Feature article

What happens when AI writes the appeal

As students increasingly use generative AI to craft assessment appeals, university staff face new challenges in maintaining the integrity of academic feedback. Here’s how we can adapt to preserve meaningful learning relationships in the face of optimisation

Jonathan Boymal

RMIT University

Using comic format to make research more accessible

Comic literature can make research more inclusive and engaging for those outside academic circles. Learn how to plan and create your own

Chris Johnson

University of Chester

How to promote your book with confidence

Promoting your book or research paper requires different skills from those needed to produce it. Here’s everything you need to know

Elinor Potts

The London School of Economics and Political Science

Two teachers at the front of a class full of students

‘Here’s what not to do’: a participatory method to develop interview skills

See what happened when educators used role plays to dramatically demonstrate poor interview practice, encouraging students to analyse and suggest improvements

Multiple authors

The University of East Anglia

A practical guide to creating a linguistically inclusive classroom

Here’s how to embrace the cultural and linguistic perspectives of your students and prepare them to thrive in an interconnected world

Eilidh Singh, Amanda Wallace

Simon Fraser University

Artificial intelligence in the university library

AI skills for tomorrow’s university librarians

University librarians need to understand how to guide students and faculty in using AI tools ethically and effectively. In the future, they will be not only information experts but also AI facilitators. Yinlin Chen offers advice on laying the groundwork

Yinlin Chen

Virginia Tech

A group of students having a discussion in class

How to use think-pair-share to improve classroom discussions

Educators can modify the think-pair-share strategy to help students craft more detailed responses and take greater ownership of discussions. Learn how

Xingyi Ouyang

Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University

A student wears headphones while on a Zoom call

Why mattering matters in practice education and leadership placements

Make students feel they matter in non-clinical facing placements to create the authentic and compassionate leaders the healthcare sector of the future needs. Here’s how

Helen Carr

Canterbury Christ Church University

How partnerships with business are evolving to support student employability

‘Intrapreneurship’, interdisciplinary degree pathways, student-led projects and early engagement are all ways universities can move industry collaboration from partnership to co-building

Saurabh Sinha

University of Canterbury | Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha

The dos and don’ts of bite-sized social media content

Learn how to create honest and authentic content that showcases community and creates a sense of belonging – invaluable for both prospective and current students

Amy Edwards, Sarah Markillie

University of Chester

Build better doctors with programmatic assessment

Programmatic assessment offers a better way to train doctors, making them more resilient and giving them the tools to manage their own professional development. Gozie Offiah explains how it works

Gozie Offiah

RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences

Airport arrival sign with welcome in English, French and Italian

How to strengthen onboarding and integration for international scientific talent

Welcoming faculty from another country requires more than adding visa information to the domestic induction process. Joanna Daaboul shares how her institution helps international researchers settle into life in France

Joanna Daaboul

Université de Technologie de Compiègne

An academic conducting research on her laptop

How I use social media as a research tool

Drawing from her autoethnographic experiences, Bhawana Shrestha discusses how she uses social media platforms to deepen collaboration, enrich methodology and widen participation in research

Bhawana Shrestha

Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University

Students respectfully debate an issue in the classroom

Don’t fear conflict in the classroom: foster respectful discussion instead

How do we have meaningful conversations about divisive topics, while dealing with the emotions these debates may spark? Lea Sitkin outlines several strategies to give students the space to explore issues they care about

Lea Sitkin

University of Westminster

Students working as a group in the library

The library’s role in reducing the attainment gap

Read about strategies aimed at closing attainment gaps, such as peer mentoring, inclusive resources and academic skills training to support students

Multiple authors

Strategic silencing: how censorship is reshaping scholarly discourse

Restrictions to US databases and scholarly work mean that researchers need new approaches to navigate research absences and silences rather than the more typical information overload, writes Alison Hicks

Alison Hicks

UCL

A close-up of a hand painting on a canvas, a paint palette in the background

Use art to cultivate business students’ understanding of climate change

Find out how a transdisciplinary project using drawing and art deepens business students’ understanding of sustainability, inspiring them to become climate champions

Ryan Man

Hong Kong Baptist University

AI-proof project-based assessments by making them context-specific

Project-based assessments rooted in real-world, institution-specific contexts help reduce over-reliance on GenAI by emphasising collaboration, oral defence and critical thinking. Learn how to design one effectively

Oliver Jarvest , Ying Zhou, Simon Sheridan

Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University

Key terms you should know to advance net zero goals across the university

Achieving net zero on college campuses is an ambitious target, but with targeted strategies, universities can help their community integrate sustainability practices into campus language and experiences

Jennifer Chirico

Georgia Tech’s Center for 21st Century Universities

Use coaching to help students juggle the pressures of academic life

Academic expectations and personal responsibilities are crushing students’ mental health. Could coaching offer them a way to take control of their own learning?

