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''Very good way to
communicate with
second/first year
students.''
''I would recommend
to organise again as
it brings confidence
out in people.''
''It was fun and provided an ex-
cellent opportunity to practice
networking skills in a profes-
sional context.
''I thought it was a good
idea to talk to final year
students as experi-
ence.''
''Very good, inter-
esting experience,
good for networking'' Feedback/
Comments
Speed
Networking
Improving the transition between levels through
student exchanges at a speed networking event
Authors: Frances Chatwin (VM project assistant) and Andy Hirst
(Course leader BICT, ITM and ITwBS)
Courses
Business and
ICT
IT with Business
Studies IT
Management
160 first and final year
students
Preparations for the Speed-Networking
Evening started long before the 26th of Feb-
ruary 2014, with the production of floor lay-
outs, hand-outs and timing schedules. All of
these documents were created to ensure that
the students could easily network and sub-
contract their projects successfully.
The floor layout (left) showed how the rooms
were set out. The final year students sat at
their tables, whilst the first year students
moved round the room to each of the groups.
Once the process had finished, and if the first
year students had successfully sold them-
selves, they were then recruited to complete
a sub-task for the final year students.
INSPIR!NG STUDENTS
External Projects supplied
by The Long well Walk;
Unifood solutions ltd;SHU; Nutribox;
Tiny Tiny Ent; FETN; Redhill Associates; Bike
Rehab; ITIL; CSER; Pixibot; HEPP; Selecta;
SMM; Baby Bright Eyes
Background
Reducing drop-out rates and encourage student assimilation into uni-
versity life is key to the university's retention strategy. As student debt
rises SHU must do more to ensure that students starting courses also
gain the full benefit. One way to support the transition through the
levels is by demystifying and enabling peers to share their own experi-
ences of the course. This poster seeks to demonstrate the usefulness of
a business speed networking event to support these exchanges.
Final year students have first hand experience of teaching and assess-
ment, understand better how to prioritise their work loads and can
empathise with younger students. Therefore enabling and encouraging
dialogue between these students is important to supporting the transi-
tion between levels. Speed networking is a way to support this dia-
logue. Speed networking originally derived from speed dating, encour-
ages interactions that otherwise would be difficult to achieve, between
different people within a short time period.
Initially the speed networking activity was purely an enterprise activity
that supported inter-trading between different groups of students.
However an unintended consequence was the transference of tacit
knowledge about student life between level 4 and level 6. The poster
hopes to highlight the effectiveness that activities like this have in ena-
bling final year and first year students to actively engage in the learning
process together; build closer ties to the course; and structures an ex-
change that improves the transition between levels.
Example of a Project Brief