Creating positive change in student education
Professor Lydia Bleasdale and Associate Professor Rachael O’Connor won funding from the LITE Incubators to engage in collaborative research within student education.
The Leeds Institute for Teaching Excellence designed themed LITE Incubators to develop research in strategic areas. The Incubators are intended to develop collaborative research, providing a playground where professional services, technical, research and academic staff, students and teams can work in partnership to create real change in student education.
Read on for how Professor Bleasdale and Rachael O’Connor used their funds to spark innovative collaborations to enhance student education.
Professor Lydia Bleasdale’s LITE incubator funding came from the Student Futures and Educational Gain remit, with support from the Inclusive Education and Belonging Incubator.
What did you do?
I've spent the last six months working with a small group of undergraduate Research Assistants, who were taking different versions of our LLB and were at different stages of their academic careers, to develop the resource list for a new, compulsory LLB Law module PRIME (Professions, Reflections, Identities, Motivations and Ethics). We've been developing the resource list – containing podcasts, fiction, non-fiction, films, videos, and so on – as well as discussing how the module could be assessed and some of the topics it should cover. I wanted to bring in some additional undergraduate voices to reflect on what we've done so far and give their advice, so – using the LITE incubator funding I received – I recruited three LLB finalists to work with me for a day. They were asked to look at the draft resource list and suggest further resources/topics; to 'draw' a Law student and what their interests are, how they might feel/act, and what they do; and to consider the timeline of a First year Law student from July pre-university, to June after their first year.
Why did you do it?
The PRIME module is unique: to the best of my knowledge, there is no module like it in any of the Law degrees in England and Wales, or indeed beyond. It won't be relying on 'traditional' academic literature, it won't contain any law, and it will potentially challenge our students to think deeply about themselves, others, and their future career aspirations. That could be an unsettling experience, so I wanted the resources we ask the students to rely upon to be ones which feel relevant to them, and appeal to a wide range of interests. That's why I recruited the five initial Research Assistants, and why I wanted to use the LITE Incubator funding to get some additional student perspectives on the development of the module to date: current students are best-placed to tell us what others are most likely to enjoy, and why, and – by recruiting a diverse group of students – to reflect the diversity within our student body. I also wanted to get their insights into a 'typical' Law student and a timeline of first year because it could help to inform the module's content, and the timing of that content.
How did it go?
Brilliantly! The participants approached all the tasks and discussions with great enthusiasm, but also in a considered, reflective way. They wanted to make first year even better for new students, and to make the module the best it can be, and their contributions will help a huge amount. There were some overlaps in how they depicted a typical Law student (worrying featured heavily!), but also some differences that we can keep in mind when we're teaching our new cohort. The timeline of the first year also drew out some differences, although it was interesting to note how many people missed the introductory week through no fault of their own: this has lessons for us all in how much we can expect our new students to know on day one of term.
Associate Professor Rachael O’Connor’s LITE incubator funding came from the Inclusive Education and Belonging Incubator and the Active & Experiential Learning Incubator.
What did you do?
On 11 June, a brilliant bunch of colleagues and current students (UG and PGT) gathered on campus for the Performance for Change workshop, led by Rachael O’Connor and supported by student co-leads (Dalton Harrison, Sofia Belayat and Annika Nair). We began with a brief exploration of why we had come together (see below). Our circle of reflection started and ended the session during which we shared an initial feeling and hope for the session. We then closed the session with a final feeling and hope for the future/next steps of this collaboration. In-between these reflective circles, we engaged in a range of fun activities designed to get us tackling the thorny topic of class discrimination in employment through the medium of creativity and performance.
A staff and student pair share the common reflections they identified through their poems and how they constructed this into their still image.
After a ‘speed-dating’ inspired getting to know each other icebreaker which included sharing artefacts relating to class we’d brought along to the session (I brought the tiny, twirling ballerina out of my nana’s jewellery box as a conversation starter), Dalton then expertly led a poetry workshop. During this part of the session, staff and students followed a reflective template to create short pieces of poetry drawing on their own perspectives of class. As we shared our poems together, this resulted in some really powerful language, phrases and terminology which served as a springboard for the next activity where we lent into ‘image theatre’. Here, we began to move our bodies and utilise our artefacts, creating still images which depicted common phrases, words or concepts coming out of our poetry. We then ‘performed’ our still images for one another and had a group discussion about what we saw and took from each other’s interpretations. This then built confidence for us to begin to construct stories, based on the still images. The groups then spent time devising a short ‘scene’ of no more than 3 minutes to explore their story relating to class discrimination at work. Sofia then led us into a discussion about the law and policy changes we felt would positively change some of the more negative experiences and outcomes depicted in the short scenes.
Why did you do it?
Classism is rife across the higher education sector and also in many professions, including law. Primarily being lawyers (although not everyone attending was a lawyer or law student), we focussed on the current absence of class as a protected characteristic under equality law in England and Wales and the impact this has on the prevalence of class-based discrimination in employment and access to work in particular. Inspired by legislative theatre techniques, I opted for this performance-based exploration of a challenging, multifaceted legal topic with the hope of encouraging participants to move beyond their comfort zones and begin to use their own bodies, words and artefacts to articulate their experiences and feelings around classism in this context. It sought to demonstrate that law is not just about statutes, huge textbooks and essay writing but is also about creative expression, community, solidarity and new experiences.
How did it go?
It was such an enjoyable afternoon spent in the company of colleagues and students with a shared aim of shining a spotlight on classism and barriers to employment, drawing out critical themes such as privilege, exclusion, hierarchy, rules of the game and complicity. It was wonderful to see students and staff exploring their creative expression in the ‘safe’ environment we cultivated together during the workshop. People who joined the session described enjoying the community feeling and shared experiences, as well as the honest and open discussions drawing on real-world experiences and applying them to the legal context. I’m really excited to keep building on this initial sandpit session and collaborate with colleagues across campus who are experts in performance to develop this work further.
Professor Bleasdale is Director of the Centre for Innovation and Research in Legal Education, and can be found on LinkedIn here. Associate Professor Rachael O’Connor is a member of the Centre for Innovation and Research in Legal Education and can be found on LinkedIn here.
