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Jess Hargreaves (Maths) and Yaprak Tavman (Economics) share their journey into SoTL and the challenges with staying current with literature, dissemination, and 'finding the debates'. Plus, should SoTL be part of REF?
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Jess Hargreaves (Maths) and Yaprak Tavman (Economics) share their journey into SoTL and the challenges with staying current with literature, dissemination, and 'finding the debates'. Plus, should SoTL be part of REF?
Listen to Maths and Economics meet SoTL, with Jess Hargreaves and Yaprak Tavman by Scholarship of Teaching and Learning MP3 song. Maths and Economics meet SoTL, with Jess Hargreaves and Yaprak Tavman song from Scholarship of Teaching and Learning is available on Audio.com. The duration of song is 53:59. This high-quality MP3 track has 1536 kbps bitrate and was uploaded on 16 Aug 2023. Stream and download Maths and Economics meet SoTL, with Jess Hargreaves and Yaprak Tavman by Scholarship of Teaching and Learning for free on Audio.com – your ultimate destination for MP3 music.
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Jess and Yaprak, both lecturers at the University of York, discuss their interest in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SOTL). Jess started her teaching career at Sheffield Hallam University and later returned to York on a teaching and scholarship contract. She emphasizes the importance of reflective practice and incorporating research into teaching. Yaprak became interested in SOTL during her PhD when students demanded a connection between economics teaching and the real world. She focuses on active learning and technology-enhanced teaching, and is currently working on introducing problem-based learning and team-based learning in economics at York. They both discuss the importance of disseminating their work and collaborating with colleagues, using various forms such as workshops, conferences, and networking opportunities provided by the university. Welcome to the Scholarship and Teaching and Learning Podcast from the University of York. This is Phil Martin. Hi, I'm Lucy Turner-Vokes. And we're joined today by Jess and Yaprak. Jess and Yaprak, thanks for coming in. Can you just give us a couple of intros to yourself and what's your disciplinary background and your interest in SOTL? So, yeah, I'm Jess Hargreaves. I'm a lecturer in the Maths Department. Originally, so when I first started lecturing, I was at Sheffield Hallam University. I did my PhD here and then started work at Sheffield Hallam, which is a more teaching-focused university. Did my version of the PGCAT there. And I think it just happens that a lot of the Maths Department, their research area isn't mathematics, it is mathematics education. So that's kind of where I started out, you know, doing the PGCAT, but also working in that team. And so, for example, the seminar series that they had in the Maths Department would be on education, not mathematical topics like it is here in York. So, yes, that's where it began. And then came back to York on a teaching and scholarship contract. So I think that's in the title. That's kind of what you should be doing, thinking about those things carefully. And I'm now an ART lecturer. So that's changed a little bit, but that's in the title. But that's not to say it's going to change in my practice. And I think we'll talk about that today, kind of how you think about... Yeah, I suppose I've brought that up. How do you think about your subject and thinking about research there and then the scholarship of the teaching side as well? Was that too long? You said a short introduction, didn't you? No, I didn't have a timer. Good to go. Yaprak, please. Thank you. Yeah, so my name is Yaprak Tahman and I'm a lecturer in the Economics Department. So I think my interest in SOTL mainly began as a result of this move in economics teaching at universities when I was near completing my PhD. So there was this increased demand from students to reconnect teaching of economics with what is happening in the real world because of the global financial crisis. And that did also incentivise me to think carefully about how we teach economics. And then I realised I... And I was also doing research on the global financial crisis. So that did really actually help me to think about how I can actively engage students. So I think my first interest in that area was in terms of active learning and using real-world applications to engage students in learning rather than using more passive learning. And then I think as a result of economics being taught in really large groups, then with the advancements in technology, I think I started becoming very interested in technology-enhanced active learning. So this is a big part of what I do at the moment. And then, yeah, currently I'm also... It's going to sound like I'm interested in everything, but currently I'm also working on introducing problem-based learning into teaching of economics for the first time at York. So I'm really now keen on focusing on team-based learning as well. We've talked in the past in this podcast about the distinction between scholarly-informed teaching and doing your own practice, carrying out your own research. Because you're talking about incorporating scholarly teaching into your own practice, which is, I think, the first step. And it's that sort of peak of curiosity. And you think, well, how can I use some of this stuff? And it's that sort of interest you get in just trying new things and changing things and reading stuff and changing your own practice to producing stuff and starting to write and doing your own work. So I just wondered where you both were on those projects. Sorry, when you were talking, it reminded me of an aspect of my life I'd just missed out then in my intro, which was that after my undergrad, well, undergrad degree, I trained to be a teacher. So a secondary school maths teacher before doing my PhD, then went back to do it. And that's obviously, like I was saying, reflective practice. That's how they teach you to be a teacher. And in some sense, that job is done for you. When they teach you to be a teacher, they're sort of, here's a, I don't know how to say, here's a session on assessment. And we have picked out what we're going to tell you, what are the good things to do. I actually did it, I don't think it exists anymore. It was called a GTP. So I didn't do a PGCE, which would be in a university. It was more like an apprenticeship version of teaching. So I think I had a less academic teacher training than perhaps the more well-trained route. So anyway, so yeah, like you say, that was sort of, in my approach from everything, when I've come back to academia, you