The second annual Sydney Education Unconference in 2024 lets us share ideas, get inspired, form networks, and connect with the wider group of educators at Sydney.
Loosely following an unconference format, registrants are invited to pose potential sessions they would like to run, or take part in. These sessions will be 45 minutes long and be interactive, collaborative, and discussion-based. Sessions will be curated ahead of the day, based on proposals and interests, and merged if necessary. Sessions would usually run once, or twice if there is sufficient demand known ahead of time.
Session formats may include:
- Workshop/tutorial/hackathon – interactive, practical, and hands-on activities that help individuals or groups produce a tangible output e.g. how to include student voice, how to design for equity, how to design assessments to include AI.
- Problem sharing – interaction session to share teaching issues/challenges and work collaboratively to solve them.
- World café or micro-stations – small rotating groups of participants aided by group facilitators to discuss a wicked challenge or share practical ideas around a set of related teaching approaches e.g. unit/course coordination challenges.
- Speed mentoring – rotating 1:1 or small group conversations that aim to mix participants and ideas around a particular topic e.g. building education-focused careers.
Details
Date and time: Wednesday 7 February 2024 from lunchtime until late afternoon
Venue: University of Sydney main campus. Due to the interactive nature of the Unconference, this will be an in-person event only.
Cost: Free, but registrations are essential for catering purposes.
Audience: University of Sydney staff who are education-focused academics, educational designers, HEA/AdvanceHE fellows, unit coordinators, sessional academics, other educators. Educators from other institutions are welcome as well.
The Unconference is co-located with the 2024 AI in Higher Education ANZ Symposium, which will run in the morning before the Unconference. You are most welcome to register for that symposium as well.
Event full - register for the waiting list
Program
This program is subject to change. All times are in Sydney time (Australian Eastern Daylight Time).
| Time | Track 1 | Track 2 | Track 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1:00 pm | Lunch | ||
| 1:45 pm | |||
| 2:00 pm | [1A] Creating a kind classroom: character, caring and cakes enables everyone to connect Anne Cusick, Jedidiah Evans, Fran Van Den Berg, Sam Clarke Location: Lecture Theatre 1130, Abercrombie Building H70 Our University is big, complex, complicated, and difficult to navigate. Classroom teachers have an opportunity and privilege to bring humanity and kindness into the machine so that we and our student... [more] | [2A] Research education and generative AI Stafford Lumsden, Joanne Hart, Gordon McDonald, Minh Huynh Location: Lecture Theatre 1070 Abercrombie Building H70 How is AI impacting undergraduate and postgraduate research education, and student research projects at any level? We aim to explore the implications of generative AI and some solutions to key challen... [more] | [3A] Indigenisation of Curricula: Growth and Opportunities Jennifer Barrett, Tom Harber, Abraham Bradfield, Kotryna Fraser, Alix Thoeming, alessandra wollaston Location: Lecture Theatre 1170, Abercrombie Building H70 The inclusion and celebration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, languages and knowledge systems in curricula is a key element of One Sydney, Many People. It is also a University commi... [more] |
| 2:45 pm | [1B] How coordinators can support students at scale but still be personal and human Jane Kerr, Shane Wilksinson, Hamish Fernando, Alix Thoeming, Ben Miller Location: Lecture Theatre 1130, Abercrombie Building H70 With growing cohort sizes and students with increasingly diverse backgrounds and needs, how do we support students whilst still maintaining the humanity of relationships? We'll explore activities... [more] | [2B] Partnering with students to design learning and assessment Alison Casey, Maria Ishkova, Jesse Xu, Jess Frawley, Minh Huynh Location: Lecture Theatre 1070 Abercrombie Building H70 Involving students as citizens of their learning is a key part of the Teaching and Learning Strategy 2023-2025. How can we partner with students in a way that genuinely invites their voices and perspe... [more] | [3B] Authentic assessment reform in the age of AI James Kite, Tatjana Seizova-Cajic, Susan Thomas, Ben Miller, Adam Bridgeman, Danny Liu Location: Lecture Theatre 1170, Abercrombie Building H70 Generative AI presents challenges and opportunities for assessments. Find out how colleagues are responding to assessments and workshop solutions for your own assessments.... [more] |
| 3:30 pm | [1C] Authentic assessment reform in the age of AI James Kite, Tatjana Seizova-Cajic, Susan Thomas, Ben Miller, Adam Bridgeman, Danny Liu Location: Lecture Theatre 1130, Abercrombie Building H70 (Repeat session) Generative AI presents challenges and opportunities for assessments. Find out how colleagues are responding to assessments and workshop solutions for your own assessments.... [more] | [2C] Making peer evaluation and feedback of an individual’s group work engagement a supportive experience Peter Kench, Ju Li Ng, Fabian Held, Becky Denham, Kria Coleman, Robyn Martin Location: Lecture Theatre 1070 Abercrombie Building H70 Group work has many benefits as students collaboratively address problems or questions. In this session, we explore how peer evaluation and feedback processes of an individual's contribution to t... [more] | [3C] Managing priorities in teaching workload Laura Di Michele, Clara Sitbon, Tim Lee, Amanda Punch, Frances Gray, Eszter Kalman, Sam Clarke Location: Lecture Theatre 1170 Abercrombie Building H70 Come and have an open dialogue with other staff (especially education-focused academics) about how we manage our priorities and how we prioritise quality in our teaching. With heavy teaching workloads... [more] |
| 4:15 pm | Drinks and canapes Please join us for drinks and canapes in the foyer area as we look ahead to 2024.... [more] | ||
What would you like to learn or share?
We are keen to find out what topics around learning, teaching, and assessment you would like to learn more about, or share. Please post your ideas into the Padlet below and vote for others that you want to see. To post an idea, click the plus button in the bottom right of the Padlet wall. If you are from the University of Sydney and would like to help facilitate a session, please leave your name in your post below.
More information
This Unconference is being run by the Educational Innovation team in the DVC (Education) Portfolio.
For more information, please contact [email protected]