Education Ideas Hub

Speaker: Lucy Baxter, Achele Agada, Halia Shah , Sonia Elks

Date & Time:  16/04/2025 12.00-13.00

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Health Inequalities: Student Teaching Preferences Perspective

Blurb: Current approaches to teaching about health inequalities are diverse in content and approach.This project aims to develop and deliver an investigation into healthcare students’ perspectives on health inequalities teaching on all health care programmes within City St George’s School of Health and Medical Sciences. The identification of student preferences for effective delivery of this teaching, then can be used when reviewing curriculums and developing new teaching resources. Education on health inequalities, social determinants of health and inclusion health are rightly increasingly being prioritised by Royal Colleges and Universities. They are extremely relevant to all healthcare workers in London, nationally and globally and we hope our evaluation work can be used for educators with a wide variety of backgrounds to include a student voice when developing their teaching on inequalities. 

Speaker: Emerald Essuman, Kajan Kailayanathan, Saranne Weller , Jennifer Stott

Date & Time: 30/04/2025 12.00-13.00

Location:  MS Teams Meeting - Developing Learning-centred Student Evaluation of Teaching (SET)

Blurb: When used effectively, student evaluation of teaching should be the start of a conversation between students and staff about how to learn and how together we can improve the experience of learning and teaching. Too often low response rates and lack of engagement with the feedback can undermine this work. The aim of this project is to develop formative evaluation tools for educators that foster student metacognition and evaluative judgement to enrich these conversations for students and staff working together to enhance teaching. This session will present some of the strategies and share the outcomes of piloting the tools with students.The session will be led by the student project leads Emerald Essuman, Year 2 BSc Radiotherapy and Oncology and Kajan Kailayanathan, Year 3 BSc Clinical Pharmacology with input from Dr Saranne Weller, Reader in Higher Education Practice and Development and Dr Jennifer Stott, Senior Lecturer in Molecular Pharmacology. 

Speaker: Ella Pakoglu , Veronica Carroll

Date & Time:  07/05/2025 12.00-13.00

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Accessible Bioinformatics for Science Education  

Blurb: Bioinformatics tools are commonly used in science practice and education, but students with specific learning differences (SpLDs), including ADHD, face particular challenges when navigating these tools, which impacts their learning and achievement. The goal of this project is to gain a better understanding of accessibility barriers for this group of students when using bioinformatics tools in class. Our aim is to increase awareness across science programme teams about obstacles faced by neurodivergent students and to make recommendations on how to improve accessibility when designing learning tasks. The session is led by Y2 Biomedical Science student, Ella Pakoglu, with Dr Veronica Carroll, Senior Lecturer in Vascular Biology. 

 

Speaker: Laura Byrne , Michael Allcock

Date & Time:  14/05/2025 12.00-13.00

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Tackling HIV Stigma in Healthcare Education

Blurb: This project aims to tackle HIV-related stigma early in the careers of our healthcare students at City St George's. We know that despite major improvements in the care people living with HIV receive, they still face stigma day to day; regrettably this is also true in a healthcare setting, leading to many of those living with HIV feeling apprehension around accessing healthcare. To tackle this stigma, we have worked with Terence Higgins trust and their HIV Ambassadors to bring the experiences of those living with HIV into the curricula of patient-facing courses via face to face workshops, along with online resources and the dissemination of an e-Learning to help staff on these courses improve their knowledge and confidence when talking around HIV & HIV-related stigma. 

 

Speaker: Deborah Padfield, Priya Odedra, Nithya Balchandra and Rowan Wilson

Date & Time: 28/05/2025 12.00-13.00

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Creative engagement for equitable homeless healthcare

Blurb: Homelessness has significantly increased in the last decade, leading to alarming health disparities and life expectancies in the 40s. Recent healthcare graduates report feeling unprepared to address these needs due to limited curriculum exposure.  Creative approaches have been shown to improve student engagement and empathy toward patients, whilst enhancing well-being and agency for homeless individuals. This project combines arts and healthcare education to address curriculum gaps and gain insights into lived experiences of homelessness.In collaboration with ‘Evolve’, a local housing and support charity, surveys will assess perspectives on current teaching and experiences of homeless individuals. A focus group and art workshop will foster connection and self-expression. Outputs include co-created artwork, a compassionate care checklist, and an online resource hub. Curriculum recommendations aim to promote equitable and informed healthcare by equipping future providers with skills to better serve homeless communities.Dr Deborah Padfield is a Reader in Arts & Health Humanities and Director of Open Spaces at City St George’s with expertise in co-design and co-production of creative interventions. Priya, Nithya, and Rowan are graduate medical students passionate about integrating arts in healthcare education

