FILTA funded projects 2009-10
- The following 4 applications were successful.
A St Andrews iGEM Team: Enhancing Student Research, Employability and Leadership Through Involvement in an International Synthetic Biology Competition
Biology: V Anne Smith and Computer Science: Juliana Bowles and Biology/Chemistry: John Mitchell and Physics & Astronomy: Chris Hooley
Amount Awarded: £4000
The aim of this project is to support the development of a St Andrews student team to enter the 2010 International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition. iGEM is an annual event held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, MA, USA. Teams of undergraduates from universities around the world undertake 10-week summer projects in synthetic biology, and then gather at a "Jamboree" to present their results and compete for prizes (overall and in subject areas). Synthetic biology uses standardised biological parts to design circuits within living cells (usually bacteria or yeast) that perform desired functions (eg metabolism of a desired compound). Student projects can range from purely theoretical (eg building models of expected behaviour of designed circuits) to lab-based creation of synthetically engineered organisms.
Teams from other Scottish universities have attended iGEM since 2006, and the Scottish Universities Life Sciences Alliance has identified student iGEM teams as a priority for developing strength in synthetic biology and interdisciplinary training. Students on a multi-disciplinary St Andrews team will benefit from experience of cutting-edge research and enhance their organisational, leadership and presentation skills. The total cost of sending a St Andrews student team to iGEM will be significant and funds will be sought from various sources (eg Wellcome, SULSA). The FILTA funding will serve as "seed money" for such things as an advertising campaign, cost to bring in a previous team to promote the initiative, team registration fees, etc.
Demiurge: A Toolkit for Creating Virtual Worlds for Education
Computer Science: Alan Miller, Colin Allison, Ross Nicoll, Lisa Dow, Andrew Halkett, Iain Oliver, Indika Perera
Amount Awarded: £2500
This project aims to develop a toolkit (Demiurge) that will help staff to create educational content within an open-source 3D virtual world, thereby supporting innovative approaches to learning and teaching. Virtual worlds can provide an immersive, interactive learning environment which supports collaboration, exploration and communication. However, there are disadvantages to using commercial providers of virtual worlds, such as Second Life, for educational purposes: eg the cost of purchasing "land", lack of control over server downtime, lack of complete control over the educational environment, remote hosting of content, etc
The toolkit will enable users to download an "OpenSim sandbox" on their own computer, enabling them to create virtual worlds for their students over which they have complete control, and which are free of charge. The toolkit will include a suite of resources including ready-made content building blocks, support for presenting educational content (eg Powerpoints), course management tools (eg assessment and feedback, group work) and user guides.
Acquisition of Knowledge Through Dissemination: The Creation of Podcasts Within Music Education
Music Centre (Philosophical, Anthropological & Film Studies): Jonathan Kemp, Michael Downes
Amount Awarded: £2008
The aim of this project is to get students to engage more deeply with the lecture content by getting them to create podcasts for the use of their peers. When students are asked to explain a subject to others it acts as incentive to learn the material in greater depth. Students will work in pairs to record and distribute podcasts based on their discussions of various historically significant instruments. The podcasts will include sound files of the instruments interspresed with discussion by the students. The award will enable the purchase of software or hardware emulations of the electronic musical instruments in question. This initiative will provide students with a range of learning experiences, including hands-on experience of recording and editing, detailed knowledge of key instruments and practice developing an academic style of discussion and presentation. The podcasts will be stored in WebCT to create a lasting, shared resource for the use of all students on the course.
Audio Enhancement of Distance Learning Materials for Professional Staff (Postgraduate Certificate/Diploma/Masters in Adults Support, Protection and Safeguarding)
Psychology: Martin Campbell, Brian Kirk, James Hogg and Admissions: Rona Mackenzie
Amount Awarded: £1267
The aim of this project is to develop high-quality audio files to enhance Powerpoint presentations in a new distance learning programme. The new postgraduate programme "Adults Support, Protection and Safeguarding" is designed to provide professional carers with an understanding of the core elements of the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act. Providing the programme in distance learning mode makes it more accessible to the target audience, who might otherwise be excluded due to the demands of their employment. However, distance learning can be particularly challenging, hence the aim of enhancing the online materials with audio content in order to provide the best possible learning experience for students. The quality of the curriculum materials is the main determinant of how students view the quality of a distance learning course.