Bavani Divo, May Lim

Singapore Institute of Technology

A logistics student working at her laptop

Active, applied and authentic learning: a model that builds skills and agency

Learn how the AAA model improved student engagement and learning outcomes in a logistics and supply chain programme, and how its principles apply across disciplines

Irfan Ul Haq , Hung Nguyen

RMIT University Vietnam

‘This is going to hurt’: taking the pain out of group assessment

Group assessment can be seen as unfair and unwieldy, but it also teaches essential skills such as teamwork and collaboration. We owe it to our students to frame it in a way that allows them to see its benefits

Sarah Sholl, Stephen Yorkstone

Edinburgh Napier University

Who’s the most sustainable? Get your students competing to be climate champions

Tap into your students’ interests and make climate action fun and competitive. Elliott Brown outlines how

Elliott Brown

Loughborough University

Workforce-ready, not left behind: inclusive work-based learning for sciences students

Many science students miss out on quality placements because of systemic barriers. Read five ways universities can embed equitable, work-based learning into non-accredited programmes and level the field

Shalinee Dhayal, Dominic Wiredu Boakye, Musarrat Maisha Reza

The University of Exeter

Different languages in speech bubbles on a laptop

International students don’t need ‘fixing’

To internationalise education, and not just enrolments, educators need to move feedback on academic language from correction to collaboration. Here Nashid Nigar offers a framework for rethinking inclusion through literacy diversity

Nashid Nigar

University of Melbourne

Two employees consider a screen filled with data

Let’s give students the skills to succeed in multiple careers, not just one job

The future is unpredictable. So instead of trying to future-proof our students’ degrees, let’s future-proof their mindset

Deborah Bartlett

Al Akhawayn University

How we use GenAI and AR to improve students’ design skills

Guidance on using generative AI and augmented reality to enhance student creativity, spatial awareness and interdisciplinary collaboration

Multiple authors

Tecnológico de Monterrey, El Bosque University, San Sebastián University

University professor teaching with laptop

Flip-Zoom-open: how Covid and AI transformed my classroom

Maybe the uncertainty of the pandemic resulted in a few positives to university teaching? Here, Perry Binder reflects on lockdown’s seismic shifts

Perry Binder

Georgia State University

Three ways to address students’ climate anxiety

While higher education has made progress with greener campuses and remote working, providing students with an education that can respond to the climate crisis will be more challenging. Here’s how educators can tackle climate anxiety

Rob Amos

Birkbeck, University of London

Students walking through campus laughing

Use welcome workshops to build student belonging

A guide to creating induction workshops in collaboration with students – with practical tips on building student confidence and trust

Sarah Hadlow

Image of a globe surrounded by the 17 SDG symbols

The need for integrated thinking at universities: from Covid-19 to the SDGs

A joined-up approach between universities, public services and businesses – as successfully demonstrated during the pandemic – is now needed if institutions are to accelerate efforts towards the Sustainable Development Goals

Abeer Hassan

University of the West of Scotland

The economics of belonging: a new way of thinking about student success

Rising costs of living and tuition mean that US university students may prioritise career and economic factors rather than self-actualisation as a reason to remain at a university

Richard Tomczak

Stony Brook University

Build belonging, with or without a centralised campus

How can young universities foster a sense of belonging in their students, given they may be operating across several different campuses? Here are some of the ways you can create community

Asmidah Ong, Darren Tan, Duane Ong

Singapore Institute of Technology

A student with a guitar surrounded by others smiling

Make your Freshers’ Week activities sing

Songwriting sessions, treasure hunts and biscuit decorating are among the creative Freshers’ Week activities that help students build self-confidence, connect with others and ease the transition to university life