 

Speaker: Katie Campion, Emmanuel Nzeyimana

Date & Time:  04/06/2025 12.00-13.00

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Exploring inclusion: This is Us

Blurb: This project explores the felt experience of inclusion using Experience Based Co-design (EBCD). The project team were aware of the differences between the intention of creating an inclusive learning environment vs the felt experience. EBCD involves interviewing people and creating a catalyst film which is then shown at the joint event. This is where students and staff come together to decide collectively on some aspects they could tackle together to improve things. They then form small co-design groups, ideate, prototype, and eventually bring their outputs to the celebration event. 

Speaker: Efthymia Papaevangelou, Yasmin Ahmed, Ikran Salah

Date & Time:  11/06/2025 12.00 -13.00

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Promoting environmental sustainability as part of inclusive education

Blurb: This project focuses on reducing the environmental impact of research laboratories at City St George's in response to the climate crisis. Key themes include carbon footprint reduction, energy efficiency, waste management, and sustainable sourcing of materials. The university aims to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, with laboratories contributing significantly to energy use and waste generation. The project will develop comprehensive sustainability training for students and staff, addressing challenges identified through surveys. The training will promote sustainable practices, including waste reduction and recycling. This initiative is crucial for those in academic research, facilities management, and sustainability roles, as it fosters long-term environmental responsibility. Dr. Papaevangelou is a Lecturer in Cellular Pharmacology at SGUL, specialising in cancer biology and treatment. She leads various modules in the BSc Clinical Pharmacology program and supervises student projects. She has more than 15 years laboratory-based experience and her research focuses on immunotherapies and combination therapies for cancer.

Speaker: Ali Raja, Katerina Cheliotis, Luqman Hamed, Mohammed Malida, Rachel Fowden-Hulme, Marianne O'Connor, Michelle Esmati, Emma Metters and Roaa Al-Bedaery

Date & Time:  Sept – Date TBC

Location: MS Teams Meeting - Supporting WP medical students to thrive

Blurb: There have been many national interventions to increase access to university, however there is evidence to suggest a discrepancy in outcomes during university studies between WP and non-WP students. This project used a participatory action research (PAR) model to compare both the lived experiences and financial challenges experienced by City St George’s WP medical students with what is known in the literature, and to collaboratively develop student-led interventions to support existing and future WP students to thrive. 

• Wednesday, 17 April 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: Roaa Al-Bedeary, Priya Chakraborty, Judith Ibison, Olga Rodriguez Falcon

• The project aims to develop and deliver an online educational primary care grand round programme for all healthcare students at St George’s University, and to offer the programme externally to students from other London medical and healthcare schools. The main objective of the programme is to inspire interest in primary care careers and provide insight into the variety of careers and academic careers in primary care. The programme will also enhance the academic offering for students, providing them with additional knowledge and expertise in clinical primary care, and academic skills including research, quality improvement and presentation skills. Although students may have the opportunity to attend secondary care grand rounds, there is currently no offering of a primary care grand round for students to attend at St George’s University. We are also not aware of this being offered within other London medical schools. We hope this programme will contribute positively to the educational experience offered to students, particularly those with an interest in primary care who currently have limited opportunities to learn about academic primary care.

• Wednesday, 08 May 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: Joanne Morrison, Angela Kubacki, Halia Shah, Luke Woodham, David Ross

• People with intellectual disabilities can have impairments in being able to express their feelings, wants and wishes. They may also have limitations in their understanding of language. Communication is a two way process and when consulting with a patient, a doctor is a communication partner, and effective communication is impacted by the doctor’s skills. People with intellectual disabilities are at risk of suggestibility to leading questions but provide less information in response to open questions. Using visual communication aids can assist with expressive language and reduce the reliance on leading questions. However, in a busy work environment doctors need easy access to effective and relevant communication aids. We hope to develop an online resource booklet which will contain a practical toolkit for communicating with people with communication impairments, preparation tips and links to communication aids.