know, like you say, you're starting as the DTA, you're doing all those sorts of things. It was already ingrained in me to do that reflective practice. But like I say, I felt a bit more spoon-fed with the things that you should be doing. Like let's just say that we're doing these sorts of things and that these are what you should be doing. Here's a lesson plan, make sure you're telling us that you're filling all these boxes, you know, for the office head inspector. But then when you come to, so do something like the PGCAP, I think that for me, that's where it was, because that was when it started being like, tell us sort of thinking about how you're teaching and thinking about how that's, where's that coming from? How is that informed? What are the ways of doing these sorts of things? And then if I'm totally honest, how does that go from that to outputs? I think it's a little bit of a sense that you've put all this, we've talked about this before, you've put that effort in to do those projects for that thing and it's kind of, right, let's actually, you know, record this or get that out there. You know, it's been done, the work's been done, let's share it if we can. So I think that's kind of where that came from. And like I say, because I was just immersed in this culture of you do something, you try these things, you take these approaches to your teaching and then you disseminate it. I think it was just, for me, oh, that's how you do these things. It wasn't kind of an active choice on my part, if that makes sense. Yeah, so you had an education background to begin with. Yeah. But was that the same for you, your practice? Yeah, I think, for me actually, I think it was quite different because I started thinking more about this once I became a TNS lecturer actually because I was also, so before I joined York as a lecturer, I was at two other universities where I was on an art contract. So there it was more about doing what I think feels right and, you know, will engage students and will enhance their learning. I was just doing it. Sometimes I think maybe instinctively, not really reading that much about it and only after I became a TNS lecturer, then I started thinking more about also research and it's more extensively, let's say, and then that also made me think about how I want to disseminate it once I realised actually there's also a whole strand of ways of doing this, right? So that's why I think that change in career actually did make an important, I think, change in my perception of it as well. Just one thing to note, we've internalised certain acronyms at the University of York and we talk about TNS and art fairly casually. Can you just unpack those for us, for anyone who's not familiar with a TNS and an art? Yeah, so TNS is teaching and scholarship and art is academic research and teaching. As far as I know. At least, yeah, the last time we checked. And PGCAT, the Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice as well. So really interesting that you're sort of working again between those anchor points, if you like, and how either a change in institution or a change in contract can prompt something or actually a past work experience just feeds right through. And I suppose, could I ask a follow-up on that, which is you have these experiences teaching, you think about them, you improve your practice either by trial and error and or hopefully by engaging with other materials and literature. Then, so, Jess, because I think you're totally right, that needs to be shared, doesn't it? And one of the interesting things about teaching is it can feel so ephemeral because it happens in a given space and time and everybody's space and time is also very sort of pressured. So how did you go from there, having recorded it, to then disseminating and sharing and what was helpful there? And maybe talking a bit about collaboration too, because I know you've both worked in tandem with other scholars. There's a lot in there. Sorry. I think for me, actually, what I really like in terms of dissemination of scholarly work is that it can happen in so many forms, right? So this is what we are doing at the moment. This is, in a way, some type of dissemination, right? And I really like that. So that's why, at the moment, I'm more focusing on dissemination through, let's say, like workshops, recording, conferences, and I think that's a really good part to start with. And I think, actually, the university has been very resourceful in that sense. For example, we have SOTL, we have PDLT, a few different, I mean, I'm using acronyms again, but a few... The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Network, the Country Learning Technology Forum. Yeah, yeah, so we have so many different units working on teaching and learning, so it's much easier, I think, to find places to disseminate it and network with people. And I think networking is also a really important part of dissemination. I sometimes find half an hour conversation with a colleague can be much more, you know, like, illuminating than reading the literature on it. So that has been my experience so far. Yeah, I agree. I think, speaking upon what you're saying, I think there are a lot of mechanisms at the university to help you with it. So, like, say, attending a journal club, which... So at the start of a journal club, you always do a thing that's like, why are you here today? And I'm always like, because I like to come to journal club and everybody else is actually there for the topic. But, yeah, like I say, I think it's just exposing yourself to those sorts of things helps show you what those sorts of things look like and think about yourself, you know, contributing to that world. So now you've said something that I want to follow up on, though. If it's not the topic, why do you like it? I think it's that chance to talk to other people who are thinking about things in the same way that you do. But, yeah, like I say, even just on a technical level, that if you don't... So when I'm supervising a student in a project and, you know, they're writing a dissertation and in the mark scheme it's saying this should be like a journal paper, that's what we're going for. So I'm saying to them, when you're reading the journal papers, you're not just reading it for the mathematical content, you're reading it to get what that thing looks like and what that structure is. And I always use the example, you know, when you're at school, they teach you to write a letter, they'll show you a letter. It doesn't matter what that letter's about, it's about, you know, the address goes here and so on. So it's partly that as well, it's just to kind of see... expose myself to that type of literature so that I can get into my head what that looks like and, as I say, envisage myself