Minutes 27/3/2019
Note taker – Laerke
Apologies: Ruairidh, Ollie, Gaby
Agenda:
Group feedback
Timetabling for next year’s course
Reviewing our commitments for this course
Forming the final reflections – questions for ourselves
Proposal for next year
What to do next week
Minutes
Group feedback:
- Education: Workshop 2/5/19, 15-18 (approx.)
- Invite people: occupation’s fb, Eventbrite, uni page, publicity among staff, invite people considering course for next year (email via sps)
- Permaculture: Making a zine as a tool for a potential workshop, date TBC start/mid-May
- Digital version will be available online (issu)
- University Series in June – possibility
- Bureaucracy: Summary of points about casualization of tutors, leaflets (?) , table outside library in mid-May, date TBC
Timetabling:
- University wants us to move it away from Wednesday afternoon because of sports
- Extend to three hours
- Split into two sections of 1,5 hours? Or 1 hour + 2 hours for different activities
- Will make it more connected
- Not quite as long that way, if we make it 3 hours
- Difficult to fit into timetable for a whole year
- How will it affect attendance?
- Suggestion: keep two hours every Wednesday and add another hour
- Use of extra hour: reading? Group projects? Up to next year
- Already have more contact hours than usual
- 3 hours make it more relaxed, have break in the middle, be more focused
- We shouldn’t be scared to ask people to make a commitment to come at multiple times in a week
- Difficult to timetable three hours
- In the evening? Does this de-legitimize the course?
- No longer only a pre-honours course, means we don’t have to take into account course as extra-curricular
- No consensus; discussion:
- Two slots would allow us all to meet more often, makes it continuous
- Three hours is a lot to stay concentrated, negotiating people’s opinions
- Suggestion: have a 3 hour slot + 1 extra optional hour for socializing
- Consensus: Try a three hour slot, but inform next year’s course of this discussion and allow them to make a choice.
- They can always book a room for an hour in addition to the three hour slot
- Timetabling: 2-5 Wednesday
Reviewing commitments:
- Reading out from commitments drafted November 14, 2018
- Points 2 and 3 we did not do (failed as a group)
- Point 2: do we want to do a second reflection
- Based on a set of questions we decide upon as a group
- Have an opportunity to make it clear that reviewing them is a part of the pass/fail mark in the second reflection
- We have agreed on this and should do it
- New reviewer/reviewee picked 3rd April
- Deadline for marks: 26th of April, everything done by mid-May
- Consensus: Deadline 26th April for reflection midnight, Deadline 10th May for peer review midnight, including reflections and peer-review not done for semester 1
- If a student cannot review a reflection because it is not done by the other student, they can freely pick another one to review to reach 4 total reviews
- How to pass this course:
- Are reflections enough?
- How do we determine participation outside of reflections?
- Proposal: Reflections (2) and reviews (4) need to be done to pass
- Consensus: decided
- Practicalities of passing:
- Send an email with your reflections (2) and reviews (4) to Sophia Woodman by 10th May
- How to review
- Ask questions that arise
- What did it make you think of – a conversation
- A personal response
- Following learning outcomes
- Will be posted online
- Don’t all have to be in reflections, but can help in shaping feedback
- Point out what you didn’t understand
BREAK – 5 min
Forming the final reflections – questions for ourselves:
- A list of questions generated in this session that people can focus their reflection on and that can be passed unto the course next year
- What activities did you learn most from and why?
- What activities did you most value and why?
- Did you use the course resource list?
- How could more reading have facilitated the course activities?
- Did we hold ourselves accountable to our commitments – why, why not? What are the implications of having commitments?
- Reflect on the group dynamics – how does community-formation fit into this?
- Focus on what we did do rather than what we didn’t
- How did your experience of the course fit into what you have read about alternative education?
- How does this course fit into your larger university experience?
- Compare the course to other courses
- Reflect on the course in relation to horizontal structures, such as relationships between students and tutors
- Reflect on structure and autonomy within the course
- How do we learn without reading? Can we?
- Explain your understanding of the topics of the course
- Why was this course perceived as different to our other academic work?
- Explore our structure of decision making – how do you feel about it now that you have seen consensus decision making in action?
- Explore theory vs research
- Reflection on the future of our university
- Include a section on what the implications of these are for next year’s course
Proposal for next year:
- Review of a write-up of proposal for next year’s course
- Addition: Planning sessions + facilitating as part of participation
- May not be accepted by board
- Problematic to get 65 mark automatically by participation
Planning for the final week:
- Meet at 18 Buccleuch Place 3F2 (will send email)
- Be ACTIVE & FUN!
- A social afterwards (movie + tea and coffee + potluck)
- Will need to decide on publicity of website
- Everybody prepare 5 minutes of something: an activity, performance, reading, jumping jacks