• Wednesday, 15 May 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: Julie Hendry, Amin Haybatollahi, Saranne Weller

• Most teaching sessions at high education institutions are delivered through lectures, where a subject expert teaches course content in a large group setting. However, student feedback at SGUL indicates that lecture quality is often variable, significantly impacting learning and experience. The aim of this student-staff project is to explore what makes an effective lecture from student and staff perspectives. Alongside addressing practical solutions to increase lecture quality, this study will explore student and staff perceptions of the personal values and attributes individual lecturers bring to sessions to enable and enhance effective learning and teaching. We intend to survey all SGUL students, and staff involved in teaching. Specific data from a mixed method questionnaire (qualitative and quantitative questions) will be further explored through a focus group with participant volunteers. Participants selected will reflect the full range of students within SGUL as much as possible. This method will allow a richness of exploration of key areas revealed from the questionnaire. Findings will be disseminated to all students, staff, and courses, and presented at internal educational events and national and international conferences. We envisage that project legacy will be a better understanding of what makes an effective lecture, generation of a toolkit to better train and support staff, and empowering students with a framework to critic and feedback lecture quality to improve their learning and experience.

• Wednesday, 22 May 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: David Gillott, Millie Shannon, Sally Mitchell

• Endometriosis is one of the most common gynaecological conditions in the UK, affecting approximately 1 in 10 people assigned female at birth. This condition can be debilitating and made even harder to deal with due to the stigma and lack of awareness surrounding it. Our project aims to equip the St George’s community with knowledge surrounding the condition to allow current and future healthcare professionals to recognise and treat the disease in a more efficient and holistic way. In addition to this we hope that it will empower those who may be affected to reach out for support and allow an open dialogue for key issues in women’s health to be created. We will produce a series of videos and social media posts for Endometriosis Awareness Month which is March 2024 that will educate about endometriosis and menstruation but also share real life experiences of what living with this chronic disease is like as well as clinicians’ experiences of treating it. We will be interviewing focus groups to inform the contents of these videos. All resources produced will be available to be viewed at any time after they are published on social media, various university outputs, a purpose-built website and CANVAS. A short MOOC will be produced for educational purposes.

• Wednesday, 05 June 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: Jane Cronin-Davies, Farah Ahmed

• Student mental health is nationally recognised as a concern across the university sector. A student staff survey project by Hamzah Niaz and Jane Cronin-Davis (2020) investigated the mental health of students and services they accessed. The results of the project identified approximately 50% students who completed the survey reported a mental health problem, with anxiety and depression being most prevalent. 28% of the respondents accessed services related to their mental health at SGUL, university counselling being the most frequently cited service. Although student did access services within the University. Many of those who participated in the were reluctant for fear of what might happen in relation to their programme, e.g., possible fitness to practice concerns. Respondents indicated that they preferred speaking to other students as this seemed less formal and easier, more impartial, and less judgemental. The university counselling service is extremely important; however, some students could benefit from peer mental health support from other students. This has been successful in other universities e.g., Warwick. A feasibility study by Osborn et al (2022), although not specifically targeted at mental health demonstrated how a peer support model addressed unmet needs of students at a London University.

• Wednesday, 12 June 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: Angela Kubacki

• Promoting, protecting and preserving academic integrity is the responsibility of every member of the St George’s community. We must consider how we can share this responsibility across faculty, staff and students and aim to cultivate a campus-wide culture committed to trust, honesty and academic integrity. With the launch of our new procedure for Academic Integrity and our guidance on ethical use of AI in assessment (ChatGPT), this project wants to give students genuine responsibility in a collaborative effort with faculty members to foster and maintain this commitment.

• Wednesday, 19 June 2024, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

• Speakers & Chair: Thushari Welikala, Anthony Albert, Khushi Gupta

• Healthcare students in UK higher education come from diverse social-cultural backgrounds and can identify themselves differently based on their sexuality, gender identity, age etc. Research show that students identifying as ‘different’ are treated differently within universities 1 and SGUL student feedback indicates that discrimination and multiple types of ‘isms’ impact negatively on their learning experience. In this project students and staff will work in partnership to identify whether and how different aspects of coloniality (the diverse elements of ongoing power structures shaped and informed by colonisation) can affect students’ learning experience within work placements across six programmes/courses at St George’s. We will use creative enquiry (the exploration of lived experience through the use of creative approaches) to articulate students’ experience of coloniality within work placements. The project outputs and the legacy:a) creative outputs (blackout poetry, role plays, and posters) that will help share subtle and challenging experiences of coloniality more effectivelyb) a set of recommendations co-designed by project partners to support St George’s, programmes to address coloniality in work placements;c) a half-day event to share the insights gained from the project (using black out poetry, role play, and posters), intending to initiate a culture change in decolonising teaching and learning within St George’s.