being part of that and contributing to it. But, so as well, there's things like you're saying about the forum, there's a conference here and it's an internal conference. You can speak at that conference, like you say, that's a good place to start. But also they offer mentorship and then there's Forum Magazine, so you might... So if I tell you a story about... So one of my... vast array of these sorts of publications, but one of them, I took advantage of all of these things. So we started off writing it as a piece for the Forum Magazine and as part of that process, that team help you and really do, you know, edits and things like that. Then I think we did a poster at the conference and, again, when you submit something to the conference as a mentorship thing you can sign up for so that people can help you with that. I also sort of called in some ringers off the bench because I knew some people who, yeah, as I say, who I'd met across Pathways that I thought would be able to help actually write the paper and be good for that as well, but just to show me the ropes of that world, like, you know, how do you publish in this area and things like that. So I think it really was taking advantage of all those things that are there at the university with a little help from my friends that got us there in the end. I think that connects nicely because we were just, we were talking about a paper before we came on air and this was about, so this was about searching the literature on SOTL and I think one of the points they made there that I thought was interesting was the fact that comparing the literature, doing a literature search on scholarship of teaching and learning to your own discipline, for example, is really different and one of the things they point to is like a broader circle of inclusion as to what we could search and they talk about, you know, more contemporary outlets like blogs and, you know, grey literature, so magazines and things like this and the sort of things that you've been mentioning as well. I mean, do you think that that's, is that, seems to me to be a really attractive feature of SOTL, that you are not, you can do what's meaningfully called bringing yourself up to speed and getting familiar with what's going on without trawling through the latest high impact peer review journals exclusively. I mean, is that something that you thought was a, I'm really leading you with this question. I thought it was quite positive. And I'm really glad you said you can't do that exclusively because you do have to do it a bit. Yeah. I think it's a, before, just to answer, I think that tension in SOTL is really interesting and where it is as a discipline because it does have a literature and it is important to know a bit about that literature, but actually the point in the paper and the point we've been talking about is it should be more expansive than that. And I think if you're going to do good practice, this is a practice based field. So it has to draw on the world outside of academia as well as be part of it. So just kind of shoehorning that in there. But yeah, where is your practice in that sense? Where do you go for that? Yeah, no, I think that's a really, as I said, that's something that I actually really like about SOTL, right? So, and I think it can be, that's how I do it at least. That's the thing that it can be a combination of all of these and it doesn't have to go in one order, right? So it is very dynamic in that sense as well. So as I said, for example, I might start with a conversation with a colleague and then get inspired by it and then I can read a bit more about it and then I have a more, let's say, informed idea about how to apply it. And then once I apply it, I can disseminate in various different ways. I mean, I think the ultimate idea is still for me to hopefully have a publication out of it and I think that's important because that's, in a way, something that stays hopefully for generations there and it reaches a wider audience as well, right? But I don't think that might be the ultimate goal, as I said, but I think it's really nice that we can have all these kind of cycles in between and that's the way I think I like doing it, as you said, because it's a very practice-based also area, right? So in that sense it's very different, I think, than research in our field. I would say all those things I completely agree with you and it does feel a little bit like if you actually want to know what's going on, you might not be in a paper, you might be somewhere else, but then, like you say, at the end of that journey you come to write a paper and then when you use the word tension, I think that's right because then it becomes difficult to do that in an academically sound way to kind of document where you've got these things from. So I find that a challenge as well. For me, in maths, it's very clear. There's a hierarchy. You wouldn't be finding something on a podcast that you would feel like you wanted to write about. But, yeah, like we're saying, it's that you've got kind of an experience and a lot of training in your field about how to do these things and then in subtle it's a little bit different. So, yeah, I find that a bit of a challenge as well that there is these different things you could be looking at and maybe should be looking at and you're sort of thinking, oh, maybe I've not looked in the right place or something like that. Maybe I'm missing something really obvious and I'm a bit stuck in the past in this paper that was written in 1996. So, yeah, I find it challenging as well. That's a very fair point actually because it does also mean there is vast literature out there in different forms, right? So, as you said, sometimes it's not as straightforward as I would find it in economics, for example. I don't always know, okay, this is the most likely place I should go for this type of research, right? So, that is in a way a challenge as well. Which is its strength and its challenge, isn't it? Yeah. Inherently, I would say, you know, there are people who've argued that if subtle wants to be taken seriously and do good work, it needs to be based in disciplines. I think it's also really well lends itself to interdisciplinarity because teaching does cut to some degree across disciplines. Of course, it will be specific, but there are also really big shared experiences and practices, PBL, you know, sort of experiential learning, these terms that we use. They're not going to work in every context, but actually they've got currency in lots of them. So, but that does make it massive. So, how do you know who to have that conversation with and how do you build those networks maybe at that sort of middle level? Because I was reading something the other day talking about sort of, again, a