Pathways for Effective Whole-System Intervention in Higher Education Institutional Staff Development

1
Pathways for Effective Whole-System Intervention
in Higher Education Institutional Staff
Development

• Dr Patrick Oseloka EZEPUE
• Research Leader in Statistics and Information
  Modelling
• Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield S1 1WB, UK

2
Outline

• Background
• Objectives
• Experiences and Mistakes in HEI Interventions
• Pathways for Whole-system Interventions (NIMSERC
  Programme)
• Ensuring Effective Nigerian Ownership
• Summary

3
Rationale and Objectives

• Explore pathways for change-focused
  interventions in HEIs
• Demonstrate an intervention for transforming
  institutional cultures, develop staff remarkably,
  impact the student's learning experiences
  phenomenally, and catalyse innovative
  HEI-industry linkages
• Discuss ways to combine direct activities which
  affect stakeholders in HEIs with national and
  continental roll-outs of such events

• HEIs are too traditional and disenabling
• Interventions do not succeed in transforming the
  HEIs significantly
• Need to base interventions on detailed
  investigation of stakeholders real as opposed to
  presenting needs
• Need to focus on removing the constraints that
  could impede programme success for all
  stakeholders

4
Experiences in HEI Interventions

• Pitfalls
• Unidirectional and lacks knowledge-connectedness
• Evident lack of intelligent problem solving
  skills among students and some staff
• Does not sufficiently cater for needs of
  different stakeholders
• Exacerbation of national and global social and
  economic problems

• Traditional Practices
• Over-emphasis on single-disciplinary research
• The curricula are too didactic, not student led
  and fail to develop modern graduate skills and
  outcomes
• Ineffective translation of knowledge to practice

5
A High Impact Intervention Model
6
The NIMSERC Research Programme

• British Council Connect Prime Ministers
  Initiative 2 (PMI2) travel grant for
  UK-Nigeria-Ghana Partnership Development in
  Higher Education
• Cross-cutting research and problem-solving theme
• New graduate outcomes including professional
  skills
• Sculpt continuing competences in
  multi-disciplinary research among mathematics,
  statistics, economics and finance academics and
  professionals

7
Student Needs Audit
Creative problem solving Applying core
concepts to case studies Understanding modern
and innovative research methods beyond the
traditional Critical thinking and decision
making skills Effective team working on
real-life problems Presentation and
communication skills Project and time
management skills General self-understanding
Personal effectiveness and motivation
Performance management Career-focused skills
e.g. effective CVs
8
Staff Needs Audit
interdisciplinary research in mathematical
sciences relevant to industry Curriculum
innovations to support better graduate
outcomes Enhanced capacities in high impact
research Top quality PhD supervision
21st century research methods and
supervision skills
9
Whole Institution Needs Audit
Curriculum innovation/balanced
assessments Holistic career models linking LTA,
research and income generation activities
Enhanced capacities in high impact
research Staff development and research
capacity building Staff development and
curriculum reinvigoration Entrepreneurship,
enterprise education and employability
International linkages in support of the
above
10
Engaging with Business and Industry
Impaired man-power base Need for forensic
approach to product development Systematic
stock and capital market analyses Firm-level
equity analysis Nexus among financial
analytics, policy and stock market
development High-level mathematical modelling
of financial products Financial
engineering/risk management
11
Character of the NIMSERC solution

• Addresses staff development in collaborative
  learning environments
• Enhances modern work, research, LTA and
  entrepreneurial skills
• Springboard for developing academic
  entrepreneurial skills amongst staff
• Radically transforms research practice in an HEI
  through multidisciplinary research
• Encourages joint publications among academics and
  professionals

12
Character of the NIMSERC solution 2

• Intensive pre-PhD workshops in foundational
  topics in the contributing disciplines
• Continual staff development through seminars and
  conferences around the main research themes
• Complimentary and wider training of industry
  staff through applied seminars, workshops and
  HEI-industry exchanges the training should be of
  a practical flavour but informed by research
• Use of field studies to expose staff and students
  to real challenges to address their training

13
Character of the NIMSERC solution 3

• An emphasis on advanced quantitative modelling
  e.g. econometrics, financial engineering,
  financial economics, investment analyses,
  financial risk management, stock and capital
  market analyses , complexity theory and scenario
  modelling
• A system of MSc-MPhil-PhD and Post-Doctoral
  research on high-impact topics
• Internationalization of the programme via
  web-enabled interfaces of resources and outcomes
• Joint authorship of leading academic papers,
  specialist text books and research monographs

14
Lessons Learnt for Effective Whole- System
Intervention

• Founded on detailed stakeholder needs analysis
  and based on specific projects which cover those
  needs
• Achieved success within the consortium should
  inform national roll-out of similar involving
  other clusters of disciplines

15
Getting on Board

• Become a consortium partner in NIMSERC
• MSc-Mphil-PhD Research in Statistics and
  Information Modelling
• Related pedagogical research and curriculum
  re-invigoration (consultancy)
• Training, workshops, transferable skills
  development and professional development (within
  the financial services sector)

16
Concluding Desiderata

• Appendix 1 Outline of other interventions
• Appendix 2 Institutional profile for Sheffield
  Hallam University
• Appendix 3 Research directions in the
  statistical and Information Modelling Research
  Group
• Appendix 4 - Brief Profile of Dr Patrick Oseloka
  EZEPUE

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• Dr Patrick Oseloka EZEPUE
• Research Leader in Statistics and Information
  Modelling
• Communications and Computing Research Centre
  (CCRC)
• Sheffield Hallam University
• City Campus
• Sheffield S1 1WB, UK
• Tel [phone] (Office) 44(0)7772632150
  (Mobile)
• Email p.ezpue_at_shu.ac.uk
• www.shu.ac.uk

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