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Mini-Projects for development and research in learning and teaching

Invitation to submit a proposal for funding

Introduction

The Engineering Subject Centre is pleased to be able to offer funding for development and research Mini-Projects. The aim of this funding opportunity is to enable the sharing and development of good practice and resources in engineering education that will be beneficial to the wider engineering community and to encourage subject-based pedagogic research. Bids submitted are assessed at a panel meeting. Details of the next meeting will be announced here in due course.

Bids submitted in December 2009 are currently being assessed. This submission will give priority to bids focusing on two themes: Student Engagement, and Embedding Education for Sustainable Development.

Student Engagement. Project proposals are invited that consider ways of increasing the pro-active involvement of students in the development of engineering programmes, curriculum design and delivery.  Proposals for developments that seek to encourage students to engage with their own learning will also be considered.

Embedding Education for Sustainable Development: Project proposals are invited that will explore and develop approaches to the embedding of sustainability, and its broader contextual issues of globalisation and citizenship, into the engineering curriculum.  It is anticipated that the outputs of these projects will complement the resources currently available from the Engineering Subject Centre in this area and add case examples to our forthcoming guide.

Submissions

The Engineering Subject Centre invites bids from engineering academics for Mini-Project funding to support work at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. This is a competitive bidding process for a fixed amount of funding and proposals will be judged by the panel against the criteria outlined below.

Informal contact about all ideas for submission is strongly encouraged. Please contact the Centre either by email or telephone on 01509 227170.

The Mini-Project scheme for development and pedadgogic research aims:

  • To promote excellence in learning and teaching in the area of engineering education.
  • To enable the development of learning and teaching resources that are of use to the wider engineering community.
  • To promote good practice in the evaluation of innovative methods of learning, teaching and assessment.
  • To disseminate within the wider community, innovative methods or resources developed initially for use within a single institution or discipline area.

Key Details

  • £3,500 is the maximum funding for a Mini-Project
  • Mini-Projects must be completed within 12 months of starting.

Who can apply?

  • All proposals must be specific to engineering education and are welcome on both generic engineering or discipline specific aspects.
  • Any academic or group of academics involved in teaching engineering at higher education level.
  • Departmental/faculty/central staff who support learning and teaching in engineering may also apply. 
  • Applications related to teaching of postgraduate students are welcomed.
  • Applications are welcomed from both individuals and collaborating groups within or across departments and/or universities.
  • Applicants are encouraged to contact their local staff and professional development units to discuss their bid and consider project partnerships or matched funding as appropriate.

Proposals will be considered under two categories

Development and Implementation of good practice

  • Proposals must have clearly defined deliverables that will be of benefit or interest to the wider engineering community and not just to the individual department(s) involved.
  • A Mini-Project should enable the sharing of existing practice or the development and subsequent sharing of new practice to the wider engineering community. Where a department submits a bid to support and develop existing projects, they will need to indicate the additional value and gain to the wider community that such a bid aims to secure.

Research and Evaluation that will inform learning and teaching within engineering.

  • These projects could build on existing work.

What types of resources should the Mini-Projects produce?

A selection of the following resources/activities should be produced as part of the outcomes of Mini-Projects and will be made available through the Engineering Subject Centre:

  • Guides
  • Workshop session or event
  • Web based resource
  • Handbook/Toolkit
  • Case Studies

It is expected that all Mini-Projects will present their resources at least once at an appropriate Engineering Subject Centre event.

How should the proposal be costed?

The maximum funding for a Mini-Project is £3,500. We are asking for Mini-projects to be costed under the following headings:

  • Staffing
  • Travel and Subsistence
  • Consumables
  • Specified other/s

We realise that the amounts of funding available are very small and that you will have to be inventive in working out how you may use the money effectively. Feel free to talk to us about your ideas - we anticipate that the funds will be used for things such as buying out a small amount of your own time, covering the costs of hiring a student, enabling networking, etc.  We are unable to cover overheads (unless accounted for within the £3500 budget) and encourage you to explore opportunities for matched funding within your university if you are required to outline Full Economic Costs (FECs) by your insitution.

What support will be provided by the Engineering Subject Centre?

Successful proposals will be allocated a member of the Engineering Subject Centre team to be their main point of contact. The contact will provide ongoing advice and support.

The Engineering Subject Centre will also provide support for the dissemination of the outcomes in the following ways:

It is also hoped that recipients will, as a result of carrying out their projects, submit papers to journals for publication, including to the Engineering Education, the Journal of the Higher Education Academy Engineering Subject Centre.

How will the successful Mini-Projects be selected?

The bids will be be assessed by at least three members of the Engineering Subject Centre team, the Management Committee and Advisory Board according to the criteria below.

The following criteria will be used for assessing the proposals:

  • Alignment of project with the stated priority themes.
  • Clarity of aims and objectives, which are relevant to the specified aims and themes of the funding.
  • Quality of methodology and feasibility of the timetable.
  • Extent of need/demand for the proposed Mini-Project.
  • Evidence of appropriate expertise of proposer.
  • Quality of the proposed products.
  • Impact Mini-Project will have on the higher education engineering community and plans for how the outcomes could be disseminated.
  • Evidence of plans to evaluate the outcomes of the project.
  • Extent to which the Mini-Project will enhance the resources/services provided by the Engineering Subject Centre.
  • Extent to which Mini-Project represents value for money.

Proposers of successful bids will then be notified and terms and conditions will be drawn up. This will include an IPR agreement. Proposers of rejected bids will be given feedback on why they were not funded. The successful projects will be published on the Engineering Subject Centre website. Evidence of the criteria that will be used to evaluate the success of the project is required.

What are the reporting procedures?

We will keep bureaucracy to a minimum to reflect the size of the funding.

The Engineering Subject Centre will monitor the funded proposals as they develop through occasional telephone calls, the submission of a simple mid-term web-based form and a final web-based report. Support is available for all stages of the project, for example Guidelines for writing a Mini-Project Report/Guide can be found here. We may also ask successful applicants to attend an initial 'orientation' meeting. Travel costs to this meeting will be met by the Engineering Subject Centre.

How do I apply?

Proposals for funding must be made using the submission form template via email to Emma Hurdle, Project Co-ordinator. Bids submitted are assessed at a panel meeting. Details of the next meeting will be announced here in due course.

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