• Wednesday, 22 March 2023, 12:00 - 13:00 (MS Teams)

Speakers: Jared Bhaskar, Will Ansley, Arya Kamyab, Claire Spiller

This project builds on the findings of a previous student-staff collaboration (the Education Enhancement project) works to target a desire for greater transparency of faculty assessment practices, student empowerment through assessment literacy and most importantly, fostering trust through a shared understanding of assessment. We propose that by using ‘assessment as learning’, we can improve Single Best Answer (SBA) question assessment literacy to both instill a greater student confidence in these assessments and be empowered to develop peer-led resources including a formative assessment bank.

 

• Wednesday, 29 March 2023, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Anna Curtis, Claire Spiller

Team: Katherine Taylor

The transition to workplace learning in the clinical environment can be challenging for the healthcare student and involves negotiating environmental, psychological, social and educational shifts. This can have a significant impact on the students’ experience in this environment, and on their ability to learn effectively. Previous work with MBBS students had identified ‘hidden curriculum’ contexts: the language, equipment, people and processes, often assumed as tacit knowledge by those designing teaching, but which presented a barrier to students feeling comfortable in this learning space. The project aims to build on our understanding of common student ‘hidden curriculum’ challenges; and to develop new resources to help to support these challenges for cross-course use.

• Wednesday, 16 November 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Rosie MacLachlan, Tamari-Rose Nyakunengwa,

Team: George Hadjiyiannakis, Chantal Salira, Student Parents and Carers Empowered (SPACE) Society

We propose a student-staff partnership model wherein we can work towards supporting childcare needs for staff and student with childcare responsibilities with the aim of supporting gender equality at George’s and fostering a healthy working environment for all. We identified the need for this when conducting interviews as part of a four-part video series entitled 'International Women's Week 2021'. We spoke with notable students and staff to gain accounts on their experiences as women in leadership and the work they felt still needed to be done both institutionally and socially for gender equality.

• Wednesday, 30 November 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Yuti Khare, James Sullivan-McHale, Roaa Al-bedaery, Shehla Baig

Team: Roaa Al-bedaery, Pedro Elston

St George’s medical students encounter patient narratives on a weekly basis in the PBL (problem-based learning) and CBL (case based learning) cases in the clinical science years. In the past, in many cases these narratives were written without consciousness of the attitudes towards inclusion they might evoke. The emotions and attitudes that these stories elicit in students were part of the hidden curriculum. From 2019, we have worked with students to change problematic case narratives, promoting inclusivity throughout the menu of cases, and to extend the reach of the taught curriculum to keep abreast of social change.

We have promoted inclusive narratives more widely by providing learning resources and support for new case writers. The first module of MBBS 5 has been transformed to show narratives that represent the diversity of the patient and healthcare community, including featuring more health professionals from the health care team.This is a qualitative study with MBBS 5 Year 1 to see if these narratives are eliciting in students the sense of being part of an inclusive, multi-professional community at the start of their time with us, or whether further work needs to be done regarding our strategy.

• Wednesday, 19 October 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Jonathan De Oliviera, Connor Togher, Naireen Asim, Roaa Al-bedaery, Shehla Baig

Team: Roaa Al-bedaery

From 2024, all UK medical students will have to pass the Medical Licensing Assessment (MLA) to graduate. In the US, this has resulted in a parallel curriculum, whereby strategic preparation using commercial resources are favoured over engaging in the intended curriculum, which focuses more broadly on the professional capabilities of students. Such professional capabilities are the hallmark of the SGUL curriculum, with Final year particularly important for readiness for foundation practice.
SGUL is embarking on an ambitious win-win approach to this, with its own intrinsic curriculum objectives, teaching and learning resources being clearly organised and aligned to the MLA in a curriculum management system, obviating the need for a parallel curriculum.
We will work with students to understand their assessment preparation behaviours and design the system with this in mind. The project will be qualitative in nature, with some purposive sampling to ensure a diversity of students are represented, and some quantitative work once the system is launched. The legacy for SGUL will be enhanced student trust and engagement in the curriculum, and a successful outcome for our students in the MLA. As a project of national interest, we expect other medical schools will be keenly watching the outcome of our efforts.

