Current projects

Summary

ESE runs fieldtrips in all years of its undergraduate courses, with most students attending several fieldtrips during their studies with us. For many students this might be their first experience of spending significant amounts of time outside and their first time travelling abroad, which leads to uncertainty and anxiety. In the case of menstruating students, this adds an extra cause of concern, especially where they do not feel comfortable or able to participate fully. Discussions about inclusive approaches to bathroom use in the field and menstruation are ongoing in the geoscience community (Nash, 2023; Cape &Wn, 2024; Dance et al, 2024). There is a changing understanding of what constitutes best practice in this area and there has not been a significant review of field practice re: menstruation in ESE since the introduction of “period kits” on fieldtrips (pre 2017).  

We propose an audit of the fieldwork currently carried out by undergraduate students in ESE to identify areas of good and bad practice within our existing fieldtrips. This can then be used to collaboratively generate suggestions for improvements and adjustments. This may include a revision of the contents of the “period kits” that field staff take into the field, or identifying suitable bathroom breaks throughout the day on specific trips. Undergraduate students who menstruate and have participated in the field trips are uniquely well situated to carry out this work, as they have a familiarity with the fieldtrips offered by the department and can identify areas where pre-fieldtrip briefings have not effectively informed students about what to expect on fieldwork. If there is time, we also hope that the student can identify areas in pre-fieldtrip briefing material that can be improved and also make suggestions about improvements to pre-fieldtrip briefing materials that are accessible and make use of the digital education capabilities at Imperial (e.g. chatbots, short form video etc.).   

 Project Lead

Elizabeth Day (e.day@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow,  Department of Earth Science & Engineering

Anita Murphy (anita.murphy@imperial.ac.uk), Student Wellbeing Adviser,  Department of Earth Science & Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

 One position available.  Open to all ESE undergraduate students.  They would ideally have experience of several fieldtrips so will probably be in their third  or fourth year of study, and will have experience of menstruating. 

Eight weeks full-time during Summer break 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Menstruating students in Fieldwork recruitment ad

Summary

We have developed new hardware and software that will allow students to collect their own data on thermal wave propagation in different materials for the second-year lab. The purpose of the project is to develop the teaching resources needed to use the new apparatus. The main output of the project will be a lab script, which will guide students through the use of the new apparatus and will be co-created with the StudentShapers.

An important part of the second-year lab is to provide scaffolded access to creativity in science, therefore, the project will also aim to identify and test common extension activities that could be done with the apparatus.

Throughout this project, the students will be working closely with the Heads of Experiment (Richard Hobson and Charles Baynham) to understand the limitations of the new apparatus. The creative aspect of the extensions is where we see that the student-led approach of the StudentShapers project to be most valuable.

 Project Lead

Michael Fox (michael.fox@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Department of Physics

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks full-time during Summer break.  Open to all Physics students who have completed the second year undergraduate programme.  Two positions available.  

(See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Thermal Waves Experiment recruitment ad

Summary

Students will co-create a creative, research-informed learning resource exploring the lived 
experience of ADHD, designed for use in the Science of Learning i-Explore module. Working 
from an initial storyboard, student partners will lead the development of engaging and 
accessible multimedia content—such as videos, graphics, or audio—that authentically 
represents neurodivergent perspectives. The resource will also support broader awarenessraising around ADHD across Imperial.

 Project Lead

Iro Ntonia (i.ntonia@imperial.ac.uk), Principal Teaching Fellow, Centre for Higher Education Research and Scholarship

Abigail Greneux-Bhajun (abigail.greneux-bhajun23@imperial.ac.uk), Undergraduate, Department of Life Sciences

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks full-time during Summer break (7 July – 29 August 2025)

Two student partner roles available.

We welcome applications from all undergraduate students, especially those with strong 
creative media skills (e.g., video editing, graphic design, audio production).

A genuine interest in ADHD or neurodiversity—whether from lived experience or as an 
ally—is highly desirable.

