Students MAP out Their Futures Features Letter from the President
The free magazine for The University of Manchester 5 October 2009 UniLifeIssue 1 Volume 7 Students MAP out their futures Features Letter from the President Given that my monthly UniLife pieces should probably reflect what is at the top of my own personal agenda, I will keep returning to the urgent News need for the University to give the utmost priority to Chemical improving the quality of the learning experiences Engineering gets offered to undergraduates here in Manchester. £30m boost Manchester’s performance in undergraduate page 3 education is patchy. In some Schools undergraduate students enter a supportive, intellectually rewarding learning environment enriched by frequent, meaningful interactions with teachers, both formally (in small groups) and informally, through timely, informative feedback on their work and through other forms of constructive personal engagement. Research Such Schools and programmes are exemplary. New clues in Easter But although the academic community cares deeply Island mystery about undergraduate learning, and all Schools contain individual teachers whose dedication, experience, I was struck recently by the relevance of page 7 creativity and passionate commitment to their an article that Derek Rowntree wrote about his own students are beacons of excellence, Manchester, as institution, the Open University (THE, 25 June - an institution, falls well short of what any of us 1 July 2009). should regard as satisfactory. How was it, he wondered, that a University with According to the most recent National Student Survey student:staff ratios of 150:1 could achieve a higher (NSS), Manchester is still ranked embarrassingly low in level of student satisfaction in the NSS that “any terms of overall student satisfaction.
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