The Learning Enhancement team provides learning and teaching support for staff across the university, including learning design and educational media services. A key focus for our team is supporting online learning, and we work closely with the learning and teaching teams in each faculty/office to support staff in utilising iLearn and all of Macquarie’s learning technologies. The team also supports projects that enhance the online learning experience at Macquarie.
The team includes:
- Amanda Parker – Learning Enhancement Manager
- Nathan Sollars – Educational Media Producer
- Alper Yuceozsoy – Learning Designer
- Fiona Hird – Educational Design Support Officer
- Marco Reyes – Educational Design Support Officer
In 2021, we are focusing on improving key areas identified in student feedback (that was received last year) about their online learning experience at MQ. Students are telling us very loudly that they want consistency across their iLearn units, and have difficulty finding important learning material and assessment information. This has led to the development of two projects, a set of MQ Online Learning Standards and a standardised iLearn template (that will be used University-wide). We are working closely with students as partners on this and they are contributing some brilliant ideas and keeping us in check! Our goal for these projects is to provide straightforward guidance for teaching staff in designing their iLearn units and increasing efficiencies by automating some of this content with an iLearn template. Ultimately, we want to achieve a consistently high-quality learning experience for our students in line with the Operating Plan priority of Students First.
The learning and teaching organisational restructure meant our team was reduced and split in half. Our technical staff moved to IT but we will continue to work very closely with them to ensure learning technologies supports the needs of students at Macquarie. This close relationship became apparent when we coordinated the University’s learning and teaching response to COVID-19. We worked very closely with staff from faculties and other areas of the University to ensure a coordinated approach in assisting teaching staff to design and adapt their teaching for the online environment.
With our manager Amanda Parker being an Ultimate Frisbee veteran – she’s introduced the team to the exhilarating world of Ultimate. Since then, our team play the occasional friendly (leading to competitive) games of Ultimate Frisbee to let off steam. Losing a game would be embarrassing enough!
The Learning Enhancement team can be contacted via their manager, Amanda, amanda.parker@mq.edu.au
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