bit formulated, but micro, meso and meta for subtle. So, micro being what you do in your own practice, how you work with colleagues in a department, meso being that institutional level. And I think you both mentioned, and I'd agree, we're reasonably well served at York for that. It doesn't always feel that clear where to go, but there are resources. And then taking that forward to kind of a more sort of international or intra-institutional level. I think just one point to make on that, that was that you, I think with both of your disciplines, it's fair to say they're quite empirical disciplines, right? So, you know, you can make claims, but they have a different approach to truth in the sense that, okay, if you look at like economic problems, like is universal basic income an effective way of mitigating poverty, for example? You know, there are right and wrong answers to that. And, you know, there's data you can draw on. And maths, obviously, is about as empirical as you can get. But when you come to looking at truth in scholarship of teaching and learning, like we talked about this, is it an empirical discipline where you can make truth claims about what works better? This is your point, isn't it? You've always looked really sceptical and said no. And this was the point I was making. So, yeah, like, so the point about the literature, I think it was just the fact that there's perhaps a broader circle of inclusion of, you know, where we can turn to for informational ideas about teaching and, you know, and learning and how people learn. I think that's in part a reflection because it just works in a slightly different way. You know, we don't necessarily think like, we don't see progress in the discipline in the sense that, oh, you know, there's been five years of progress in subtle, so now we sort of teach better than we did five years ago and no more. I don't think anyone thinks like that. So the literature isn't necessarily standing on the shoulders of giants. It's kind of, I think the paper there mentions more sort of conversational avenues of literature searching rather than... How does it divide them up again? It's got two... It talks about comprehensive and selective sourcing, which is a little bit manufactured, but I think there is a basic distinction, isn't there, between... Comprehensive sources seem to be the more traditional search for, like, library databases or educational research databases, and then selective I found quite interesting, actually. It's more... Felt to me more like when you're already a bit more acclimatised to the field, so they talk about looking at bibliographies, which actually I found some really helpful way of getting into a topic. So you read one article, you check the reference list at the back, and within, you know, three or four hours reading, you've got a sense of what's the debate on it. And I remember doing my PhD, my supervisor always talking about, well, you know, what are the key aspects of the debate? And I found it really difficult to kind of... Well, what's a debate? You know, it's not people. But that is scholarship, isn't it? It's a conversation that goes on over time, and it's about finding a conversation you want to listen to and being able to sort of cut out some stuff as well from that. I think that's really interesting. I've never thought about how it's not... It is standing on the shoulders of giants, but not in a linear directional way, isn't it? Whereas, like you say, maths, someone's done this, and then you're sort of building on it. Yeah, I've never thought of it like that. I always thought of it in the way that I was, you know, doing PGCAP or whatever and thinking, oh, I'm at such a disadvantage because all these people who do human analysis, like, they know how to do all this stuff, whereas it doesn't feel like similar to maths. It feels really other. But that's also to do with institutional stuff and pragmatics of, for example, how much funding SOTL gets. So, if it's classroom-based and it's inquiry-based and it starts often quite individualistic, the results are going to have limitations. If you did put large amounts of money into it or do longitudinal studies, you might get sort of different data. Then again, you've got the fact that there's so many variables. So, that's why I always do my sceptical eyebrow when we ask about it. Can we know what's working and what's not working? Well, yes, in a certain context, in a certain place, in a certain time. Yeah, we'll be on a podcast and she'll just raise an eyebrow. That's when I'm feeling happier. I don't snarl on those things. No, you're very restrained. Again, maybe it's the mathematical mind, but when you do these sorts of things, they want you to say, has this worked? Is this good? Obviously, you're writing something. Usually, you're saying, this is the best thing ever. Everyone should join me and do this. But I always find that difficult to evidence these things because I always think, say something like you're doing a problem-based learning, you might ask, how are you going to measure if that's been good? You could ask the students what they think, but sometimes you've deliberately made them uncomfortable. So, they're not going to give you an all-singing, all-dancing answer to that question and it's only, like you're saying, later on that they might look back and say, I'm really glad we did that problem-based learning. Now, I'm here in my job and it's really helping me out. But that's not a limitation of the discipline. It's a limitation of the resource because if you had the funding to ask them five years later, you could get that data. I mean, of course, it's always perception and that's one way of measuring something. Are you measuring learning? Not always. You've got performance as well, haven't you, in terms of ability to meet learning outcomes? Yeah, because there are studies like this in economics, right? They do follow same people throughout their life, actually, and then realise, you know, some patterns that exist among certain people with certain characteristics. So, yeah, like you said, but there has to be a significant amount of funding for it. But, yeah, I think also like Jess's point is really valid because when they're doing problem-based learning, for example, they will probably be not so happy about it at the beginning because we're going to push them out of their comfort zones. But then once they go for an interview where they need to discuss a topic among a group of interviewees, then they will realise, oh, I actually could maybe stand out because of what I did before. But then, yeah, you don't really capture that data if you don't follow them. I think that's probably like one way of overcoming this, I guess, is to keep doing these surveys, probably. But then