Evaluation of Digital Assets to support LHCS Students’ Sense of Belonging

Project leader(s): Zoë ChapmanJanette Wallace
Theme: Access, Participation and Success
Faculty: STEM
Status: Current
Dates: July 2024 to July 2026

With an increase in HEI’s offering online distance learning programmes because of the pandemic (Lockee.B.B 2021), supporting student retention and attainment has become a key mission within the OU to remain competitive. As part of this the LHCS APS team have several initiatives to increase retention and improve attainment, some of which are focussed upon building a sense of belonging which has been linked to STEM student success in previous studies (Rainey, K. et al. (2018)). Such initiatives include creation of digital assets (such as inspiring scientist postcards, student newsletter etc), building an informal online space (e.g., café forum on the science site, Discord) and creating more informal events (e.g., virtual quizzes) to run alongside academic offerings.

Delivering these initiatives takes time and resources so to support the APS team, through the STEM APP programme a student intern was hired to provide student perspective on, as well as co-creation of, the first initiative; the creation of digital assets. The role of the intern was to participate in discussions around initial ideas for the creation of digital assets, and lead on creation of designs; developing an asset bank of digital assets which can be used for regular dissemination. The intern was successfully hired and started working on in January 2024. They had a contract for 12 weeks, working 12.5 hours per week, which was further extended for 5 weeks, working 10 hours per week. The work of the intern exceeded expectations and a bank of digital postcards have been created, as well as a framework of a quarterly, digital magazine. Again, through the STEM APP programme a second student intern will be hired (APP funding agreed but intern not recruited yet) to provide student perspective on, as well as co-creation of, the second initiative; student magazine.

The aim of this project is to investigate the dissemination of the digital assets and evaluate their impact on students’ sense of belonging.

The dissemination of the digital postcards is due to start at the beginning of the 2024J academic year, in October 2024. One postcard per month will be disseminated to students for a period of 12 months. The postcard will be hosted on the Science Study Site, a link to which will be emailed out to students. The use of the CAMEL email system to communicate widely with students allows more students to be approached. One drawback of this system is that it the CAMEL email system is incapable of hosting imagery therefore the postcard cannot be placed within the body of an email. Sending an email with a link to the Science Site drives traffic to the Science Study Site and increase its usefulness and engagement for students along term objective of the wider LHCS school. Further, using the Science Study Site will allow the embedding of Real Time Student Feedback (RTSF) for the purposes of evaluating the postcards, and will allow quantitative data collection based on web traffic to support the understanding of their impact. Thus, hosting the postcards on the Science Study Site and guiding students there via a hyperlink in the CAMEL email, seems to be the most broadly applicable strategy for dissemination.

The dissemination of the quarterly digital magazine is due to start at the beginning of 2025, in January. One magazine per quarter (every 3 months) will be disseminated to students for an initial period of 12 months with scope to continue dissemination indefinitely. Like the postcards, the digital magazine will be hosted on the Science Study Site for the same rationale.

The evaluation of the assets will be carried out via a mixed methods approach. Quantitative data can be captured via web traffic to the Science Study Site, as well as data on click rates from emails. Qualitative data can be captured via RTSF questions. Further, it is anticipated that a JISC survey will be created and communicated with students to obtain their opinions and attitudes on both the postcards and the digital magazine. Questions in the survey will include those which obtain qualitative and quantitative data sets to contribute to the assets’ evaluation. The survey will take place in 2025 once the postcards and magazine have been disseminated.

It is hoped that the impact of this project will be multifaceted, and that the digital assets will be received well by students, fostering an improved sense of belonging, and improving an overall sense of community. It is also hoped that if the assets are received well, this will continue to be a feature of LHCS, and further assets will be developed to continue supporting a sense of belonging. This project has the potential to inform areas of future scholarship such as how asset creation could be developed even further and contribute to a wider body of research on ways to improve a sense of belonging.

The outcome of the project hopes to inform whether the creation and dissemination of digital assets in the form of a series of digital postcards and the implementation of a quarterly digital magazine, influences LHCS students’ sense of belonging.

References:

Lockee, B.B (2021) Online education in the post-COVID era. Nature Electronics | VOL 4 | January 2021 | 5–6 | 2 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41928-020-00534-0

Rainey, K. et al. (2018) ‘Race and gender differences in how sense of belonging influences decisions to major in STEM’, International journal of STEM education, 5(1), pp. 10–14. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1186/s40594-018-0115-6.