Projects

eSTEeM is providing a mechanism for professional development through practice-based scholarship within a mentored community. Much of our work is organised on a project basis with project management aimed at the delivery of new educational outcomes and scholarship outputs. 

eSTEeM supports a rolling portfolio of approx. 80 active scholarship projects under a number of themes which include:

  • Access, Participation and Success
  • Innovative assessment
  • Online/onscreen STEM practice
  • Supporting students
  • Technologies for STEM learning

To learn more about our projects, please click on the project titles or use the search feature below by entering keywords. To search by the name of a project leader, please use the 'Filter by Project Leader' tab on the right-hand side of this page.

Search results

10 results found

Understanding the impact of ongoing support for students returning to study after reaching Restricted status

Elizabeth Shakespeare Anthony Short

Student retention and continuation are key drivers for this project. They are also key focus areas for the University.

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How students’ use of language relates to learning, retention and performance in assessment on TU100

John Woodthorpe Jim Donohue

This project built on previous work between MCT and WELS (formally FELS) on language use and student attainment at level 1, including in the production of TU100.

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Understanding and improving students’ learning experience and engagement with practical science on-line: The case of virtual and remote microscopes

Christothea Herodotou

There is a need to better understand what works best for students who study practical science online in order to improve their overall learning experience.

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Utilising the Teaching Tricky Topic process to Identify and Address Student Misunderstandings across Three OU Modules

Elizabeth FitzGerald Rob Janes Elaine Moore Jo Iacovides

In summary, this project aimed to create shared understandings of disciplinary misconceptions (Tricky Topics) in particular modules, and to create new ways of overcoming those misconceptions.

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VISION - Visual Interfaces for Systematising and Interpreting Online Notes

Ale Okada Anna De Liddo Andrea Berardi

Understanding students’ preferences and habits about digital reading is fundamental to support paperless learning.

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Engaging stakeholders as experts in the trial and evaluation of Disability Language Guidance

Elaine McPherson Kate Lister

To support inclusive and equitable study, universities often categorise students as ‘disabled’ for them to access specific support for their studies and require them to engage with terms such as ‘disclosing a disability’ and ‘reasonable adjustments’.

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Using technology-enabled learning networks to drive module improvements in STEM

Lesley Boyd Rob Janes

This project provides one way to answer the need to close the feedback loop between OU tutors and campus-based teams, to develop a joint understanding of teaching and learning design challenges, and to put tutors as close as possible to the development of solutions.

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Supporting student academic skills development - an evaluation of an English for Academic Purposes pilot

Jo Fayram John Woodthorpe

Highly Commended at the 5th eSTEeM Scholarship Projects of the Year Awards 2022.

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Evaluating the design of the virtual microscope with students

Christothea Herodotou

Existing studies about the design of the Virtual Microscope (VM) detail the technical specifications of the microscope such as improving the client response time when requesting an image and portability across computer platforms (Çatalyürek et al., 2003; Fereira et al., 1997) and report on develo

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Developing robust assessment in the light of Generative AI developments

Liz Hardie Jonquil Lowe Mychelle Pryde Kevin Waugh Mirjam Hauck Francine Ryan Daniel Gooch Volker Patent Kieran McCartney Claire Maguire Mike Richards Heather Richardson

This was a cross-faculty NCFE (Northern Council for Further Education) funded project.

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