again, we, at least in economics, have the challenge of having students answer those as well. That's one thing I have found really difficult because, yeah, with economics... Sorry, I didn't hear you. Having students do what? To answer with the survey. Yeah, respondent. Yeah, like the response rates have to be at a certain level for us to claim that this is what we observed and this is why it's useful. But if you can't get that certain level, it's very difficult. And that, as I said, is one of the challenges I found. Definitely. So this is a question I formed off the back of early on in the article. This point about the literature being structured differently in two individual disciplines. Conducting searches can be really challenging. Obviously, you two are great examples of this. You come from these very different backgrounds to Seoul and it's going to be constructed in a different way. How did you find tackling databases and doing comprehensive literature searches on the education literature? And part two of that question as well occurred to me as I was reading. People who come from a certain background have... You have an advantage if you're researching your discipline because you already have a sort of baseline of knowledge of the literature. You might not know exactly what you're writing about and you obviously need to research stuff, but you know where to find things, you know who the big names are, you know what the problems are, you know what the discussion points are. So you can go about it in a much more efficient way, whereas when you're coming to a new discipline like this, you don't even know or might not even know what the starting point is. So, yeah, there are two parts to that. I just wondered if you could... What were your experiences with approaching the literature for the first time on SOSL? Yeah, definitely I found it difficult and that was one of the reasons why I was saying earlier collaboration because it's trying... Like you say, in your discipline, you sort of know who the people are. So it's, do I know somebody who might be able to give me a bit of a crash course? But that's, like I was saying earlier, for me, that's one of my own... No, insecurity is the wrong word, but worries that I have because I do just feel that you may miss something mega. That's, like I say, why I would bring in the friend who knows a bit more about it to say, am I just missing something that everybody else in the world knows about, but I don't because, yeah, there could be something hidden in the general literature, there might be something in maths, there might be something that they've done in archaeology that's really relevant and you've missed that off and it's really famous. So, for me, I find it difficult. I don't have the answer, but as I say, one of them was trying to get people involved who I feel know a little bit more to help me out there. But it's like you were saying earlier, I think for me it was starting with something, trying to work out what's the super famous thing and then kind of using that a little bit as a, let's have a look in the bibliography and see if that can steer me in places. But, yeah, it's latching on to that. Is there something that's the seminal work that, you know, I'd be an idiot if I missed and then using that to help me. But then, like I say, I always have this worry that I've missed it. But then that's the review process, isn't it? They should tell me if I've missed something. It should be a community practice and it's not only your responsibility. And that's why I think, again, there's a sort of communal potential here that's really important not to lose. That should be a bigger responsibility as well. And like I was saying there, things in the university that you can kind of test it out by going up, like you were saying there, in the levels, going up a little bit. So, yeah, have I done something in a foreign magazine? And do those people go, oh, you know, you've missed this thing. And, again, it's that critical friend. It's not them telling me off saying, oh, my gosh, I can't believe you missed that. It is, have you read this? You might find this one interesting. But that's the worry I have all the time. Maybe that drives me. I think, actually, that made me now think. In that sense, I feel people who are interested in SOTL are actually maybe much less cruel than, you know, people doing research in our own fields. I mean, now that you said it, I realize I would be much more likely to get a response like that, oh, I can't believe you missed that. I mean, I guess that is also, again, an advantage of being able to have these conversations without having this fear of, I guess, looking like a fool, I suppose. Because that's what I have been doing a lot as well. And I think it's really useful. So if you find something, let's say, you're interested in. So yesterday, for example, I just attended a workshop on employability and how to embed it in the curriculum. And I think it's quite relevant for problem-based learning. So that's why I attended that workshop. And then there, actually, I met some people who are already working on this or who are interested in this. And then it's much easier to ask them, right, actually, if I want to do this, can you actually point me in the direction of some resources or can I have a chat with you? And then I think once you know who to go to in which area within your own network, let's say, I think it becomes much more easier. So that's the approach I have been usually following. So it's communities of practice, which is the kind of, like, formal way of saying sharing and collaborating and kind of that kind of, again, I would quote, if it was at Schulman, it's teaching commons. It's fast if we have to recreate the wheel every time. So something about going and having those conversations. And it reminds me as well of in the social practitioner videos, which you were part of, Phil, Penn Holland was saying, find your people, find your people at the institution, but they'll then help you find your people in the wider literature. And it does feel uncomfortable at first, actually. I mean, that is scholarship, isn't it? And research is there is a risk of you kind of realize how much you don't know. You also know, like, I don't know why it's interesting. It's generative as well as terrifying. I like the point about the insecurity. Good thing is really valid because you get you don't know what what's new knowledge and what's a cliche. Like you might say, I mean, people coming from a different background who are new to education, perhaps they're experts in their field, but they don't know a lot of the educational literature is new. They might be they might be reading about Bloom's taxonomy for the first time. And, you know, a lot. It's