As Solutionpath’s pathfinder institution in the UK, Nottingham Trent University (NTU) have worked with Solutionpath from the beginning of their learning analytics journey, partnering with us to collaboratively design and develop the StREAM student engagement analytics platform. It is they who are responsible for some of the foundational design principles that underpin StREAM – from ensuring that decisions on ‘risk’ are based on what students do while they are at university, not who they are, through to ensuring that whatever data and information is visible to staff users of StREAM is also visible to students – including information about any interventions/interactions.
In this case study, Ed Foster, Head of Student Engagement and Analytics at the Centre for Student and Community Engagement at NTU, reflects upon and explores some of the key factors that impact how successful an interaction with a student can be, based on their StREAM engagement data. NTU received Erasmus+ funding to participate in the OfLA project (Onwards from Learning Analytics) where their research focused on effective student interventions.
The OfLA project was ‘designed to deal with the challenge of acting meaningfully upon learning analytics or other early warning systems to support inclusion and student success’. In this regard, the project aligns to the broad adoption approach that we at Solutionpath take to a StREAM deployment, namely that the provision of engagement information based on students’ digital footprints is simply the starting point in effecting meaningful change at the individual student level. The key to a successful deployment and use of analytics is dependent upon what happens next – how that engagement information is used to impact outcomes for each student.
Ed explores how starting with the end in mind when it comes to intervention design
can help to maximise the potential for success for every student.
