The Scholarship of Engagement

for PoliticsBarrie Axford

Oxford Brookes University

Aims of the Project• To develop, promote and evaluate the Scholarship Of

Engagement for Politics as a formal dimension of the Politics and International Relations curriculum in UK universities.

• To harness the ability of placements to enhance the learning and teaching of citizenship and governance, by integrating them into the university curriculum, enhancing the Politics undergraduate experience.

• Development of partnership frameworks with local and regional government agencies, other political actors, such as none governmental organisations and the voluntary sector, to ensure a wide variety of placements.

• Create a repertoire of examples to evaluate the impact and effectiveness on student learning, offering other UK Politics departments the opportunity to develop there own models of engagement.

Project Achievements

• 3 rounds of placements completed• 36 students from 3 universities sent on

placement• 19 placement providers recruited• Placements developed and lessons learned

noted• Full set of placement documents produced• IT platform created and maintained

www.politicsinaction.ac.uk • Data gathered from all stakeholders • Cascade to other institutions

Findings

Majority of students interviewed felt that the placement they had undertaken would have an impact on their future learning.

In our post-placement questionnaires:• 78% felt that the placement had helped their

understanding of ‘politics’.• 72% had already been able to use their

placement experience in assignments. • 64% had been able to use their experience in

class discussions.

Findings 2 In their blogs, students clearly demonstrated that

their understanding of politics had been complemented and enriched by their placement experiences:

I am beginning to see issues work their way through the policy process . . . I think a really good way to get an idea of the workings of the organisation would be to follow an issue around the committees like this – I am beginning to get an idea of how they all relate to each other . . .

Who'd have thought something that you learn in a classroom would actually be relevant in real life! The main reason I undertook this placement was to see how much was relevant, and to see the actual, physical consequences of the theory that is learnt in lectures, so this was particularly useful as far as I was concerned.

Findings 3

Comments from the interviews carried out with students immediately after their placement ended also indicated that students felt that their placements either had or would have an impact on their future studies:

Yeah, I definitely think it will. Yeah, I mean as I say it’s brought to . . . I know something now about an area I never would have studied anyway. It’s very boring to read about local government, and you know, actually quite interesting to observe and take part in. So that has informed all kinds of questions about the relationship between national government and local government, all kinds of questions about devolution to the regions that are very relevant at the moment. And as government is not an area that I’ve considered before it is, yeah it’s definitely informed that, I think.

Findings 4

18 out of the 26 students interviewed post-placement talked about the placement having an impact on what job they wanted to do once they left university. In some cases the placement had reinforced an idea they already had about the area they wanted to work in:

So yeah I’ve always wanted to be an MP or work in the civil service, so I think that’s just kind of brought it back that I want to go that direction rather than be an MEP and go a bit more you know European . . . I don’t know, I think it kind of enforced it. I mean I never had the idea of being an MEP anyway.

Findings 5

For some others, the experience meant that they decided they definitely wouldn’t want to work in a certain area after their degree ended:

I don’t think I do want to work for an MP . . . and I suppose that’s something I got out of the placement. I mean I really enjoyed it but I wouldn’t want to do it as a job, certainly not in a constituency office anyway.

Findings 6

For other students the experience had opened up new possibilities and opportunities that students hadn’t necessarily considered:

Well I wasn’t too sure about where I wanted to go. I knew I wanted to do something related to politics but I wasn’t sure where. I would be quite happy now to go and get a job somewhere in local government.

Findings 7

Results from the post-placement questionnaires:

• 72% of respondents felt that the placement had influenced their career aspirations.

• 75% said they felt better prepared for work following their placement.

• 86% felt they had gained skills that would be useful when they began work.

Output 1Dissemination:

The team has organised one conference, and one workshop, and disseminated to a total of 17 presentations, throughout the UK.

Project Templates:The Scholarship of Engagement has all templates used within the project, with other useful resources on placements, all available on the web site at www.politicsinaction.ac.uk

Final Project Evaluation Report: The final Scholarship of Engagement for Politics paper, available for access on the website at www.politicsinaction.ac.uk/newResources/publications.htm

Output 2Academic Institutions:

• Placements within the project universities.• Strong interest in the project from other

universities.• Transferability funding has allowed the project

to work intensively with an additional four partners in UK universities, with the aim of implementing the Scholarship of Engagement for Politics within their undergraduate curriculum.

• Transferability has provided further evidence for the wider UK academic community of the potential value of integrated placement learning within Politics/International Relations and cognate disciplines.