From the strategy team
The Ambassadors actively promoted engagement activities to the wider student community, led consultation with fellow students, supported other all-University activities, and provided their own insights and feedback at every stage of the strategy development process.
Here, they share with you the experience they had in contributing to the strategy development.
We are immensely grateful for our students’ insights and input, which have helped to shape the direction of education and the student experience at the University.
Who were our Advancing Students and Education Ambassadors?
In April 2022 our student ambassadors were engaged through the Students@Work team, which coordinates employment for students across the University.
From 54 applications, 17 student ambassadors were appointed.
The ambassadors were trained in peer-led consultation, facilitation and engagement techniques, and event coordination.
Ambassadors led the strategy’s student consultation
Ambassadors considered the emerging ideas for the strategy and decided they should focus student consultation on ideas to help students make connections with each other and develop a sense of belonging.
They designed and led their own activities to gather student feedback on this issue.
The part of the process I enjoyed the most was getting to understand the issues students face, but also trying to provide solutions to them. We talked a lot about disconnect, but I guess in a way, we are connected by some of the issues we face AND by the passion we have to change them
Marina
I liked brainstorming ideas that could be implemented in the future, and being able to share all wild, wacky and unrealistic ideas. I love the enthusiasm for progress, change and improvement
Bianca
Ambassador-led events
The Ambassadors’ events were run as pop-up stands at two Discover Unimelb events, the Study Abroad Fair and the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival. Here's what they did:
Welcome
The ambassadors welcomed students and introduced the ASE Strategy, with prompts such as: “What if the university grouped you into houses like Ace /Spade / Heart/Diamond?Would that have helped you make friends?”; “Have you heard about the Advancing Students & Education Strategy?”; “We are here trying to make things better for students at the university, we have some ideas but we’re interested to hear your ideas”; “The ASE Strategy is working to improve the university experience for students”. The Ambassadors asked about friendships, because research shows the more connected students feel, the more likely they are to have a positive university experience.
Voting
Students were given two Lego pieces to vote on the question "What would most help you make friends & connections at university?". Some of the responses included common free time with all students, intensive or block subjects, immersive cohort experiences, being assigned a house group and more interactive learning experiences. Students were told "Use your lego pieces to build the future of the University of Melbourne student experience!"
Poster board
Students reflected on two poster board questions, 1. "How did you make friends and connections at university, what was most helpful?" and 2. "What has made you feel disconnected at university?". They were then prompted with the follow-up questions, "Is there anything else you think we should know?".
Key findings
- Clubs and societies were popular for making strong connections.
- It isn’t true that students don't care anymore. They want to be together and want access to opportunities, even if they don’t take up each one. Having a number of opportunities will allow the time for students to balance taking advantage of them, alongside their study and other commitments.
- Ambassadors were surprised by the level of engagement from students and the depth of discussions they had. They also reported that students had lots of opinions about what they wanted and what they cared about, wanted to know how soon they could expect changes to happen, what could they personally do and what were the Ambassadors doing to help, and often didn't think that their opinion would have a serious impact.
- Students want to talk to people more in person, they want connection and more interactive opportunities.
- Academic stress was a driver in creating disconnection, along with a sense of lack of curriculum coordination and communication.
- Online learning was problematic in providing interactions amongst peers.
Ambassadors helped throughout the consultation process
Workshops: Ambassadors assisted at all of our student and staff expert workshops, and gave their own input too.
Online strategy forums: Ambassadors helped guide and stimulate discussions in each online forum, and provided their own ideas and reflections. More than 600 responses were posted on online discussion topics.
Full day symposium: Ambassadors helped run a full day Evolving the Melbourne Curriculum symposium. Two ambassadors spoke as part of the Curriculum Hallmarks panels on 'What we teach’ and ‘How we teach’.
Focus groups: Ambassadors participated in a focus group to test ideas about student services and support.
Town hall: Ambassadors supported the town hall, sharing some of their experience of being an Ambassador and their reflections on the themes of the strategy.
It was an eye opening experience to discover how many students share the same concerns and ideas for improvements, the same likes and dislikes. We are not alone in our opinions, desires and needs.
- Bianca
“It was really eye-opening for me to hear from and interact with SASS staff and their concerns regarding clarity of services for academic staff and students. I feel students don’t hear about concerns from the staff front enough and it was definitely super insightful to hear the concerns and passionate responses about areas of improvement” - Louise
“I liked getting to know so many other people and contributing my thoughts for a better future student experience” - Jasika
“I enjoyed being able to give, and talk about, opinions and hearing everybody else’s throughout the process” - Beth
“It was useful to see how something so broad (like a 10 year strategy) is whittled down, centrifuged, broken up into smaller targets and action plans and how that still provided us many avenues of interest and engagement to pursue” - Jamie
“I do think our participation made a difference to the student input because it was a direct voice and insight into our student experience. What I really appreciated is that in each session, the staff who ran them actually made sure to understand the points we brought up as opposed to paraphrasing them or superseding it with input from the University” - Marina
“I felt like I was given an opportunity to make a real impact on the direction of the University” - Trevor
“I enjoyed learning how to interpret and analyse the deeper theme and meaning of someones opinion. For example, they say they hate online classes but being able to connect that with others’ opinions to realise that it might be the lack of interaction that makes them feel like they don’t belong or there isn’t a community at Uni” - Dorothy
“I learnt more about the Uni and it’s role/value in my life personally, as well as how it impacts other students. I grew my communication, organisational and leadership skills” - Bianca
“Being able to really synthesise, reflect and develop innovative solutions to engage a variety of people. As an aspiring policy maker/analyst, this experience has given me lots of food for thought” - Louise
“I would like to encourage other students to participate in such events and programs to boost their confidence while interacting with students and peers. It would also give them the opportunity to bring change in the system and challenge the less explored areas of the system” - Omkar
I want other student to know that they should get involved. Getting involved allows them to see what is happening but to also be part of what is happening. It also broadens their mind, giving them a different perspective to uni life
- Sher Maine
Strategy team reflection
“The involvement of the ambassadors in the development of the Advancing Students and Education Strategy has been invaluable. Having ingrained student engagement and involvement throughout the process provided real-time student feedback on ideas that were emerging, encouraged engagement with a large number of students within the University community and helped shape the strategy directions.”
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