Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Mathematics and Engineering Education,
School Lead (Inclusive Scholarship), Centre for Academic Inclusion in Science and Engineering (CAISE)
Research Seminars Coordinator, Centre for Research in Engineering and Materials Education (CREME)
Queen Mary Research Integrity Champion
The following describe the range of scholarship projects I have been involved in within the fields of mathematics and engineering education (further details can be found on https://www.sems.qmul.ac.uk/staff/r.shah/research/funding/
(a) ‘Empowering local community groups in university-community partnerships’
In this project, I am organising a workshop featuring existing local community partners involved in community-based learning and teaching in current undergraduate modules at QMUL to explore how they experience such community-university collaborations. It is funded by a community engagement grant by the QMUL Centre for Public Engagement.
(b) ‘Identifying threshold concepts in mathematics modules’
This scoping study project is aimed at identifying and recognising key threshold concepts within undergraduate mathematics-based courses at university. As part of this, I will be leading a workshop for academic colleagues to recognise and examine the pedagogical implications of such concepts in curriculum development and assessment design. It is funded by an education grant by the London Mathematical Society and an internal grant from QMUL School of Engineering and Materials Science.
(c) ‘Promoting equity in education for sustainable development (ESD) through community-based learning and teaching (CBLT)’
This project aims to investigate the integration of ESD and community-based education within the curricula of two collaborating universities in East London (QMUL and UCL). It involves co-creation with student partners and learning developers to assess the extent of integration and identify gaps and challenges in achieving equitable learning outcomes in ESD and develop recommendations for integrating effective CBLT approaches into ESD practices. It is funded by a research grant by the Association for Learning Development in Higher Education.
(d) ‘Empowering students through diversification of STEM curricula’
In this project I am co-designing (with students) teaching toolkit materials featuring short biographies of past and present mathematicians, scientists and engineers from under-represented minority groups to embed within undergraduate STEM modules.
(e) ‘Embedding ethics in mathematics courses’
As part of this project, I am involved in designing and compiling a teaching resource toolkit containing a set of varied mathematical problems across different topics with key ethical aspects embedded within them for use by lecturers for tutorial worksheets for individual mathematics-based modules.
(f) ‘Community-based placements in engineering'
This co-creational project (in conjunction with student interns) aims to generate a comprehensive state-of-the-art review of all aspects of community-based placements at undergraduate and postgraduate taught levels to benefit engineering education. It is funded by two research grants by the UCL Centre for Engineering Education.
(g) ‘Systematic review of university-industry partnerships’
This project aimed at conducting a systematic literature review of studies on university-industry partnerships in engineering education to yield recommendations for education practitioners to embed industry involvement within the undergraduate curriculum and was funded by a project research internship award by UCL.
(h) ‘Diversifying the curriculum through community-based learning’
This project featured an institution wide study to discover the potential barriers and opportunities to community-engaged learning and teaching approaches. It used a ‘students-as partners’ approach, where students interested in community-based learning took the leading role in the qualitative study and was funded by a postgraduate research assistantship award by UCL.
The work has contributed immensely to my career progression through appointment to various institutional leadership roles, in addition to building a strong portfolio for the next stages of teaching and scholarship recognition and academic promotion. In my role as SEMS School Lead for Inclusive Scholarship for the faculty-wide Centre for Academic Inclusion in Science and Engineering (CAISE), I am responsible for championing the scholarship of inclusive education within the school by developing methodologies and tools to enhance inclusion, supporting staff by organising workshop events and promoting dissemination of work.
As Research Seminars Coordinator for the Centre for Research in Engineering and Materials Education, I organise year-round seminars for the school by nominating and inviting external speakers to events. As a Research Integrity Champion for QMUL, I also help disseminate information by organising research integrity and ethics events for colleagues, giving policy feedback and assisting the research integrity committee with research misconduct investigations. Finally, scholarship work has also become extremely relevant to my ongoing application for Senior Fellowship of Advance HE (SFHEA) and will certainly also prove invaluable for my subsequent academic promotion to Senior Lecturer in due course.
The scholarship projects have had significant impact through their dissemination avenues including peer-reviewed journal publications, conference proceedings and presentations, research seminars and invited talks and workshops to academics, educators and researchers. In addition to this it has led to my enabling several of the students who worked with me as co-creators on the research projects to gain recognition for their contributions through successful applications for the QMUL SEED award administered by the Queen Mary Academy. There has also been more tangible student impact in line with QMUL’s Strategy 2030 and Inclusive Curriculum focus within a variety of undergraduate STEM-based modules both within my own as well as other schools, following the embedding of newly developed teaching materials to enhance the curricula. Finally, the research outputs have certainly added immense value to the strategic reputation of the Centre for Research in Engineering and Materials Education in SEMS.
I would highlight to academics, particularly those on the Teaching and Scholarship route, that scholarship and pedagogic research outputs and contributions are immensely crucial for progression in their academic careers for promotion, recognition and acquisition of additional leadership responsibilities. I tend to view and give scholarship the same, if not more, value and importance as
standard technical research that academic counterparts on the traditional Teaching and Research route have to do, in terms of applying for education/scholarship grants, disseminating through publications, conferences etc. and collaboratively working with other academics and students on different projects. In addition to this, scholarship enables immediate impact through prompt reflection and introspection on one’s own teaching style, delivery and design, which in turn greatly improves students’ experiences of teaching and learning at university.