when you come to write about it, you don't know. Do I need to do I still need to reference Bloom's taxonomy or is it just, you know, been absorbed into common parlance now? And these kinds of things where you're insecure, you don't know whether what you're saying is perhaps. I wonder if that's, again, a bit of a disciplinary thing, because I certainly had that through my PhD where there were a lot, you know, I would go to I went to conferences when I was doing my research and thought, well, does everybody in the room think this is just ridiculous because it feels fresh and new to me, but it might not be that fresh or that new. But maybe that's more about that discursive kind of text based work where you could easily miss stuff. Whereas I guess if you're it's a bit more. What's the word? Sort of accumulative knowledge. It's easier to know you've got it right when you've got it right. Yeah, I think that so to stick up for our discipline a little bit. I think it is that because that when if I'm going to a mass conference to speak about some mass research, I'm quietly confident that I do know this is new because I've read everything that I need to read. And like I said, there's a confidence that I feel like I've turned over every rock that I know to turn over. And then in this world, it's like there might be a rock I don't even know that I haven't turned over. So that's perhaps why people are a bit more like you've missed this. You shouldn't have missed this. But yeah. So I think that's the difference, maybe in the disciplines, that it's easier to feel confident about what's fresh and new, perhaps in other disciplines than these ones. Is it is it also about how outputs are recognised or measured in the in disciplinary research? I suppose there's rest, isn't there? And there's to make an understatement, a fair degree of competition around that. Whereas we don't have that yet. Happily, it is. That's really interesting. Be careful what you wish for, because we are in a research intensive. The currency of the institution is research. That's what gets the kind of status. And there's a bit of me that doesn't want to go anywhere near that with scholarships. Actually, I think it's a much healthier sort of environment to be in. But that is also a limitation because it means we don't get the recognition in the same way yet for the scholarship. So I wonder if it's also a bit about the sort of position of those things in the institution. Or maybe it's just that the scholarship are a very sort of generous lot. It is relational, isn't it? Yeah. Good teaching is relational. You would hope for that, I think, in a kind of scholarly community as well. Yeah, but I think that's that. Like you say, the community that you're speaking to, they're there because they're interested and they. Yeah, they're not. Whereas. Yeah. Yeah. I suppose, obviously, in economics, however, they're there because they're interested. But it's a different way, isn't it? I suppose we're a bit of a selected, selected group. We've all found each other because we want to look a little bit more at this. And I know everybody's feeling a little bit the same. So, yeah, it's different. But I think the difference and one of the nice differences as well in scholarship is that people are a bit more upfront about that discomfort for whatever reason. And I find that really refreshing and really sort of helpful because it is there. And then you can work with people about it. And this, like you said, to me, is scholarship. It's having an open discussion, reflecting, challenging, being curious, kind of wanting to get further with something. And it feels refreshing as well, right? Like when everyone is a bit more honest about, you know, how they feel. And that also, in a way, shapes the conversation you have. I find that very refreshing, as I said, I think. Yeah, maybe if there was a ref, people wouldn't be as honest. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's the critique now, isn't it? A referable research that it follows a certain path rather than necessarily the curiosity driven or the kind of, I don't know, empiricist way you should be going, but what the agenda says you should be doing. So, yeah, long live the no ref for Sotala. Connect that that line about maybe thinking differently to the paper again. So if we're saying, you know, scholarship in some senses is a bit of a counterbalance to that referable or sort of metrics driven stuff. One of the points in the paper is that we should be looking for literature that's not canonical and literature that's not sort of easily findable in all these. What do they call them? Comprehensive tools. So how how would you do that? And you said that's something that's quite a live conversation in economics now. Can you reflect a bit on that in economics or around the muscle? Yeah, sure. I mean, yeah, I can. I think so far economics, for example, as I said, there was this movement to kind of re-engage economics with the real world problems and policies. And there was, for example, I think it was a couple of people initially who created an open resource book to teach for those who want to teach economics that way. And I was actually using it as well. It was only, I think, maybe a handful of universities who were using it. And now I think they said it's more than 300 universities around the world using this, for example. So that made it for me much easier to then find people who think in a similar way. And they were sharing a lot of resources on that website as well after it started. So in that way, I think if you have I think it connects to what I said before. If you know a resource on a particular area that you're interested in, then that can help you a lot actually with finding what you're looking for, even though it might not be in journals. So for me, yeah, yeah. So for me, that was – and in economics, again, it's a bit easier, I suppose. I don't know other fields, obviously, but in UK, for example, we have Economics Network. They also have in US a similar committee that works on enhancing teaching and learning in economics in universities. So then I know those are one of the two places that I can look for as well. They have like case studies as well, for example. So then it makes it much easier. Those resources and those kind of materials, are they – what do they give you that you wouldn't find in the mainstream, if you like? Or what's the value for you? I mean, I think one of the main advantages is that it is – there's a much quicker turnaround, right? So they don't have to go through all these really long, let's say, review processes. I mean, there is still some review, but it's not as scrutinized as you would need to have a review in a journal article. So then that means there are case studies