigger picture thing you're developing with the students. If you can get them to maybe not be perfect at it, but at least when they go to the workplace, they've got some of those skills in their back pocket that they can pull out when they are met with a manager or, you know, in a group situation where the dynamic isn't quite right and they don't feel comfortable. How can they speak up or how can they articulate if they develop it in a safe space and university when they go to work environment, they should be able to hopefully translate that over. Yeah, absolutely. So just to finish up with them, what do your initial findings mean then for higher education policy and practice? Yeah, there's there's several fold, I suppose, but not to labour on the point. I've broken them kind of down into the National Forum Student Success Framework and picked out a kind of one or two key headings to kind of just give a bit of context of what could be done. What's an easy win, I suppose? What's a low hanging fruit? What can we do here? And I suppose the first one is under the enabling institutional capabilities heading and evidence based decision making within this research, there is now clear evidence that students need support and assessment if it's part of a group or environment needs to be carefully considered within an integrated learning and assessment strategy can't just be stuck on at the end because, you know, you've run out of time or you've got too many things to correct. You want to divide it by four by having groups of four. So we need to think about how to support staff and thinking strategically in terms of assessment strategy for a semester for, you know, even across the program, for example, if a program team could come together and then the support for students, how to deal with a group or environment that will be assessed, how to, you know, maybe divorce the thing from the process and allow them to figure out their process force and then let them come in and do their thing. And the same for the staff, you know, so support is a big thing there. And this leads into the second point is structured and well resourced profession development and staff, you know, are becoming more aware of gender in our lives exposed to initiatives like Athena Swan and so on. And how best can we translate that awareness raising at that level into our teaching practice? So can we, you know, bring our Athena Swan hat with us and bring it into the lab with us and try and translate some of the stuff that we're discussing them or the initiatives trying to do at a university level into, you know, a classroom level or into a lab level. And the same for the students, you know, could those students be exposed to more Athena Swan like initiatives at a student level, as opposed to just been done at the university and they're part of the university, but they're not really part of the Athena Swan process. And I suppose from enabling practices perspective, under the assessment of feedback, it's quite obvious, you know, the assessment was not really liked in terms of group perspective, but maybe that's that's an opportunity. You know, if we look at our previous work for the National Forum of Foreign as Learning Assessment approaches, with support would allow the students to see the reason behind doing a group-based assessment. A lot of time from the focus groups and interviews, the students were kind of saying, I don't really get why we're doing this in a group, I could probably do it on my own. And that's probably poor design from the assessment perspective, and also poor communication. You know, here's the reason why you're doing this in assessment, it's the group as opposed to doing it on your own. And again, focus on key things like conflict resolution, you know, coordinating resources in the group, you know, focusing on the output. And as you said before, this is definitely a set of transferable skills that are going to be great for winter in university, but even more important when they get out of university in the big bad world. So, you know, agility, resilience, adaptability, all these things are important for the students to be able to call on when they need it, and where they develop that, but in a safe space, like in a university setting. So, and beyond that, I suppose, from the sector perspective, I suppose, I really lent on a national community of practice, the shore network to the science under budget research experience network, I'm part of that network, and it allowed me to connect into other academics that were kind of friendly to this type of research, and then students within those institutions were, and were contactable in a much more efficient way than me just kind of shouting out from behind the screen and hoping that somebody would listen to me and allow them to put a face to a name and a reason to take part in this survey and broaden the base of that target of population, those science students. And it allowed me to get students from across the higher education sector in Ireland. So communities of practice are really cool things to be involved in. They're great sound boards for crazy ideas that you do have sometimes that someone needs to temp you down a little bit, but give you no encouragement to do it, but kind of calm you down a little bit. And so I really think if we could develop, you know, we have one in science, the science under budget research experience is quite productive and quite busy at the moment, but there's certainly other areas in higher education that don't have that community, that national community to draw people together to be sound boards for each other, to be support for each other. And so if we are really going to do cross, cross island, you know, north and south of Ireland research, we need to have those communities to allow people to connect. And if we're going to get in touch with students as key stakeholders, as key partners in our research, we need to have a way of connecting to those students as well. So those communities of practice think are really good. If we can keep, take a look what we've done, keep doing that and do a bit more in places that don't have anything that'd be really beneficial for the sector as a whole as well. Hmm, couldn't agree more. Well, I think this is a really thoughtfully designed study. I think it's it's answered some questions and raised a whole lot more. I found it fascinating that the students were so savvy about being able to distinguish between group workers, a learning experience versus group workers, an assessment experience. And I think the light that you shed on assessment just reminds us that it's assessment that matters most to students, I think, in the university experience. But it's often something that academics just don't pay enough attention to. So I think that you've certainly uncovered some very interesting findings that should inform policy and practice and I think open up a whole new area for further development and research. So I hope that you'll continue to do work in that area. And thank you very much for everything that you've shared with me today. Thank you, Marnie. It was great to chat and great to share. And hopefully this is just a start of a conversation with others in Ireland and beyond. And as you say, this is just shining a light on a particular area, but there's other areas that we need to shine light on as well. So to start with something big, we hope.