The project is hybrid and flexible to remote working during the summer, depending on the 
availability and needs of the selected students.

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

ADHD Speaks for Itself recruitment ad

Summary

What you will do: This is an exciting opportunity to influence teaching practice and co-research with staff innovative ways to embed public engagement in the undergraduate curriculum at Imperial. You will:

• explore public engagement through a series of fun workshops including a visit to the Science Museum
• critique current approaches to relevant modules offered by Imperial and brainstorm changes you’d like to bring about.
• co-design with staff and carry out bespoke research with other undergraduate students to test your proposed ideas. analyse the results into research findings and provide useful recommendations to the university
• plan how to share the results with the Imperial community and potentially co-present with staff after project completion.

About the project: Public engagement (PE)[1] is creative, fun and exciting for both universities and public audiences involved. It is increasingly regarded as an important driver in the teaching and learning strategies within higher education (HE). Yet public engagement provision for undergraduates is very limited.

This unique, collaborative research project aims to understand your perspectives on modules that provide you with teaching experiences that positively impact public communities. By partnering with you we want you to have a say into how public engagement is taught at Imperial to ultimately ensure future undergraduates meaningfully encounter public engagement throughout their journey at Imperial and consider it as part of their STEM identity early on in their careers.

The project consists of two interrelated parts (with a break in July). We will be meeting regularly on campus as a group and for the research you will carry out you will have the option to do this either in person or online.

[1] Public engagement is defined as “the myriad of ways in which the activity and benefits of higher education and research can be shared with the public. Engagement is by definition a two-way process, involving interaction and listening, with the goal of generating mutual benefit (NCCPE)”

 Project Lead

Maria Serveta (m.serveta@imperial.ac.uk), Engagement Coordinator (Capacity Building), Office of the Provost

Further Details/Experience Required

 3 full-time weeks between June-August, with additional part-time in August for research.  

Five positions available, ideally one from each department below.  

Calling all Undergraduate students from the following departments:

• Dyson School of Design Engineering
• Life Sciences
• Maths
• Physics
• School of Medicine Students on the MBBS and BMB 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details; Please read the full recruitment ad and how to apply)

Co-Investigating Public Engagement recruitment ad

Summary

Providing effective feedback in lab-based teaching is challenging due to the varying levels of support typically needed through the experimental work. Feedback from previous years indicates that while students value autonomy, they also benefit from timely and personalised milestone-specific input from their project supervisor. Traditional feedback methods often lack immediacy and alignment with individual approaches and are constrained by staff time and departmental resources. This project aims to bridge these gaps using a machine learning workflow that delivers on-demand, adaptive feedback aligned with students’ progress, enhancing learning, fostering independence, and ensuring support throughout the lab project.

As a student partner, you will collaborate with the staff partner to transform how feedback is delivered in lab-based modules. You will play a key role in co-developing an interactive ML-based tool that provides real-time and personalised guidance. Your engagement will involve contributing to the development of the material, model training and fine-tuning, and eventually evaluating the tool’s performance and effectiveness. Additionally, your participation will include sharing valuable insights from the student perspective, co-developing features and adapting the tool to diverse students’ learning needs. Ultimately, your contributions will drive real change in how feedback and guidance are delivered in lab-based modules, helping create a more supportive and inclusive experience across Imperial.

 Project Lead

Mohamed Maher (mohamed.maher18@imperial.ac.uk), Process Control Engineer, Department of Chemical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

 Two positions available.  Open to all 2nd year Chemical Engineering undergraduate students.  

