Author Archives: Catherine Mcconnell

About Catherine Mcconnell

I am a senior lecturer at the University of Brighton in the Centre for Learning and Teaching. My role encompasses a range of research and practice, working directly with students, academic staff and central departments in the areas of developing academic skills, student transition to university, peer assisted learning and looking at ways to improve student engagement, employability and retention. In 2014 I was awarded Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy.

Digital Learning Partnerships

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In 2021/22 the Digital Learning Partners initiative was launched to introduce a new approach to supporting student and staff digital capabilities. The partnership project involves staff and a paid student partner working together on a small initiative or project that will enhance the digital skills of students, either through the curriculum or more widely. We were very open to broad range of proposals, for example gaining an understanding of students’ digital experiences, creating engaging support resources for software or digital tools, to creating digitally rich teaching materials. Nine projects have been awarded in this round, which funds approximately 33 hours of students’ time.

All of the projects have been based on several key criteria, the main one that students take the lead in developing an aspect of the project and are not just assisting. The student partners have gained, consolidated and shared digital skills with staff and other students in many innovative ways. The final criteria was to produce a legacy from the project such as a teaching resource, blog post or presentation – which we are pleased to showcase in this blog site.

Use the menu above or links below to navigate the site and learn more about each project, which include:

This initiative has been led by Fiona Handley and Catherine McConnell in the Learning and Teaching Hub, with Information Services, and the support of Kevin Morton, Digital Learning Lead in the School of Sport and Health Sciences. If you are a member of staff at the University of Brighton and are interested in running a project in 2022/23 look out for more information from your Digital Learning Leads or see the information on our Digital Learning Partners internal Sharepoint page.