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

203 results found

Evaluation of online journal club (OJC) in S285: to what extent does this help students develop employability skills?

Lorraine Waters Rachel McMullan

Developing employability skills have been identified as an Open University priority; there is evidence that these transferable ‘soft’ skills are often limited in science graduates entering the workplace.

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What is known about how to write online exams and how to prepare students for them?

Martin Braun

When the Covid pandemic affected education, universities around the globe had to move not only their content delivery online, but also their assessments.

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The Use of Learning Analytics in STEM over 4 years

Tom Olney Carlton Wood

Learning analytics is a rapidly expanding area of interest for many higher education institutions.

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Evaluating STEM/FBL APP Virtual Internship Scheme

Diane Butler Andrew Potter Catherine Comfort Kristen Reid

Winner of the 7th eSTEeM Scholarship Projects of the Year Award 2024.

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Evaluating the use of an Inclusive Curriculum Tool in STEM modules

Diane Butler Andrew Potter

This project evaluated the application of the Open University (OU) Inclusive Curriculum Tool (ICT), version 4, within a selection of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) modules.

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Enrichment workshops to enhance student engagement and employability

Janet Haresnape Ruth Gilbert Heather Fraser Hanne Bown David Ruiz Hannah Gandy

The aim of this project was to evaluate the programme of enrichment workshops which had been offered to biology and health sciences students in the School of Life, Health and Chemical sciences at the Open University during the summer months in 2022 and 2023.  The aims of the enrichment works

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Haptic thinking; identifying haptic tooling interventions for an online design course

Lisa Bowers

Highly Commended at the 1st eSTEeM Scholarship Projects of the Year Awards 2018 under the category – Innovative/Original Approach to Teaching.

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Building a sense of community in a core 2nd level Physics module (S217) and investigating qualitatively its effect on retention

Anne-Katrin Klehe

The OU has a broad intake of students from a very wide breadth of educational backgrounds. Most students study part time, mostly up to 60 credits per year while at the same time working full time, looking after a family and/or caring for someone.

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Which factors are correlated with undergraduate engineering distance learning students’ expectations of ethical issues?

Joanna Sessford

Ethics is becoming an increasingly important part of engineering curriculum. Engineers need to be able to recognise and make ethical decisions in their working life. This is essential for a number of different reasons including to avoid potentially life taking disasters. 

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Improving retention through small interventions: The U101 postcard project

Theodora Philcox Elouise Huxor

This project aims to improve student retention on U101, Design thinking. U101 is a gateway Level 1 design module and part of Q61 in Engineering and Innovation (E&I).

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