MANAGEMENT OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH - 2023/4
Module code: MMIM016
Module Overview
Students will receive training in managing scientific research including managing time and groups, ethics, quality assurance, statistics and networking. Group exercises will be used to facilitate effective and successful teamwork and students will work together to produce and deliver a short presentation and a scientific poster on a global and topical theme galvanized from the latest literature. A networking event at the end of the module will allow the student to present their work to their peers, PhD students, post-doctoral scientists, and academics in the department developing students resilience. Finally, students will produce a grant proposal to hone higher order thinking skills essential for employability and also apply key digital skills to design experiments and analyse data. This effortlessly encompasses all of the five pillars.
Module provider
School of Biosciences
Module Leader
BESTE Dany (Biosciences)
Number of Credits: 15
ECTS Credits: 7.5
Framework: FHEQ Level 7
Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A
Overall student workload
Workshop Hours: 16.5
Independent Learning Hours: 66
Seminar Hours: 8.5
Practical/Performance Hours: 4
Guided Learning: 50
Captured Content: 5
Module Availability
Semester 1
Prerequisites / Co-requisites
None
Module content
Seminar 1: Writing a successful grant proposal (2 h)
Seminar 2. Writing a talk (1.5 h)
Seminar 3. Quality Assurance and Quality control (2 h)
Workshop 1: Delivering outstanding oral presentations (8 h)
Seminar 4. Composing attractive and effective scientific posters (1.5 h)
Workshop 2: Ethics (2 h)
Seminar 5: Intelligent experimental design for grant proposals (1.5 h)
Workshop 3: Poster design workshop (2 h)
Workshop 4: Management skills/ project/people/time (3 h)
Workshop 5: Networking skills (1.5 h)
Poster presentation and networking event (4 h).
Assessment pattern
| Assessment type | Unit of assessment | Weighting |
|---|---|---|
| Coursework | PRESENTATION | 20 |
| Coursework | POSTER | 20 |
| Coursework | ESSAY | 60 |
Alternative Assessment
None
Assessment Strategy
The assessment strategy is designed to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate:
• That they can write and deliver an oral presentation (employability, resilience)
• They can write and present a scientific poster (employability)
• They are able to work in a group and deliver work in a timely fashion (resilience, employability, sustainability)
• They are able to assess their peers (resilience, global and cultural awareness)
• They are able to write an original research idea up as a grant proposal (global and cultural awareness, employability, digital capabilities).
Thus, the summative assessment for this module consists of:
A short group presentation (20%, 10 minutes, ILO1,2,4): the students are divided into groups randomly and select a topical and high-impact themes galvanised from the latest literature. Students present laymen talks (this involves collaboration with SPLASH)
A group poster presentation (20%, 4 hours, ILO1, 2, 3, 4): The students continue with their selected theme and in their groups develop a poster which they present to other academic, PDRA’s and PhD students thereby providing the students with an experience an authentic conference atmosphere.
Grant proposal (50% non-technical summary (300 words), Scientific summary (300 words)
Main proposal (5-6 pages), ILO1,2,3,4): Finally, the students write an individual grant proposal based on this theme to develop their skills in generating testable hypothesis, experiments, and grant writing skills.
Formative assessment and feedback
Students will get extensive feedback throughout the course from both the academics, PGRs and we use peer to peer assessment within this module.
Module aims
- Facilitate effective and successful teamwork developing key employability skills and resilience.
- Explain concepts of ethics, statistics, quality assurance ensuring sustainability in science and global and cultural capabilities
- Augment skills required to produce well-argued written and oral work, essential to any profession.
- Enhance student¿s ability to manage their own time and the time of others developing student resilience.
- Develop students¿ ability to pose research questions, develop hypotheses, and design experiments using digital capabilities to answer important questions.
Learning outcomes
| Attributes Developed | ||
| 001 | ||
| 002 | ||
| 006 | Communicate scientific ideas and research through effective and attractive scientific posters, oral presentations, and grant proposals enhancing future employability. | CPT |
| 003 | ||
| 004 | ||
| 005 | . | |
| 007 | Apply methods for time and people management enhancing resilience | P |
| 008 | Generate testable research hypothesis | KCPT |
| 009 | Reflect and critically analyse the ethics involved in scientific research important in the sustainability of research. | KC |
Attributes Developed
C - Cognitive/analytical
K - Subject knowledge
T - Transferable skills
P - Professional/Practical skills
Methods of Teaching / Learning
The learning and teaching strategy is designed to:
Provide students the maximum amount of practice in management of scientific research. Each week has a different theme (writing, speaking, analysis, management and synthesising everything together) and employs a combination of interactive sessions, lectures, group work, group discussions and workshops to insure maximum student interaction and participation.
Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.
Reading list
https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: MMIM016
Other information
|
Resourcefulness & resilience: This module provides students with an excellent opportunity to enhance their critical thinking using a flipped classroom approach and thereby developing students critical thinking and empowering students to take ownership of their own learning. Global & cultural capabilities: This module incorporates a variety of approaches to facilitate student participation. We use peer to peer marking. During the module, the students have sessions on ethical considerations of research. We ensure that are topical topics are selected from the most recent scientific papers to reflect global problems and are not just focused on the global north. Sustainability: Develop students’ awareness of how global warming and destruction of habitats has affected infectious diseases. Digital capabilities: Students design and write a grant proposal based on a hot topic which they have already presented a talk and poster on. This can be on any research question which can be wet or dry and must include details on statistics, power calculations etc. Employability: Students learn several important transferable skills in this module which employers want including team working, presentation skills (oral and written), networking and there is a big focus on critical thinking. |
Programmes this module appears in
| Programme | Semester | Classification | Qualifying conditions |
|---|---|---|---|
| Biomedical Science MSci (Hons) | 1 | Optional | A weighted aggregate mark of 50% is required to pass the module |
Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2023/4 academic year.