Helen Eadon-Sinkinson

University of Chester

University libraries’ modern role in supporting faculty and graduate research

When research is increasingly computational, interdisciplinary and comprised of multi-institutional teams who frequently collaborate virtually, university libraries must keep pace to support faculty and graduate students, as Tyler Walters explains

Tyler Walters

Virginia Tech

A woman holds her head in her hands over a laptop screen

Be aware of the invisible baggage of poverty your students carry

We need to acknowledge the realities of poverty and inequality, and the trauma it leaves our students with. Here are six principles to make higher education more inclusive

Jordan Donnelly

University of the West of Scotland

Engagement isn’t a trade-off – it’s a path to stronger research

REF 2021 placed more emphasis on impact and engagement, meaning we must no longer rely on our research to speak for itself. Read how to engage with those beyond academia to ensure your work has a greater impact on society

Florian Bauer , Raffaello Rossi

The University of Bristol

Find the hero energy in the story of your research

Want to connect with funders, the media, the public or policymakers? Start by thinking like a storyteller

Erin O’Dwyer

Good Prose Studios, University of Sydney

Students and a teacher having a discussion in the classroom

Teaching your first course? Follow these steps

Just landed your first adjunct teaching role and don’t know where to start? Here’s how to make the most of your strengths, design a clear syllabus and deliver engaging, manageable sessions

Daniel Martínez, Robert Sanford

Independent academic

A finger follows text in a book written in question marks

How to support students with dyslexia in your teaching

Students dealing with dyslexia and other specific learning difficulties may struggle in the classroom more than their peers. With their number increasing, here’s how to give them the space they need to learn

María Catalina Bolaños Dubos

Universidad Austral

Run your lab more smoothly by centralising chemicals management

A simple change reduced our lab waste by a tenth. Find out how you can do it too

Mohd Fatimie Irzaq Khamis

Universiti Teknologi Petronas (UTP)

Bluetooth for better health: using tech to support student well-being

Students can self-regulate their learning and improve their well-being by spending less time at their desks and more time moving – thanks to Bluetooth headsets

Michelle Civile, Julie Pepper

The University of Exeter

Prometheus concept of technological innovation

Cultivating a responsible innovation mindset among future tech leaders

The classroom is a perfect place to discuss the messy, real-world consequences of technological discoveries, writes Andreas Alexiou. Beyond ‘How?’, students should be asking ‘Should we…?’ and ‘What if…?’ questions around ethics and responsibility

Andreas Alexiou

University of Southampton

Are we overlooking the power of autonomy when it comes to motivating students?

Educators fear giving students too much choice in their learning will see them making the wrong decisions. But structuring choice without dictating the answers could be the way forward

Danny Oppenheimer

Carnegie Mellon University

Two film students working on a project together

Use peer assessment to give students more accountability in group projects

Structured peer assessment can significantly improve student engagement and accountability in group work. Read about two methods that led film students to produce better-quality work

Qian Zhuang

Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University

How can higher education better support international students with disabilities?

Institutions need to work harder to understand international students with disabilities’ needs and challenges, and put in place more obvious and intentional communication with them

Carol Evans, Maurie van den Heever, Ralph E. McKinney

University of Salford, GoodX Software, Marshall University

Tackling accent bias: the ‘last acceptable form of discrimination’

Accent bias undermines Black international students’ confidence and belonging in UK universities. Institutions must tackle this exclusion through awareness, training, and a proactive celebration of linguistic diversity

Patrice Seuwou

University of Northampton

A happy group of students pose on a flight of steps

Three strategies to build student belonging from the start of their academic journey

Many students struggle with the jump from school to university life. Here are three ways to help them hit the ground running

Siu Yau Lee

Hong Kong Baptist University

Exterior of the Newman Library at Virginia Tech

How to put joy at the centre of the university library

The role of the university library is poised for re-evaluation – not just as an academic hub but as a space where connection, belonging and access can come alive in everyday ways. Pro tip: cake and dogs help. Kayla McNabb explains

Kayla McNabb

Virginia Tech

Seven questions to ask when reforming academic skills services

With academic skills services facing a perfect storm of challenges, many are under review. Here’s how to make sure your students’ needs are being effectively met, through seven questions

Steve Briggs, Ralitsa Kantcheva

University of Bedfordshire

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