The E-learning Unit are able to fund pieces of e-learning development that an individual academic may not have the time or skills to do themselves.  We talk over the planned work with you, provide you with an E-Learning Assistant to assist in the development and we provide background oversight to ensure the project takes place as planned and agreed.  We then ask that you provide feedback about the development by writing a short case study and/or presenting at one of our Practitioner Network events.

What is it?

Traditionally, at the E-Learning Unit, we have been able to offer guidance and training to staff to develop their e-learning initiatives.  However, for larger or technically complex projects, we have found that a number of good ideas are never realised simply because we can’t help with production. The E-Learning Production Scheme helps us plug that gap and enables us to offer valuable resource to staff who have good ideas for e-learning, but perhaps not the time or skills to get the project started.

If we are able to fund your project under the Scheme, we will recruit and train an E-Learning Assistant to work on it with you.  The assistant will be a student from within Queen Mary who will work under the direction of a Learning Technologist from the E-Learning Unit.  You will of course retain control of your project, but it will benefit from both guidance from the ELU and extra resource through a dedicated E-Learning Assistant.

What we will fund

The scheme is open to all staff at Queen Mary. We will fund projects that are tightly defined in scope and can be completed within a single academic year.  The scheme is not able to supplement general teaching budgets nor provide regular funding for ongoing projects, but exists instead to provide a “kick–start” to new initiatives.

As a general  guide, if your project:

• is a new activity or initiative for you or your course;
• makes use of learning technologies (i.e locally supported technologies such as QMplus, QMplus Hub, QMplus Media, Q-Review or external to QMUL;
• is self-contained i.e. has a start and an end date;
• is sustainable i.e. it will continue without intensive ELU input after the project has finished;
• is small – i.e. requires 2 or 4 weeks of an E-Learning Assistant’s time; and
• cannot be funded with your existing departmental teaching budget

then we may fund it. You can browse some examples of our current projects . However, if you are not sure, get in touch with us (elearning@qmul.ac.uk) and we can discuss it. Projects that have been discussed with a member of the team prior to submission usually fare better than those that don’t!

How it works

If you have an e-learning idea you would like to pursue, feel free to arrange a meeting with us to discuss your idea/proposal before you submit the form below to the E-learning Unit (elearning@qmul.ac.uk) . If you have already discussed with us then please outline the project as mentioned on the form below so that we can process the application formally.

The next stage is to meet with a Learning Technologist and work with them to define your requirements, agree on the level of funding (usually stated as a maximum number of hours of an Assistant) and identify what role your E-Learning Assistant should take.  All this takes place in the first week after we notify you. We will take the time to recruit a suitable student – if you have a student in mind, you can put them forward – and then we’re ready to start.

What we want from you

Our aim in running this service is to encourage a culture of innovation in the uses of learning technologies across Queen Mary.  We hope to increase both the number and variety of activities, but also to disseminate good practice to colleagues across the College.

What we ask of you, is to meet agreed deadlines and agree to share your experience with others through either a written or video case-study or interview on our website, or perhaps a presentation of your work at a Teaching and Learning seminar.

ELU Contact

Please feel free to contact Manoj Singh in the E-Learning Unit if you have any questions or require further information.