popping up very frequently. So that also, in a way, makes it much easier to keep up to date with what people are doing, and also to know about people who are working on different things. So then it's much – it feels much more informal. So then it also feels like I could approach them, let's say, very easily, send an email, and I would feel more confident that they would respond to me, for example. But if I were to send them maybe an email about an article they published in this journal, which had thousands of citations, I would think, ah, they're probably not going to respond to me. So I think using those resources and those who are engaging with those resources makes it much easier to, again, communicate and collaborate and keep up to date with what is happening. There's also a bit of an issue with the comprehensive strand of literature reviews they're talking about, with big journals and high-impact publications. These things are behind paywalls, and they are usually only accessible if you're part of an institution. Is there a sort of inclusivity argument to moving to a more sort of open-source, open-knowledge forum? Because there's a lot of people, teaching practitioners, who aren't part of large institutions with mega-budgets and don't have access and can't pay $50 a day for access to a journal, therefore kind of are excluded from the conversation and find it difficult to carry out their research. I mean, is that an argument as well to broaden the circle in other disciplines? I know this is – I know the peer-review process and these publications have come under fire a bit in loads of institutions. I don't know what feeling is in yours, economics and maths, but it just seems to me they are a little bit behind the times, perhaps, and they're not quite as – maybe we should be moving to things that are a little bit more accessible to everyone. Yeah, I think – so, again, go back to when I was a teacher. They're not. They're people who are teaching every single day, but they're not going to be reading journals. But they have a lot of – you know, there's Mr Barton Maths and all these things that are really famous, and they have those sorts of ways of spreading cool ideas, and they're not. And then I did a survey, and then I can show you that this – you know, there's that bit of looking at something someone else has done and going, oh, yeah, that's good, and I can't say, you know, officially why I think it's good. I just think it's good. Oh, great, yeah. Yeah, and I think that's – how can I phrase this? So, when you're doing the PGCAP or whatever, you do get people saying things like, oh, you know, I just don't want to – you know, I've had this idea. I think it's good. This is why I do it, but I don't want to have to go and read ten – you know, read the literature and evidence why I think it's going to be a successful thing. And so I think there is that. Like you say, it's practice-based. We're talking about busy people who are doing things every single day, and that's just a quicker way of getting it out there and sharing it, and if you actually do something officially and properly for a journal, that is necessarily going to take more time, isn't it? So, yeah, I just think the reality is that perhaps the way that's going to make a real impact on what people do is going to be, like you're saying, these sorts of resources that are a bit more widely accessible. I don't think it's exclusively one or the other. No, yeah. I think you absolutely need both, and I think that's why I always found learning and teaching really interesting because, for me, I came from a really pure humanities background where things were very abstract. I was looking at specific texts from 160 years ago that, you know, probably 20 people other than me might have been interested in, and that was, in some sense, useful, but there wasn't much practice. There wasn't much meeting of theory and practicality, and I think I missed that because I missed the humanity of it as well, and I think to do good scholarship, to do scholarly teaching, we need those shared networks, and that is a different need to a journal article for me, and I want both. I think the challenge, again, is finding time to engage with the more formal stuff, but I think there's a value in it, and I wouldn't want it to go away because I think there's care and consideration there that you can't put into a blog post or, you know, a shared set of resources. Yeah. And I think it's, again, I think it's because I come from a discipline, maybe as an economist you're a bit more like this in that, in some way, you know, traditional scientists would be looking at this world and going, oh, what are they doing, and sort of studying it like if you study tigers or whatever, but they're not part of it, whereas, say, in economics, you are part of it, so it's that, yeah, it needs both, doesn't it? It's like, actually, they're the group that you're studying, but you're also a part of it as well, so it's, yeah, you're also a tiger. We need a social scientist. Yeah. Surely. But I think just one more thing to bring back to the paper as well, because when we talked there about what kinds of literature, we were kind of talking about more traditional or sort of higher status literature, like journal articles, verses, if you like, grey literature, blogs. I also think there's a sort of inclusivity aspect in terms of which journal articles. So they talk here a lot about this North American bias from scholarship because it did develop there, and it's something I've been thinking about in relation to Journal Club as well. What if I put a small case study from Indonesia on there? Is anybody going to come if I do that? And maybe I should be a bit braver with that and choose a topic where the topic is relevant, but the context is really maybe quite different. But there's something about, yeah, how do we suddenly break out of our little Western-centric, US-centric sort of canon of stuff? Do we do that just by... Because in a library you might find something or you might have a conversation with something. They talk about serendipity here, which I think is quite interesting too. I mean, I probably romanticise that a bit, but I think there's a value in it. Do you read outside of your... Yeah, no, I read that bit. ...time to do that. I like that bit because it talks about browsing the literature. I can't remember the last time you had a... One of the things I usually recommend my students to do is actually physically go to the library. Yeah. You end up coming out with things that you didn't expect. It is a bit serendipitous, and I think the idea... I mean, I think they mentioned in the article the idea of... I can't remember what the wording was they used, but searching for things that support your