Using a sustainability focused, co-created engineering assessment as a vehicle for staff development

Sustainable Engineering is a key enabler in the transition to achieving global netzero. At postgraduate level, the Engineering Department at Teesside University explores this topic via an innovative module delivered to a large (300+) cohort of engineering students from a range of sub-disciplines. This presentation describes how experiences on this module have led to the creation of a unique staff development opportunity that addresses a range of academic practices.
Within the module, new and early career staff support an experienced core team during a Group Learning Activity where students collaborate on a formative assessment that scaffolds the subsequent creation of an individual summative assessment. During this exercise staff facilitate the completion of the formative assessment and discuss the students’ unique and self-selected summative assessment topics, which often relate to sustainability issues in their home regions. This dialogic approach improves student engagement and affords staff with greater context when marking. It also offers staff exposure to classroom management techniques, digital tools and assessment and feedback practices, with additional opportunities for discipline-specific knowledge enhancement and peer observation. In this presentation we will reflect on two years of module delivery and propose a formalised in-module staff development plan that can be adapted to other scenarios.