Solutions Manual

For

Cambridge Academic Performance

About the hold ups

HOLD-UPs are creativity workshops during which 10 to 15

SenseMakers gather to solve the challenge of a social

entrepreneur.

They are organized by members of MakeSense, a

worldwide community of 15 000 volunteers in 86 cities

around the globe,. They give their time & skills to help

Social Entrepreneurs have a better impact by finding

solutions to their problems.

Post your challenge on www.makesense.org, or choose the

one you would like to solve!

This manual includes the solutions imagined by the participants to the hold up done together.

Day of the hold up: 24/01/2015 Location of the hold up: CB2, Cambridge Person who facilitated it: Helene Bourgeois/ Elodie

Draperi

Challenge: To design tools for a market research.

Objectives:- Finding the way to reach out Cambridge students (highschool or college)- Designing accessible tools for students.- Relevant content for the market research.

Constraints:- Filling the survey shouldn't be longer than 5 minutes- We need to reach out at least 200 people in Cambridge within one month- It has to be online

about the entrepreneur: For the past ten years Liz has worked in the NHS as an Occupational Therapist. Her focus has been within the psychiatric service supporting people when they are experiencing difficulties with their mental health.

Her specialism has become working with and supporting students to complete their studies successfully. Prior to the NHS, she worked for seven years within a Buddhist Business. She saw how effective ethical business practice is and developed her own conviction to work ethically, which has underpinned her career ever since.

As a child she lived in many countries attending different schools. She understand the experience of studying away from home and country. She completed her O' Levels whilst weekly boarding and her A' Levels as a full time boarder away from her family.

She completed her first Degree whilst living at University. She completed a Diploma in Noise and Acoustics for Manchester Environmental Health Services whilst working full-time. Most recently, she completed the fast track, two-year Degree in Occupational Therapy at Colchester whilst living in Cambridge. Studying under such varying conditions has given her a very real interest and insight into the issues that face students.

During her last Degree her partner became very ill. She learned to be realistic and pragmatic in order to complete her studies. She used the skills she was learning on her course to support her own health and performance. These experiences have founded her approach now, when working with students.

She began very early on to look at the process of study and to explore how to be most efficient under stressful conditions. This is why she have set up Cambridge Academic Performance. It is based on Occupational Therapy principles, personal experience and ethical business practice.

the challenge: We know that up to 29% of students show signs of clinical

distress. One in five then experience distress but most shun college and university counselling services (up to 80% NUS Silently Stressed Survey). We know that many go online for help. But what are they looking for? How do they frame the question? In this way our service can start to address their needs more directly.

the concept solutionsLiz’s outcomes will be a questionnaire. She wants to find

out the tool she could use and the questions she should ask.

Entrepreneur& Challenge

About Cambridge Academic PerformanceOur mission is to support students to enable them to achieve their full

potential and succeed in their studies and in their lives. We wish to capture the 80% off students who, whilst feeling distressed and struggling, will not go to see a professional because of the stigma around mental health. Students’ mental health issues are on the rise. An overwhelming 80% are unwilling to approach support services in their institution for fear of stigmatisation. Cambridge Academic Performance is an independent, not for profit, completely confidential professional performance coaching service. Blending coaching, supervision, mentoring and therapy, Cambridge Academic Performance’s approach is tailored and targeted. Removing the stigma associated with counselling, we believe this model sets up students (and their subsequent employers) to sustain success.

Liz Parker is the entrepreneur for this project. Contact her by mail:

liz@camperformance.co.uk

45 min x10 concepts

Solutions

1. Key words + Website organisation Key words:- « achieving goals »-« self-confidence »-« improving performance »-« help with study »-« exam stress »

Even if students would have typed different words, they would all arrive on Liz’s Website where they would be able to hear short videos of people speaking about their experience with Liz or to fill a short questionnaire.It would be a way to get them into Liz’s work and centralize information about students.

Achieving academic/

personal goals - survey

When students are struggling

in their academic life they’re looking on line => We have to find out what are the keywords they’re using.

2. “3 words for…” A tool designed to find out which are the worlds used by students and motivate them to fill the questionnaire.

When you’re arriving on Cambridge Academic Performance website you’ll have to tick if you’re a student, a parent or a professional. In order to answer different questions.

Information about “How long is it?”/ “What’s for?”/ “How to do it?” 

Liz can publicise on her Website some incentive like “Improve your academic performance with a free trial : Webinar/ Seminar: self-development/ stress”

“This is relevant to your friends!”Questions:-Can you write 3 words you think about “success”/ “exams”/ “trouble”/ “problem”?-What would be your difficulties with academic performance?-What symptoms do you have when you’re experimenting difficulties?- Where would you look for information if you have some difficulties?

Well done. Thank you for your contribution!

Before the survey, we have to catch students vocabulary:-> we can go in places where students are talking together in order to find out which worlds they’re using, which problems they’re facing. -> Asking to the current students, how did they find Liz and what would they answer to these questions. Asking them what is their vocabulary.

-> Instead of asking a question with different options of answers, they would have to do the research while filling the survey in order to have the real answers (not the one they think they will do). For instance: “If you feel stress, what would you look for in Internet. Copy and paste the first Website link appearing below.”-> Liz can create something like a focus group as well (on Facebook for example) where she could ask people if the questions she found are correct. “I need to know how would you phrase…” -> http://www.usertesting.com/ is a Website to get videos of real people speaking their thoughts as they use your website or mobile app., to go beyond analytics and understand why users do what they do. It gives you an insight to someone’s mind.What would you like to do a survey?-> Use a very open language. Confirm/ deny terminology-> Use # and tweet. For instance, we can tweet and ask students what are the top 10 terms for academic performance.

3. Some tools to take a picture of students minds