Current role: Reader (Education and Pedagogy), Department Education Lead
Focus of NTF application: design and delivery of inclusive curricula, student engagement and belonging, innovation and technology-enhanced learning.
Twitter id: @ThezzaNicholson
Manchester Met profile page
Contact: d.nicholson@mmu.ac.uk

Dr Theresa Nicholson is a Reader (Higher Education and Pedagogy) and Education Lead for the Department of Natural Sciences in the Faculty of Science and Engineering. Theresa is an AdvanceHE National Teaching Fellow (2020) and an HEA Principal Fellow. Theresa is best known for her passionate advocacy of inclusive learning and teaching and for driving forward the University’s commitments around equality, diversity and inclusion. She is a steering committee member for the national charity Diversity in Geoscience UK, and at Manchester Met, is the Faculty’s Equality and Diversity Champion. Theresa has developed University policy around inclusive practice and created a staff development game Diversity Dash! She contributes to a Faculty working group seeking to address the Award Gap (BAME, BTEC) and to the University’s Inclusive Learning Community.

Theresa has pioneered many curriculum innovations and her signature pedagogy is characterised by student-centred, active, authentic learning that builds-in flexible assessment, aligning learning with students’ aspirations, motivations and interests. She is working with the Faculty Educational Change Workstream to embed an active futures pedagogy across curricula in the Science and Engineering New Build.

Theresa’s primary research interests draw together the strands of curriculum design and inclusive learning and teaching, and she has published widely on aspects of creativity and peer learning in assessment; student engagement and belonging; technology-enhanced learning; inclusive student partnership; and support for d/Deaf and disabled students. She is currently researching synergies between enquiry-based learning and global citizenship, and their potential for supporting diversity awareness and enhancing graduate outcomes.

Keywords: Inclusion, Curriculum , Enquiry-Based Learning, Education for Sustainable Development, Technology-Enhanced Learning

Current role: Principal Lecturer in Academic CPD
Focus of NTF application: creativity and open education
Twitter id: @chrissinerantzi
Personal website/institutional page
HEA Fellowship page
Contact: c.nerantzi@mmu.ac.uk

Chrissi is a Principal Lecturer in Academic CPD in the University Teaching Academy at Manchester Metropolitan University. She has academic leadership of the Good Practice Exchange, Communities and Networks, is the institutional lead for NTF and CATE submissions, teaches on the PgCert and the MA in Higher Education, is the Faculty link for the Arts and Humanities Faculty and developed and leads FLEX since 2014 an openly licensed practice-based professional development initiative with formal and informal pathways that has inspired colleagues to adapt FLEX for students. Chrissi is pioneering a wide range of creative, innovative, open and collaborative approaches to learning, teaching and assessment across the institution, including the use of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®, learning through making and play and storytelling. Her research interests include, creativity, open education, cross-boundary collaborative learning and communities. She collaborates with colleagues nationally and internationally in these areas.

Chrissi is a UK HEA National Teaching Fellow (2015), HEA Principal Fellow (PFHEA), Senior Fellow of the Staff and Educational Development Association (SFSEDA), a Member of ALT (CMALT) and a Global OER Graduate Network Fellow and the ALT Learning Technologist of the Year 2017. Chrissi is also an HEA Accreditor and a member of the Advisory Board of the award winning UNESCO programme Open Education for a Better World as well as the global mentor co-ordinator of this programme. She is the co-founder of the highly successful international Learning and Teaching in Higher Education tweetchat (#LTHEchat); the founder of the international community Creativity for Learning in Higher Education with 11 member institutions and the co-founder of Creative Academic that promotes creativity globally and publishes the Creative Academic Magazine. Chrissi has developed and funded a series openly licensed courses such as the Flexible, Online and Distance Learning (FDOL), Bring Your Own Devices for Learning (BYOD4L) and the Flexible, Open and Social Learning (FOS) that have been offered by multiple institutions for staff and students.

Keywords: open education, collaborative learning, creativity, storytelling, flexible learning

Current role: Head of Manchester School of Architecture
HEA Fellowship page
Contact: k.singh@mmu.ac.uk

My NTF application was set against the context of The Wilson review of Business-University collaboration (2012) as well as the Lord Young Report (2014) which recognised the importance of enterprise education for students in higher education. However, the BIS Enterprise Education Impact in Higher and Further Education study (2013) found that the majority of such activities are based in business subjects rather than in creative subjects such as Architecture. Furthermore, the all-party parliamentary group for micro-businesses report An Education System fit for an Entrepreneur (2014) recommended that Universities be encouraged and supported in embedding an enterprise education culture for all students.

Although this kind of approach is widely recognised now, when I began my interest in blurring the boundaries between academia and professional practice in the mid to late 1990s, the word “practice”, a focus on employability and “life beyond graduation” was frowned upon in Schools of Architecture which tended to have a trendy predominance of abstract theory and philosophy such as the De-constructivist movement. It has therefore been very rewarding that my agenda has become somewhat mainstream.

During my time as Programme Director and then Head of the Birmingham School of Architecture I led a number of initiatives that included a mandatory work placement in Level 5, live projects, staff consultancy (a pre-cursor to Knowledge Exchange), student teaching assistants, friends of the school scheme, a volunteer critic scheme, passport to practice, into work interviews, architectural synergies industry simulation project, knowledge exchange module with part time students, teaching practices, a Beyond Graduation programme for unemployed students, student led assessment weightings options linked to ownership, and a student engagement policy with the University’s Estates Department projects.

Keywords: Enterprise Education, Industry links, Knowledge Exchange, Employability, Entrepreneurship

Current role: Reader (Learning & Teaching)
A focus of my application was the use of innovative pedagogy to support health professionals to explore and manage their emotions. In the claim, I reflected on how I had used the arts, for example, poetry, to support emotional self-awareness development. This had led to the development of a website, Caring Words, which encourages health care students to share their experiences through reflective poetry writing.
Twitter id: @Heijinxs
HEA Fellowship page
Contact: k.jack@mmu.ac.uk

Dr Kirsten Jack is a Professor of Nursing Education at the Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care. She was awarded a UK Higher Education Academy (HEA) National Teaching Fellowship in 2014. She is Principal Fellow of the HEA and Fellow of the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (ISSOTL) and a Senior Fellow of the Staff and Educational Development Association (SFSEDA. Kirsten is the HPSC Faculty Lead for Interprofessional Education and is passionate about the personal and professional development of health and social care students. She has explored the use of the arts to support learning across several contexts, has published extensively on this subject and presented her research at national and international levels. Kirsten is the Northern Hub Lead for Sigma Nursing Society Phi Mu Chapter, an organisation focused on the development of nursing leadership. She is an active member of ISSOTL and sits on the Publications Committee as well as promoting the Fellows Scheme, to support colleagues to develop leadership in the scholarship of teaching and learning.

Keywords: Arts; Interprofessional Education; Leadership; Nursing