• Wednesday, 12 May 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers:  Tamari Nyakunengwa, MBBS5 Year 3, President of Athena SWAN society, George Hadjiyiannakis and Chantal Salira, MBBS5 Year 2, SU Equality & Diversity officers 

This year for International Women’s Day, president of St George’s Athena SWAN and the SU Equality & Diversity officers collaborated to produce a four-part video series entitled 'International Women's Week 2021'. They interviewed notable students and staff to gain accounts on their experiences as women in leadership and the work they feel still needs to be done both institutionally and socially for gender equality. 

This talk summarises the campaign’s main findings and uses clips from the interviews to facilitate discussions on being the only woman in the room, the increased caring responsibilities for women during COVID, and the lack of access to childcare for women in the workplace, specifically at George’s. 

The team aim to apply for a Student-Staff Partnership Grant to further develop their work towards supporting childcare needs for staff and student parents with the aim of supporting gender equality at George’s and fostering a healthy working environment for all.  

•  21 April 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Dr. Penelope Murphy, Senior Lecturer in Physiology, Pierre George Kostanteen, MBBS5 Year 2, Arvand Vahedi, MBBS5  Year 2, Sai Selvarajan, Biomedical Science Year 2

This project investigates students’ independent learning and the types of online resources they engage with. The aim is to review the potential for integrating alternative online resources into Canvas to be accessible by students across St George's.

The team will blend quantitative and qualitative methods, including surveys, focus groups and diary studies to address questions about how students study independently of the formally provided/recommended, what online tools/resource they use, as well as staff's perspectives on and recommendations for online resources. Based on study findings, the team will produce a report and create a Canvas module with resources made available for the entire St George's community.

 

• 19 February 2019, 12.30-14:00, H4.2 and 5

Emma Metters, MBBS Careers tutor and Arabella Watkins, medicine student, set out to enhance the careers resources to produce video profiles of doctors and healthcare professional in different specialities at different stages of their career. Come and find out how they got on and how these resources will be invaluable to the student body. 

• Wednesday, 7 July 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Dr John Hammond, Associate Professor, Joint Faculty of Health, Social Care and Education, Niko Brenner, BSc Physiotherapy Year 3

Team: Caspian Priest, MBBS4 Year 3, Amelia Fraser-Dale, MBBS5 Year 2, Margot Turner, Senior Lecturer in Diversity and Medical Education

This project addresses the limitations in teaching trans-specific healthcare by developing improved teaching resources on transgender healthcare and inclusion at SGUL. An interdisciplinary group of students, some of whom are trans themselves, will work to create a range of teaching materials including: trans healthcare information pages for use on CANVAS, interactive learning activities (e.g. quizzes) and videos of trans-specific healthcare scenarios to facilitate PBL (problem-based learning) discussion. The content created will be stored on Canvas for future student cohorts, with the potential to be integrated as part of course curriculum. The overarching aim of the initiative is to improve the access to and quality of healthcare received by transgender individuals by creating a repository of resources and by developing the cultural competence of healthcare students.

• 27 November 2019, 12.30-14:00, Alistair Hunter Room

Margot Turner has taken part in the Student Staff Partnership grant a couple of times and is going to share her insight on her projects that she ran in collaboration with students. Using an interdisciplinary approach, Margot’s projects emphasises the role that St George’s can play to empower people to influence and improve societies and communities. This session will discuss the Black History Month exhibition and work being done to address honour-based violence, family rituals and forced marriages.  

• Wednesday, 16 June 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Angela Kubacki, Head of Clinical Communication, John Ward, MBBS5 F Year

Team: Fiona Cairns, Widening Participation Manager, Naz Hussain, Associate Director of Marketing and Student Recruitment, Dr Laura Byrne, MBBS Admissions Tutor, Sarah Waygood, Senior Lecturer Physiotherapy

Unequal access to medicine to students from lower income backgrounds has been long-highlighted by the Medical Schools Council. The project aims to bring insights to address this issue by focusing on two questions: 1. to what extent do students from lower income backgrounds recognise Medicine as a potential career path? 2. to what extent do applicants from lower income backgrounds have access to resources and information regarding preparing for interviews. The team intend to analyse subgroup differences, develop understanding of applicants' perceptions of access to Medicine and consider the impact of remote MMIs on equality and diversity. The team aims to establish a permanent student-staff working group that will continue the work of improving access to information and resources for all applicants, in particular those from disadvantages backgrounds.

