Introducing the “GLFs” (graduate learning facilitators)

This year we’ve developed a new role in the department: a graduate learning facilitator (I know a terrible title, but we owe that one to HR). We’re trailing the role to see if it helps support the learning experience of our undergraduate students. We currently have 5 ‘facilitators’, who finished the BA Design in June 2014. Their role is to act as a bridge between staff and students – to ensure a vibrant and engaging studio culture. They’re here to bring some of their (recent) learning, directly back to the current cohort. In someway they can be seen as the cultural memory of the programme; a way for us to maintain and transfer the learning from one year group to another, both in terms of skills and topic knowledge. The idea is that they bring another perspective to experience of being a design student (hopefully they can reassure our current students that ‘it’ll all be ok’ in the end!).

We have two GLF’s in the first year (Tee and Belen), two in the second (Birute and Charlie) and one in the third year (Hannah). I’ve asked them over the next month to write a post reflecting on their experience. So far, they’ve run some great workshops, help design the briefs and contribute to the development of the degree show. We’re also asking them to engage in staff research projects to start to break down the ‘research / teaching’ divide.