Jisc case studies wiki Case studies / University of Gloucestershire - CeAL
  • If you are citizen of an European Union member nation, you may not use this service unless you are at least 16 years old.

  • You already know Dokkio is an AI-powered assistant to organize & manage your digital files & messages. Very soon, Dokkio will support Outlook as well as One Drive. Check it out today!

View
 

University of Gloucestershire - CeAL

Centre for Active Learning (CeAL) CETL, Cheltenham

 

Background & Context

 

Type of Project

 

The main element was a new building but there was also a refurbishment of part of the Victorian campus running concurrently.

 

Start and End Dates

 

CETL Bid April 2004, second stage October 2004, won award in January 2005 (demolition began Summer 2005), new building opened in September 2006.

 

Case Study tags: learning spaces, new build, university of gloucestershire, south-west englandhigher education

 

What was the context of the development?

 

The whole building was underpinned by a particular pedagogic philosophy. The CETL wanted a building which fostered active styles of learning with some ICT support, in particular collaborative styles of learning with the students and the tutor learning together and groups of students learning together. The Higher Education Funding Council produced a booklet called Social Learning Spaces and this concept started to be termed 'Social Learning' i.e. students learning in a rather more informal style.

 

Where other projects may have been centrally driven by Library Services or equivalent, the CETL planning came principally out of an academic department, the School of Environment.

 

There are many principles behind the pedagogy including flexibility, collaboration and international contacts.

The main pedagogic principles are about active styles of learning, collaboration between staff and students and between students and students, and increasingly amongst staff.

 

Pedagogic excellence and experimentation are the initial principles, these being the focus of Centres of Excellence in Teaching and Learning. It is an exploration, an experimentation with teaching, spreading and facilitating good practice that was already there.

 

There are a number of additional elements in the background. The University has had an explicit commitment to sustainable development since the early 1990s and all new buildings have been designed to very high environmental standards in terms of energy efficiency, water use, heating, lighting and cooling, that kind of thing. There are very high levels of insulation and mostly part-passive ventilation. There is some forced ventilation in the building as it is often inconvenient to open some windows due to local road noises. There is no air conditioning in the building; warm and cool air is circulated and the building is 'intelligent' in that it monitors room temperatures, adjusting accordingly. The building uses part natural materials using local stone from the Cotswolds, wood from sustainable sources, there is also glass and steel inside. The copper cladding on the outside is part-recycled and is being evaluated for BREEAM (Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method) currently. University landscaping students are involved in developing the grounds including the use of plants that will be used for teaching in Biology. The students have also been putting up bird, bat and bee boxes. Those are important on sustainability grounds and the fact that the students are deciding on the locations is part of their active learning. The students get up ladders with hammers!

 

The former School of Environment, which is the area from which the CETL grew, had quite a track record in writing good practice guidance for HEFCE about how to support disabled students in their studies and this was guidance was followed in the planning stages. Disabled users and potential users were consulted and the building was designed to be very accessible (including automatic doors throughout) to mobility impaired, blind and deaf students for instance.

 

What happens in the space?

 

The Centre for Active Learning building is wireless networked, multi-purposed and themed on each floor. Designed on three levels, the building advertises tolerance to food, drink and mobile phone use.

The ground floor is very informal. This is an open drop-in space with a variety of comfortable furniture styles for group work and with some standing access at 12 computers for quick access to email and the web plus 6 desktop PCs designed for group activity. There are spaces with higher level tables and plasma screens. Vending machines supply hot and cold drinks and snacks. The first floor is similar in its design and use of comfortable furnishings and can be used for drop-in sessions but can also be configured into a classroom. There are offices for post graduate students involved in research into this approach to teaching and learning. This space is also shared with an audio typist assisting with research work, and with visiting scholars.

 

The top floor becomes more formal again; it is in boardroom format with a large oval table for use by classes for student presentations, employer or professional body visits and video conferencing.

The whole campus is Grade II listed and so there were restrictions particularly relating to the external appearance of any new buildings. It is a High Victorian 'Gothic' Cotswold limestone, ivy-clad, quadrangled campus so care had to be taken in relation to applications for planning permission. Local planners need to agree, and there was a consultation exercise where other peoples' opinions were sought. The new building sits on the footprint of a now-demolished flat roofed 1960's annexe. The planners said they were not keen on a pastiche of the existing historic buildings, but they wanted something that was sympathetic to the existing structures and existing mature trees. The new building is built partly of the same materials, with mimicking shapes (steeply pitched roof, 'towers') but part of it is constructed in new materials. The ground floor is locally-sourced Cotswold limestone, and the top two floors are clad in pre-patinated copper - it is quite striking.