• 20 January 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)
• Watch the session here.

Speakers: Jane Cronin-Davis, Hamzah Niaz 

This session will draw on the experience of developing a SSPG project aiming to increase awareness about the various resources and services that can offer help and support students dealing with mental health issues. The project was fundamental to obtaining valuable data in understanding the prevalence of mental illness among all students, from all courses, as well as learning about what barriers prevent students from accessing certain services on offer. During the session, Jane and Hamzah will discuss the key findings from their university-wide survey as well as the impact of this project for the future of mental health and wellbeing at St George's.

• 29 January 2019, 12.30-14:00, Lecture Theatre B

Dr Judith Ibison and medicine student Corey Briffa in collaboration with other students and staff across the university, led an interdisciplinary project to review leadership teaching for St George’s undergraduate students. Come and hear what they found out, what legacy their project will leave and share your insights on leadership in higher education. 

• Wednesday, 28 April 2021, 13:00-14:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Dr. Emma Metters, Senior Lecturer in Primary Care and Medical Education, Hannah Gyekye-Mensah, MBBS5

This project enhanced careers resources by producing and evaluating video profiles of doctors and healthcare professionals in different specialities and at different stages in their careers.  The project group will present the two years of the project which have received SSPG funding, including the initial student survey, the video resources and infographics that have been produced and the final project evaluation and student feedback.  There are now plans to develop the project across other programmes.  Come along to find out more!

• Wednesday 19 May 2021, 12:00:13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Aileen O’Brien, Dean for Students, Daniya Khalid, BSc Biomedical Science Year 3, Samia Tajbiha, BSc Biomedical Science Year 2

Team: Dr Darren Bell, Psychiatrist, Dr Izzy Mark, Psychiatrist, Lon Teija, Education & Welfare Support Officer

The aim of the project is to create an enrollable module concentrating on mental health and well-being within St George’s, by providing and signposting all George’s students to reliable and organised wellbeing and welfare information. Similar to other tools, such as Careers module or Study+, this module would act as an easily accessible, centralised resource repository. By integating all the resources in one location, the module would raise awareness about available support, simplify students' access to mental health and well-being information and avoid students feeling potentially confused or overwhelmed by the numerous resources made available at St George’s. To achieve this, the team will use Canvas to design and form the module which will be populated with existing materials as well as original ones created by the team. The aim is to create this as a continuously updated repository to be used by the entire student body at St George's.

• Wednesday, 26 January 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Brogan Guest, Lecturer in Physician Associate Studies, Vicky Roebuck, MPAS Year 1

This project seeks to improve communication between clinical SGUL students and patients who do not speak English as their first language. The study will focus on two main areas: to evaluate the current English as a second language (ESL) teaching materials in St George's clinical programmes and to create and test new resources for improving communication skills. First, the team will analyse existing material and highlight strengths and areas for improvement in each curriculum. Then, in collaboration with the communication skills teams at St George's, the team will design simple, effective teaching materials, including videos and infographics, which will be tested through role playing scenarios of taking clinical history. Students from clinical Programmes will learn from the new teaching materials and will be paired with volunteers from the community who speak English at a basic level. Their interactions will be recorded, and their feedback will be collected and analysed. The analysis findings will be used to improve the teaching materials which will then be distributed to clinical departments within St George's to augment ESL teaching.

• Wednesday, 2 June 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Dr Olga Rodriguez Falcon, Lecturer in Learning Development, CIDE, Hauwa Hakimi Muhammad, BSc Biomedical Science Year 2

Team: Dr Ferran Valderrama, Reader in Cancer Cell Biology

A collaboration between CIDE's staff, teaching staff and students, this Peer Assisted Learning (PAL) initiative aims to facilitate the coordination of online study groups for the Biomedical Science and Physiotherapy Programmes. Here, Year 2 students will peer-assist Year 1 students. The groups will provide an informal setting for peer-to-peer support where students can discuss their course and interact with their peers' broad and diverse group. The goals are to increase Year 1 students' engagement with their course and create a sense of community among the students, especially during the pandemic. For Year 2 students, who will act as PAL leads, the aims are to support them in enhancing their employability by developing professional facilitation, organization, and teamwork skills.