own argument already. Yeah. Isn't that sort of like the most unscientific way of... So, yeah, as opposed to sitting at a database, you know, and just searching for things that, you know, confirm what you think, going out there and just browsing and coming across things that may or may not... So, the number one recommendation on that, Phil, is be wakeful. Wakeful. Which is a little bit, again, vague, but it is that sense of genuine curiosity, isn't it, and not... I didn't even know that was a word. Well, it is now. Self-assess, read widely and seriously. Name them, identify with care, include voices. So, again, there's language here that reminds me of sort of EDI initiatives and staff-student partnership as well, but it's conscious looking, isn't it? It's something about sort of not just doing the autonomous sort of return. I think at a risk of opening a can of worms, but that's something that, because the search engine is a bit more black box, you're not... So, again, reading that, I am aware that, in some way, if I search for something and you search for something on Google Scholar, we might get different things, but I don't know... So, I'm aware of it, but I don't know that mechanism, so I don't know exactly how to be aware of it, whereas if you're in a library, you understand that. There's nothing... Do you see what I mean? They're not going to... I see different books to you or whatever. So, I think... And then, yeah, so the chat GTP thing and the saying about how that's going to just really entrench biases that are already there. And, yeah, I think that's on the next level, but it's certainly something we need to be conscious of. What are your future directions, do you think, with regard to your scholarship? Lunch or... Yeah, that's it. Right, done. Yeah, where would you like to go with your scholarship? Well, I think... I mean, I did talk a bit about what I'm doing at the moment, right? So, I think, yeah, for me, the main thing is to become more knowledgeable, I guess, in problem-based learning, because it is something, I think, that has been applied more widely in some other disciplines, like in Europe, you know, law school. And through this partnership I had with other departments, I also realized, actually, there are quite a few departments that use it much more extensively. But in economics, I don't think it is... I mean, at least in York, it has never been used, and I also know at other universities. There are some exceptions, obviously, in Europe, but other than those, in the UK, at least, I know it's not that widely used. So, I think, for me... So, in this case, I will really need to do... I mean, I have been doing some reading already, but I know that I need to also go much deeper than what I already know at the moment. So, I think, for me, that's probably a priority, because then, next year, we are going to design that module. So, that's why now we are collecting feedback from students who have already been exposed to it, and then that, together with the literature, will inform the module and assessment design. And, yeah, I think, as I said, for me, that's the main thing. So, my other interest, I probably will need to put on the shelf for a bit. So, that's, yeah, my, I guess, the most significant project that I will be working on. I was having this conversation yesterday in a maths context about, sort of, you know, should you have one area that you absolutely fix on and become the world expert in, or should you spread yourself a bit thinner? With FOTL stuff, I kind of... My answer to that would be, I think you should be doing what you're doing. And so, that's why I'm going to say I'm going to... Maybe we need to speak to each other. Maybe this is a serendipitous moment. But, so, the stuff that I was doing before was on PAL, because that was what I was heavily involved in, but now I've got a new role, so I'm moving away from that. So, I think, for me, there's no point in me still doing a load of stuff on PAL, just because I've spent time on it already. So, my future thing I'm thinking about, and I hope some of the things we've touched on today, this might make my life a little bit easier, because it's students as consultants, because I'm statistics, which is an area, and then, like I was saying before, so that should be quite discipline-specific, so hopefully that's narrowing the rocks I need to turn over. But, yeah, so that's where I'm thinking, and I've got a few things that we're doing in the department and a few people that we know, and I'm actually... Oh, no, this is... I shouldn't say this. I've been asked to be on a panel. I was quite... Yeah, no, it's just, you know, when your mouth started working, you're like, oh, no, everyone's going to be like, oh, gosh, yes. But, yeah, so I've been asked to be on a panel at a conference about students as consultants, so that will hopefully be talking to the right people, even if I'm shocked they've considered me to be one of them. Maybe they want to have someone asking the silly questions. But, yeah, so that's the sort of direction I'm moving in a little bit. But problem-based learning, I think, links in with that, so maybe there are some rocks a bit further away I need to turn over as well. Will you both come back and tell us about them? Because we'll definitely be doing this in a year, won't we? Yeah. Whilst you hear the recording, if you're sure you are, you know, tell us back. Bold claim. Yeah, definitely. Definitely, yeah. Again, so I'm taking over new module and we've... Yeah, I don't know how widely this is going to be, but the semesterisation, modulisation, so things are getting overhauled anyway, so this is very much in my mind as I'm reworking this module, thinking about this particular module, how that could be done in a different way. So, yeah, I think that will be a longer-term thing because just of the nature of, well, teaching, isn't it? You sort of have to do one thing and then keep refining it. So, yeah, definitely, if you'll have us, we'll come back. Yeah, I mean, it'll be good to do some of these, like you're talking about the economics study, people over time, you know, how has your practice changed? Especially, like, looking back on a conversation that you had a year ago, then it might be really interesting. Yeah, it would be really interesting. Yeah, they've set some goals right now. Yeah. That we can revisit. Yeah, yeah. It's time next year, Delboy. Yeah, yeah. No, it was Rodney, wasn't it? Sorry. Yeah. We're millionaires. Yeah. Delboy said it, yeah. It's time next year, Rodney, we'll be published. Anyway, well, it's been really great. Thank you so much for coming in, guys. Thank you for having us. It's been a pleasure, yeah. See you next year. Thank you.
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