 

Also, the University of Gloucestershire is highly committed to sustainability and sustainable development and so this is an extremely environmentally-friendly and sustainable building in its materials and energy use.

Originally it was used solely by staff and students in the School of Environment but now it is extending out across the other Departments in the Faculty.

 

On the ground floor students can work informally individually or in groups and on more formal project work.

On the first floor there can be classes which move between lecture format and students working in groups as part of the class, e.g. typically a lecture could consist of students sitting in armchairs or on sofas taking notes by hand or laptop and then the tutor may direct some to be engaged in project work and then reporting back at the end of class. The students will then use the IT equipment and work in groups, gathering information and then constructing a presentation or a set of notes. The IT equipment is designed so that the tutor can pull information from the screens that the students have been using on to a central screen for discussion.

Groups of staff are using the building informally as well as the students. The top floor is typically used for seminars or presentations lead by either staff or students, for discussions with the group physically in the class or between students at the University or indeed with students or tutors at another University in the UK or abroad.

 

Two office spaces are located on the top floor. One is for the CeAL Academic Manager, the other one for the learning technologist. There is also a small kitchenette, which allows the top floor to be used for small external events.

 

Funding Sources

 

HEFCE plus small amount of additional funding from the University of £300,000.

 

Cost of Project

 

HEFCE £2m plus extra £350,000. £2,350,000.00 in total.

 

Technology

 

Technology is viewed by CeAL colleagues as being in the service of teaching, not teaching being driven by technology. Part of the function of the building is to inform and celebrate what the University's students are doing. The learning technologist can display student work in the foyer on large plasma screens as a celebration of their achievements. The screens can also display other information such as upcoming seminars and publicity material. The whole building is wireless enabled but on separate floors there are a number of wired PCs, some of which are for quick access but others are positioned on large tables with large screens for groups to be able to work at. Students are able to borrow laptops, but it is anticipated that in the future more and more students will own and bring in their own laptops.

Smartboards are available so that writing can be converted into text. It is planned to install webcams on the ground floor to allow student groups in Gloucestershire to interact with student groups elsewhere.

 

Video conferencing facilities are available on the top floor and recent link-ups include Australia and America. Laptops can be plugged in directly via a connection on the table top.

 

In the first and second floor areas there is a main console with access to PowerPoint, the internet etc. In addition DVDs can be shown and visualisers are available for projecting book images (or indeed images of objects or organisms) directly into the plasma screen on the wall. Student presentations can also be shown. An additional 6 screens are available.

 

Adding Value

 

As it is quick, easy and accessible the technology allows students and tutors to do things that otherwise they wouldn't otherwise be able to do. If someone is teaching in a space they can direct students to explore something themselves as an activity during the session; to identify information, to synthesise it and pull it altogether, and because the room is IT enabled, the students working in groups can access the information quickly without leaving the room. The work could then be displayed centrally for discussion with the teacher or the whole class. The process is seamless.

 

Technology also enables communication with colleagues on other campuses and in other Universities, so enlarging and internationalising the University's students' experiences.

Increasingly, visual imagery is becoming very important in many subject disciplines, for example Geography, English, History and Environmental Science, and there are now ways of delivering very high quality imagery so people can see it right where they are sitting, They no longer have to be directed to a book, and the tutor or student does not have to mess around with a set of slides; it can be seen directly from somebody's easy chair or sofa.

 

Success Factors

 

What Makes The Space Successful?

 

There are two key indicators - firstly, the students like it and they are learning effectively from it, and secondly the staff like it and are learning from it.

 

User evaluation also indicates that it is working technically and the ease of use is one of the reasons that students like it - a huge understanding of technology is not required to use it.

 

Help is always at hand as some undergraduate students have been employed as 'learning mentors'; they roam the building at peak usage times in their team t-shirts asking students if they need any technical or procedural assistance (for example, how to engage in group work more effectively).

 

What Is Innovative About The Design And The Use Of The Space?

 

The architects were a practice from Bath called Feilden, Clegg and Bradley, who specialise in educational buildings. This building was designed by the senior partner, Peter Clegg. He said that in his experience it was one of the most innovative philosophies that he had come across. He was much more used to designing formal teaching spaces such as lecture theatres, so the informality and the social learning element was relatively new to him. The philosophy at the time of the design was innovative, if not unique; there are one or two other buildings in the UK that have gone down the same route.

 

Because it is an historic campus it takes a long time to get planning permission so the team actually had to start thinking about this some time ago; however it remains relatively innovative in terms of it being a social learning space with subtle IT support. Technology is very important in the CeAL but it is not in your face, it is more in the background.