• Wednesday, 29 September 2021, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Angela Kubacki, Head of Clinical Communication, Leo Hudson, MBBS4 P Year, Jennifer Collom, MBBS4 P Year

Team: Laura Yalley-Ogunro, Lecturer in Clinical Communication, Hannah Hart, Clinical & Communication Skills Coordinator, The Clinical Communication Team

This project aims to train peer tutors to deliver high quality, relevant and engaging Clinical Communication Skills teaching to medical students. The initiative has been piloted in the 20/21 Autumn term for MBBS 4 Year 1 students and has already received positive student feedback. 

The team will initially recruit P and F year students and open to T   year at a later stage. Peer tutor training will include facilitating learning with simulated patients, giving feedback and effective facilitation skills. The team aim to create an open and friendly programme that is flexible to any necessary change alongside continually developing students as teachers.

• 17 February 2021, 12:30-13:30, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Judith Ibison, Corey Briffa, Salina Khan,  Maxim Minakov

In 2019-20, this SSPG project reviewed the leadership curricula of all Courses and interviewed Course Directors about the delivery of teaching on leadership skills. The team also ran focus groups for students about their knowledge and skills with respect to leadership competencies and their views on what was needed. One of the most interesting findings was that few students self-identified as future leaders, at this stage of training.

During the session, the team will present more findings from the project with a view to stimulating shared thinking across St George's Courses about how we can further develop St George's learners for their current and future leadership roles.

• Wednesday, 30 March 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Hannah Cock, Ellie Corkerry

Team Name: Kevin Hayes, Katie Perkins, Kajal Patel, Lola Arowoshola, Zhenya (Yevgnia) Nerukh

MBBS Course Director and MBBS5 P year student Ellie will outline how this project aims to improve student assessment literacy and experience as well as support students who have failed assessments with their decision making and navigation of their options. The final product will be based on student personal experiences and staff expertise and be presented in written, visual and interactive formats. Whilst using examples from medicine, the work will be applicable to any SGUL course to improve understanding about how to support students in relation to failed assessments and guide the academic staff who advise them.

• Wednesday, 19 January 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Laura Byrne, MBBS Admissions Tutor, Navandeep Thumber, MBBS4 P Year

Team: Grace Poole, MBBS5 F Year, Naomi Melamed, MBBS4, F Year, Reeja Premjee, MBBS5, Intercalation Year

Each year, a cohort of successful Biomedical Sciences students who have completed their degree join the MBBS course in the third (T) year. This project seeks to aid in the transfer process by providing online peer-based mentorship and communication skills training. To this end, the team will first recruit students in P Year to act as mentors for clinical communication skills and will match them with T Year transfer students. Secondly, the team will create a bank of resources on Canvas, in particular videos of simulated clinical skills focusing on history taking. This bank will be available to all clinical MBBS students to aid with improving confidence in taking patient histories, and preparing for OSCEs.

The team aims to embed the clinical transfer mentorship program into the MBBS course to ensure continuous quality improvement through annual evaluation and feedback.

• Wednesday, 23 February 2022, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Dr. David Gillott, co-head Physiology, senior lecturer, Josephina Price, MBBS4 Year 1

Team: Karima Zitouni, PBL facilitator, Ibrahim Basar, MBBS4 Year 1, Sophie Ridge, MBBS4 Year 1, Tessa Rosendahl, MBBS4 Year 1, Ioannis Nikolaou, MBBS4 Year 1, Henry Stone, MBBS4 Year 1, Sophia Ehsani, MBBS4 Year 1, Megan Wright, MBBS4 Year 1.

The project will explore the different perspectives of St George’s students who have used problem-based-learning (PBL) in two completely different settings. Using a standardised end-of-module-feedback form launched at the introduction of PBL at St George’s, first-years’ opinions, who have had PBL wholly online over Microsoft Teams during the pandemic will be directly compared to previous first-years taught on-site and in-person at the University. Drawing themes out that appear in student comments in the forms, as well as comparing students’ ranked scores of different aspects of PBL, the project plans to carry out focus-groups of first-year MBBS4 students to delve deeper into the student perspective. This project has the capacity to be broadened to other cohorts, relevant to the improvement of small-group learning application at St George’s University as well as other educational institutes.

