Clare Power

Peer facilitated learning in mathematics for engineering : a case study from an Australian university

Abstract The purpose of this case study is to discuss the effectiveness of peer assisted learning as an engagement strategy for first year engineering students. Studies have shown that engagement is critical to student success in higher education and that it requires a multifaceted approach that recognises the diverse needs of contemporary heterogeneous cohorts. By using the case study of a peer facilitator in a Mathematics for Engineers unit at an Australian University we hope to provide some insights into the Peer Assisted Study Session (PASS) model of student engagement and learning support. PASS is the nomenclature commonly used in Australia for Supplemental Instruction; a peer facilitated learning model that has been shown to improve students’ academic performance as well as assisting in their transition to the university environment. The authors are the coordinator of the PASS programme and a student facilitator from an Australian university. Kiyomi Dunphy, the student facilitator, provides insight into her experience of running weekly study sessions for students and this is supplemented with comments from the programme attendees. Rather than focusing on quantitative data, we have taken a qualitative approach, with the intention of explicating the model as it operates in our particular context.

Equity Buddie s: Building Communities of Practice to Support the Transition and Retention of Students Through Their First Year at University

While in the past, students entering universities tended to come from privileged backgrounds, the expansion of opportunities to enter higher education over the past two decades has led to the inclusion of increasing proportions of students from diverse socio-cultural backgrounds. Students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds or who are first in family to attend university often require additional support as they transition into university to build their academic and institutional knowledge. Peer mentoring programs are one initiative introduced in universities to support the transition and retention of first year students, including those from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds or first in family. This chapter discusses the peer mentoring program Equity Buddies Support Network developed at the University of Western Sydney, School of Education as a community of practice designed to support the transition and retention of first year students. It begins with a brief description of the Equity Buddies Support Network, followed by a discussion of how its design incorporated the features of a community of practice. It presents both the formal and informal learning that took place within the Equity Buddies communities of practice finishing with a reflection on Equity Buddies as a community of practice. It also makes connections between the practices of this networked community and the development of students’ cultural capital, in particular institutional capital.

On the Thresholds of Legitimacy: A Collaborative Exploration of Being and Becoming Academic

This chapter uses a collective biography methodology to explore threshold moments of academic legitimacy. They demonstrate the precarious processes and liminal spaces of being and becoming ‘academic’. We examine how the well-documented practices that characterise the corporate/managerial/enterprise university frame the experiences of women aspiring to work in the sector and the affective and embodied ramifications of such practices as casualisation, contractualism, and competition between intellectual workers. Informed by work on academic subjectivities in contemporary universities (e.g. Bansel, Studies in Higher Education, 36(5), 543–556, 2011; Mewburn, Studies in Continuing Education, 33(3), 321–332, 2011; Petersen and Davies, Learning and Teaching, 3(2), 92–109, 2010; Petersen, Studies in Higher Education, 32(4), 475–487, 2007; Petersen, Educational Philosophy and Theory, 40(3), 394–406, 2008), and specifically on analyses of women’s experiences (e.g. Clegg, Privilege, agency and affect: Understanding the production and effects of action. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013; David, Feminism, gender and universities: Politics, passion and pedagogies. Farnham, UK: Ashgate, 2014; Leathwood and Read, Gender and the changing face of higher education: A feminized future? Maidenhead, UK: Open University Press, 2009; Wilson et al., Gender and Education, 22(5), 535–545, 2010), we explore ambivalence, desire, disappointment, and at times joy in our experiences of securing PhDs and seeking work in universities. We argue that for early career and aspiring academics, becoming ‘academic’ is a precarious, contingent process where legitimacy is always provisional and reliant on conferral from those who are powerfully positioned in and beyond the institution of the academy.

A Facilitated Community of Practice: Enabling Student Success in the Blended Learning Environment

This chapter explains the implementation, facilitation and experiences of a community of practice; video-based Peer Assisted Study Sessions (vPASS), which utilised recorded lectures and collaborative learning methodologies for at-risk undergraduate students studying Mathematics for Engineers. Students who had previously failed this core subject, were invited to enrol in the vPASS mode of Mathematics for Engineers which provided a facilitated, small group learning environment. They found significant benefits in the experiences of learning together and supporting each other’s learning trajectory through the challenging content. We consider vPASS through the lenses of ‘mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire’ which Wenger describes as processes that contribute to communities of practice (Wenger in Social learning systems and communities of practice. Springer and the Open University, Milton Keynes, pp 179–197, 2010b, p. 72). Although this program was based in a particular subject, the principles and approaches which underlie vPASS are transferable to other discipline areas. Transforming the experience of learning from a lecture into a social meaning making activity provides students with life-long learning skills; a graduate attribute of many institutions. It can also enable students to take greater responsibility for their learning as their motivation increases and they develop effective study strategies.