30/10: Reflection of HPE Scholarship Process 2019

Reflection of HPE Scholarship Process 2019

30th October 2019

Today was the final day of the Health & Physical Education Scholarship process for 2019. For the Health & Physical Education scholarship students self-select a topic or issue they would like to exam in depth over a 30 page report. As this was my first year leading the programme I thought I'd take the time to reflect on the positives and negatives of this year's process to help improve for next year.

Tips for 2020:

• Multiple afternoon workshops
  This year we held 4 afternoon workshops in Term 4. Each workshop ran for about 3 hours. The aim of these workshops was to give students an opportunity to chip away at their report, while having the support of staff in the room. Overall this process was really effective this year. This worked better than previous years where we held two big workshops that ran for about 6-7 hours each. For 2020 I would look at potentially adding some in the final week of T3 to encourage students to start working earlier.
• Insist on drafts by end of T3
  This year it seemed like students started the writing process later than previous years. I'm not sure if this is because we had less NCEA students participating this year who are given class time? By adding a workshop or two in the final week of Term 3 I would hope that would encourage students to start writing earlier. I would also push for students to have a rough draft before the end of Term 3.
• Push criticality
  This year some students struggled with the level of criticality needed for their report. They often chose topics they were passionate about, which is great, but they often had a strong view or opinion which reflected as a one sided argument. This typically was harder for the Cambridge students and I wonder if this is due to the level of criticality in Level 2 & 3 Physical Education? I wonder if we can push the idea of criticality earlier e.g. in Dragon’s Den workshop?
• Focus on solutions
  Students often also underestimate the importance of the solutions that they suggest towards the end of their report. By really looking in depth to what they suggest such as how it would be implemented, the change they hope it will have etc it will show a deeper understanding and a more critical view.
• Encourage students to reference as they writeStudents often underestimate the time it takes for them to reference their work properly once they have finished their writing. By teaching students how to reference and to reference as they go this will help to eliminate the rush of referencing once a report is deemed complete.
• Research & ReadingsSome students struggled to find academic readings and references to refer to while writing their report. Next year a base folder could be made with readings applicable to different scholarship topics for students to access and utilise.

This process wouldn't be as effective if it wasn't for the help and support of the department. For now all we can do is wait until the results come out to see how our students have gone.