The last three months will have passed in a blur of exams and marking, with more to come! Hopefully our programme of events, including the Journal Club and L&T seminars, will have provided added stimulation and created some food for thought for you.

We have been continuing to forge links with key units in the wider University that will benefit L&T staff in the Faculty as a whole. In May we held a joint event with ECLS, CfLaT and the T&L in HE Research Group. This was a ‘Pecha Kucha’ Research Sharing Event and it was very well attended by Faculty staff. I have met with staff in the Learning and Teaching Development Service, looking at ways we can work together to support staff here in the Faculty. They have a wealth of experience and contacts we can tap into in terms of guest speakers and training opportunities. The ECLS research tea for students completing the ‘Thinking Critically about Research Methodology’ (EDU8207) has prompted two new initiatives. Firstly, with the support of Anna Reid, module leader, we are exploring the opportunity for FMS staff acting as co-supervisors on future student projects. Secondly, we will be promoting to Heads of Schools the opportunity for their T&L staff to sign up to do EDU8207 as a stand-alone module that will enhance their portfolio of skills. If you are interested in either of these do get in touch with me.

We have also been digesting and acting on ideas from our Launch event.  We now have a blog! https://blogs.ncl.ac.uk/erdp/. This is open to the world so please do circulate the link to contacts outside of the University. The blog will include all of our newsletter articles so it should be a good way to start spreading the good work we’re doing here in Newcastle. We’re pulling together seminars for the autumn which will include one covering the ever tricky topic of ‘ethics’ and one that will be presented by Dr Hamish Macleod from Edinburgh University, both ideas prompted by the Launch event.

I’m very pleased to announce that the Faculty will be funding staff through a new round of EQUATE. EQUATE sets out to share research and knowledge about T&L and apply that research and knowledge to a range of action research projects. The plan is that this round will include a ‘writing day’ with the intention that staff will not only get accreditation within existing frameworks at Master’s and Doctoral level, they will produce a publishable paper.

I hope you enjoy the newsletter.  There’s a lot of innovative project work and good news to read about.  If you have articles for the next issue due in September just send them through to  fms.educational.research@newcastle.ac.uk.

Professor Steve McHanwell, Director FMS Unit for ERDP