 

The structure of the actual building is quite innovative too. It is a steel framed building and as it is quite close to mature trees it has innovative foundations, it looks new/different but does conform to planning regulations. The older Victorian part of the campus has ivy covered Gothic styled buildings with tall pointed windows, turrets and battlements, limestone block walls which are a yellowy colour, with a dark red tiled roof. The new building uses the same colours and has the same limestone on the ground floor. The upper floor has a pre-patinated copper colour the same colour and pitch as the roof of the older buildings. It has modern columns and windows mimicking the older buildings. The copper will age with time. The building won an award from the Cheltenham Civic Society for the best new building in Cheltenham in 2006-07. Thought-provoking quotations are painted on the walls in some places, which people like - quirky things!

 

Top Tips

 

Consult everybody - especially students - very early on. Right back at the beginning during the planning stage of the building students provided some great feedback; they were asked what they would like to see in the new building, what kind of features. They wanted a building that was open 24/7. They wanted long opening hours, they wanted it to be welcoming, and they wanted coffee/drinks to be available. They wanted it to be stylish. One student said they would like it to be like Starbucks in terms of being comfortable and focussed but sort of themed. The University have taken a huge amount of care with the use of colour, furnishing and decoration inside. It is already a stylish and interesting space. All of that came out of the consultation. Students were saying things like 'we want a wicked building', 'we want an awesome building' and that that would make them feel good about their learning and their interactions with the University. They wanted somewhere they would feel that they wanted to be. So consultation with the students has been important.

 

Foster innovation but not for innovation's sake. Be reasonably well grounded in something that has been tested already. Foster active styles of learning in the right kind of space and take it on a bit further.

Visit other places. Some innovative types of furniture and furnishings are not as well received by staff and students as others. Some seating may not be comfortable over long periods, the CETL have gone for innovation but grounded in something that was known would work in terms of comfort.

Consult staff frequently. There wasn't 100% agreement all the time because it would end up with something that you had got already (only nicer perhaps). The CeAL wanted to position the building with a little more innovation than most of the academic staff would have suggested, but without being so radical that nobody would want to use the space.

 

There is a bit of a leap of faith, there is a point at which you have to abandon total security and say 'well, actually we are going to do something that is a little different'. The Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning were encouraged to be innovative, to take risks, and the CeAL has done. There has been a bedding-in period as far as the technology is concerned. It is very easy to use but there have been lots of training sessions for academics to show what they can do in the building. More and more people are now using it.

 

Think about the future use of the space. This space isn't big enough! But the size was constrained by the site. Many requests have been received from national and international academics who want to do research with the CETL and extra desks have been squeezed into the postgraduate office and additional space is being sought elsewhere on the campus. Originally one desk was allocated for a visiting scholar and now three or four at a time are needed.

Pilot ideas. The same philosophy is now being developed on the University's new campus in Gloucester.

 

Lessons Learned

 

The building is 'intelligent' in terms of its energy use, but due to changes in the planned for 'local' heating system controls halfway through the development these were moved to another site and they are still not quite right. It is a fairly minor problem.

 

There have been a few small glitches with the smartcard entry system, the systems are quite new and not terribly robust.

 

There have been some problems with the automatic door opening systems which were designed for mobility impaired people e.g. the touchpad that opens the door has not always been operational, which is obviously not ideal.

 

There are still some issues which the sector needs to address in terms of guidance on the most effective basic things like door opening systems that do not burn out, and associated with that are security systems that let in the right people and keep out the wrong people. That is not only on this campus, other universities have similar issues.

During the building phase there were other developments across the rest of the campus and it is quite difficult to tie-up a stand alone development (such as this one) with other changes across the campus. Changes to main walkways have been made affecting access arrangements to the building and they are being looked at again.

 

Post Occupancy: Changes Made As A Result Of Feedback

 

Semi-formal feedback has been collected from different routes, from different users and visitors, from external events and over time. Learning mentors keep records of use and what students are doing in the building. They have a blog which they keep as a group, which gives us a running record of what is going on in the building and whether there are any problematic issues.

 

A long term more formal system of questionnaire feedback is being conducted also. Cards are put on every floor with a competition running for £100 prize money; students are asked to fill in one of these cards every time they use the building. Students are asked what they are doing, where they are doing it, why they are doing it in that building and what they think about the building and also whether they have any suggestions for altering it.

Feedback also comes from presentations at conferences which have been given for example the Warwick Conference on Social Learning Spaces (April 2007). There are no major changes as it is still early days but there hasn't been any cause to make any changes yet.

 

Contact Details

 

Carolyn Roberts, croberts@glos.ac.uk

 

Case study written 2006/07