• Wednesday, 6 October 2021, 12:00-13:00, MS Teams

Speakers: Julie Hendry, Course Director Therapeutic Radiography, Corneliu Cazacu, BSc Therapeutic Radiography Year 2

Team: Benita Thomas, BSc Therapeutic Radiography Year 2, Charlotte Lam, BSc Therapeutic Radiography Year 1

During a global pandemic, online learning has been essential to continuing education and training while ensuring safety for teachers and students. This project aims to analyse how student engagement has been affected by online teaching, whether it can be improved, and what, if any, changes could be implemented for future needs. The study will explore the main themes of the effects of online learning by conducting focus groups and interviews with volunteer students from all three years of the Therapeutic Radiography undergraduate Programme.  The team aims to highlight how the advantages of online learning could be cultivated in new approaches. The goal is to enable students and staff to improve remote studying, offering a more caring and compassionate curriculum for students who would benefit from remote learning, such as those caring for a family member, mature students having children or students with a poorer financial situation needing more time off the campus to work. This project complements the Online Education Framework survey conducted by St George's by providing more qualitative data and insight into the lived experiences of students.

• Wednesday, 21 July 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Prof. Peter Whincup, Director of the SGUL Population Health Research Institute, co-chair of the SGUL Environmental Working Group, Yahia El-Tanani, MBBS5 Year 2, Grace Leyland, MBBS5 Year 2

This is a project aimed to improve the sustainability of SGUL. The team will gather St George's community's opinions on what eco-friendly changes should be implemented at the university with a secondary aim to set up an Eco Society. At the same time, the team will take the first steps towards transforming St George's into a more environmentally-friendly campus through actions to replace existing coffee cups with biodegradable alternative and plastic straws in the SU bar with paper ones. 

The team hope that the project's legacy will inspire future sustainability initiatives, through the Eco Society that will be established, through university-led strategies, and through other student-staff partnerships.

• Wednesday, 5 May 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Angela Kubacki, Head of Clinical Communication, James Sullivan-McHale, MBBS5 Year 2, Aditya Dhiran, MBBS5 Year 2, Nathan McNamara, MBBS5 Year 2, Hussein Abu Rabia, MBBS5 Year 2

This is a pilot study with the aim of enhancing educational output with a specific focus on the role of religion and faith. We will be running workshops that will aim to teach a number of other MBBS5 2nd year students about two religions each and this will be supplemented by pre-workshop and post-workshop questionnaires. The questionnaires will consist of clinical scenarios which will require short written answers as well as a series of true/false questions which we will repeat after the workshop. We will compare the two sets of data and we will draw our conclusions and findings from them. The aim of this project is to enhance the understanding of religion and faith for the students.  We hope this will help them deal better with clinical scenarios in the future, but also promote a degree of inter-faith understanding between the students themselves. We also hope that the feedback we receive will allow us to gain an understanding of what teaching methods work best and how productive the content itself is. This will allow us to develop our project for any future iterations, we will reflect and discuss our methodology and our findings in our final report.

• Wednesday, 9 June 2021, 12:00-13:00, Education Ideas Hub Teams site (online)

Speakers: Jeff Saddington-Wiltshire, Student Engagement Officer, Sarah Jones, VP Education&Welfare

Team: Ify Osefoh, BSc Biomedical Science, Year 3, Lola Arowoshola, MBBS5 P Year, Maye Jabi, MBBS5 P Year, Ogor Babundo, MBBS5 T Year, SU General Secretary), Sam Mountain, BSc Paramedic Science Year 1

This project aims to understand student’s perceptions of the student voice platform Unitu, launched at St George’s in February 2020. Since it launched, 63% of St George’s students have activated their accounts, producing over 1,000 posts, 160,000 views and 8,000 comments, and Unitu has been St George’s platform of choice to have their voices heard regarding academic and student experience issues. The team will study students' perceptions through a combination of qualitative and qualitative methods, such as surveys and focus groups. The analysis of the resulting data will be complemented by Unitu analytical data to produce an internal report. The aim is to produce recommendations to enhance the functionality of Unitu and to develop tools for evaluating the effectiveness of student engagement and student voice tools. The team aim to also share the research externally in conferences or academic journals to open up dialogue with colleagues across the sector.