''Very good way to

communicate with

second/first year

students.''

''I would recommend

to organise again as

it brings confidence

out in people.''

''It was fun and provided an ex-

cellent opportunity to practice

networking skills in a profes-

sional context.

''I thought it was a good

idea to talk to final year

students as experi-

ence.''

''Very good, inter-

esting experience,

good for networking'' Feedback/

Comments

Speed

Networking

Improving the transition between levels through

student exchanges at a speed networking event

Authors: Frances Chatwin (VM project assistant) and Andy Hirst

(Course leader BICT, ITM and ITwBS)

Courses

Business and

ICT

IT with Business

Studies IT

Management

160 first and final year

students

Preparations for the Speed-Networking

Evening started long before the 26th of Feb-

ruary 2014, with the production of floor lay-

outs, hand-outs and timing schedules. All of

these documents were created to ensure that

the students could easily network and sub-

contract their projects successfully.

The floor layout (left) showed how the rooms

were set out. The final year students sat at

their tables, whilst the first year students

moved round the room to each of the groups.

Once the process had finished, and if the first

year students had successfully sold them-

selves, they were then recruited to complete

a sub-task for the final year students.

INSPIR!NG STUDENTS

External Projects supplied

by The Long well Walk;

Unifood solutions ltd;SHU; Nutribox;

Tiny Tiny Ent; FETN; Redhill Associates; Bike

Rehab; ITIL; CSER; Pixibot; HEPP; Selecta;

SMM; Baby Bright Eyes

Background

Reducing drop-out rates and encourage student assimilation into uni-

versity life is key to the university's retention strategy. As student debt

rises SHU must do more to ensure that students starting courses also

gain the full benefit. One way to support the transition through the

levels is by demystifying and enabling peers to share their own experi-

ences of the course. This poster seeks to demonstrate the usefulness of

a business speed networking event to support these exchanges.

Final year students have first hand experience of teaching and assess-

ment, understand better how to prioritise their work loads and can

empathise with younger students. Therefore enabling and encouraging

dialogue between these students is important to supporting the transi-

tion between levels. Speed networking is a way to support this dia-

logue. Speed networking originally derived from speed dating, encour-

ages interactions that otherwise would be difficult to achieve, between

different people within a short time period.

Initially the speed networking activity was purely an enterprise activity

that supported inter-trading between different groups of students.

However an unintended consequence was the transference of tacit

knowledge about student life between level 4 and level 6. The poster

hopes to highlight the effectiveness that activities like this have in ena-

bling final year and first year students to actively engage in the learning

process together; build closer ties to the course; and structures an ex-

change that improves the transition between levels.

Example of a Project Brief