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Student Engagement Toolkit
Alignment to PS vision and ambitions:
Background: Student engagement is crucial for ensuring university projects reflect the needs, experiences, and perspectives of UoM’s diverse student body. However, engagement practices across the Strategic Change Office (SCO) have often been inconsistent, with some projects struggling to communicate with and effectively engage with students throughout project lifecycles. It became clear that here was need for a more structured and sustainable approach to embedding student voices into current and future change initiatives.
This initiative aimed to develop and launch a Student Engagement Toolkit, providing practical guidance for project managers and the wider project team on how to meaningfully involve students throughout the project lifecycle. The completed Toolkit was then presented during a dedicated in-person workshop attended by SCO colleagues and students on Tuesday 25th March 2025 that intended to:
- Raise awareness of student engagement best practices.
- Equip staff with practical tools and strategies.
- Foster collaboration between professional services teams and students
With increasing recognition of the value of student co-creation, this initiative aligned with the University’s strategic focus on student experience and engagement. It aimed to address existing gaps in engagement practices and promote a more student-centred approach to change management, especially in projects that directly impact students.
The Toolkit was developed by Bliss Ross between November 2024- March 2025 and had contributions from 26 members of staff across 9 different departments. The project was overseen by the Deputy Director of Transformation, Miranda Hall. Other key stakeholders include SCO colleagues responsible for leading change projects and current and future UoM students.
Objectives
What did the project aim to achieve? Outline the main objectives:
- Develop and launch a Student Engagement Toolkit to provide staff with clear guidance on embedding student voices in change projects.
- Facilitate collaboration between students and professional services staff, ensuring students’ perspectives inform project decisions.
- Promote best practices for sustainable student engagement, encouraging long-term improvements in how change initiatives involve students.
Approach and Challenges
Approach:
The launch of the Toolkit was structured as a two-part workshop which combined knowledge-sharing with an interactive group case study activity:
1. Listen and Learn:
- Introduction by Miranda Hall, setting the scene for the importance of student engagement.
- Presentation of the Student Engagement Toolkit (Bliss Ross), outlining best practices, strategies, and tools.
- Reflections on previous student engagement efforts (Ella Gould – Evolve, Monica Mihai – External Calling), sharing lessons learned.
- Student talk by Anna Thompson, highlighting the value of paid student involvement in university projects through casual employment and a Student Experience Internship (SEI).
2. Interactive Group Activity:
- SCO colleagues worked in table groups alongside students to identify key touch points for student engagement and to develop a subsequent student engagement plan for a fictional Learner Analytics Project.
- This exercise encouraged collaboration, practical application of the toolkit, and deeper discussions on best practice engagement strategies.
Challenges & How They Were Addressed:
- Raising awareness of the Toolkit: Ensuring staff understood its relevance and how to apply it. This was tackled through live demonstrations and practical exercises.
- Ensuring diverse student representation: The session incorporated students from different backgrounds, providing a range of perspectives rather than relying solely on Executive Officers.
- Clarifying expectations for change: The session prompted valuable discussions on how staff should implement engagement practices in their own projects, though further work is needed to define next steps.
Outcomes and Key Learnings
Positive outcomes/learnings:
- Greater awareness of student engagement approaches: Staff gained insights into different engagement strategies and student communication channels.
- Practical tools for immediate application: The Toolkit provides clear, actionable guidance for embedding student voices in projects.
- Stronger student-staff collaboration: The session created opportunities for direct discussions between students and professional services staff.
What could be improved?
- Expanding the Toolkit’s reach.
- Student engagement audits to ensure that projects are engaging with students.
- TBC in ‘Conclusion and Future Plans’ section.
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Considerations
- The workshop emphasised the importance of engaging a diverse range of students, rather than relying on a small, highly engaged group.
- Discussions included how different student demographics access engagement opportunities and the need for incentives and tailored communication approaches.
- The Toolkit encourages inclusive engagement practices, ensuring projects consider accessibility, underrepresented student groups, and different modes of involvement.
Feedback/Testimonials
- 16/17 participants who filled in the MS Evaluation Survey rated the workshop 5 stars.
- Fiona Stentaford, Business Change Manager: “The toolkit is going to be a great resource and will save time whilst ensuring we engage in the right way.”
- Lisa Wake, Project Manager: “Ideas to engage students which are timely for me with campaign and will help with comms planning.”
- Adrian Kosikowski, UoM Student: “Thank you so much for inviting us. The whole event was great…I have also had Adam from my table suggest some small future collaborations between our two teams. So, we are very excited to have made this exciting new connection today.”
- Szaffi Jarbath, UoM Student: “Hi Bliss, it was lovely meeting you yesterday! Thank you for yesterday's amazing session- I genuinely found it insightful and exiting to see so many staff from different departments engage and take our contributions so seriously. Keep it up and hopefully see you at another event!”
Conclusion and Future Plans
This initiative successfully introduced a structured approach to student engagement, equipping staff with practical tools and fostering collaboration between students and professional services teams.
Next Steps:
- Expanding Toolkit adoption—exploring ways to share it more widely across the university. I have plans to get back in touch with the 26 staff (across 9 departments) who contributed to the Toolkit to thank them for their inputs and encourage them to cascade it with their respective teams.
- Defining a clear call to action—ensuring staff understand how to apply engagement practices in their projects and ensuring that student engagement is embedded within project budgets at the outset.
- Sustaining Toolkit updates—Miranda has reached out to the Business Change Team to clarify who will own this work and keep it up to date when I rotate to my next placement.