Eight weeks full-time during Summer break 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Lab-Based teaching ML approach recruitment ad

Summary

Following a review of the software used on the Computational Methods thread which runs through the first three-years of the MEng Civil Engineering degree it was decided that Python would replace MATLAB as the software to be taught, with current first year students introduced to coding using Python rather than MATLAB. The second part of Computational Methods 2 introduces structural analysis, using the stiffness and finite element methods, as an application of the coding skills that have been developed on the thread beforehand, and is assessed through coursework. MATLAB was well suited for implementing the stiffness and finite element methods, as it is based on matrix operations (MATLAB standing for Matrix Laboratory) while Python is based on array operations. This necessitates that this part of the Computational Methods 2 module undergoes a more complete redesign. A potential pedagogical advantage of moving to Python, is that Python scripts can be incorporated into Rhino/Grasshopper, a geometric modelling software, and associated parametric plugin that first year students are introduced to as part of Sketching and Modelling. The use of Python embedded in Grasshopper provides an opportunity to allow students and staff to develop a more intuitive understanding of how different parameters such as material or cross-section properties affect structural behaviour, as Grasshopper definitions, which can be quickly created, allow the effect of altering input parameters to be visualised in real time. With skills in using Rhino/Grasshopper in parametric design being increasingly sought after by industry, with some graduate job descriptions requiring this, the redevelopment of the Structural Analysis part of Computational Methods 2 presents a unique opportunity to improve teaching and learning on this module and introduce sought after parametric engineering skills into the curriculum.

The project the student to participate in the redesign of the Structural Analysis part of Computational Methods 2. The student will have recently experienced the current version of this part of Computational Methods 2 implemented in MATLAB and so is best placed to reflect on the current challenges and help identify the opportunities using Python embedded within Grasshopper. They will be able to comment from first-hand experience on whether the coursework aligns with the intended learning outcomes for the module as well as on the workload associated with the coursework. They will be able to co-create new material for the module with Dr Phillips and advise on aspects of Python and Grasshopper that students are likely to be unfamiliar with. It is planned that Dr Phillips in consultation with the student will develop some material in advance of the start of the Student Shapers project with the student critiquing and assisting in adapting this material, with regular discussions between Dr Phillips and the student throughout the six weeks, with the aim of developing a completed set of tried and tested notes, lecture slides, computer lab exercises, and coursework brief as part of the Student Shapers project.

During the project progress will be checked through regular twice weekly meeting, with a schedule set for completion of different module materials. In the longer term the student partner will be encouraged to continue to feedback to the department and directly to Dr Phillips on the development of the Computational Methods thread through the degree, as well as on future development of a Digital Engineering elective module, building on the concepts introduced. The redesigned module will also be presented to the newly formed Industry Advisory Board (IAB) as an example of how students and staff can work to redevelop parts of the curriculum.

 Project Lead

Andrew Phillips (andrew.phillips@imperial.ac.uk), Reader in Structural Biomechanics, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

 One position available.  Open to any current second or third year MEng Civil Engineering student who has successfully completed Computational Methods 2.  

Six weeks full-time during Summer break 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Redesign of Computational Methods 2 recruitment ad

Summary

What makes this project unique?

We are inviting you to take part in a unique collaboration where you will be directly involved in shaping the future of assessment and feedback for students across Imperial. This opportunity is not to be missed and the scale of this project will see you operate in a network which stretches the breadth of the whole institution.

Background

Assessment and feedback are critical components of the learning experience at Imperial and we recognise that it is an area where improvements are needed to support the student experience. The University has made a commitment to improve assessment and feedback experiences by setting up a 2 year project to review and refine assessments across all faculties. The University has set up an Assessment and Feedback Monitoring and Advisory group to spearhead a comprehensive university-wide improvement in these areas. As part of the initial phase of this initiative, staff Faculty Review Coordinators have been recruited to work within faculties and departments to progress this work and ensure collaboration between students and staff on this project. The next phase of this initiative is to facilitate a partnership between yourselves, as students, and staff in faculties, in making meaningful changes to how assessment and feedback are received by staff and students alike.

This project is coordinated by the Education Office however, you will be working with your peers, elected student representatives and the staff Faculty Review Coordinators in your own faculty.

What activities can you get involved with?

This project is up to you and your respective Faculty Review Coordinator to shape as you are the experts in your own departments. The project has an overall ambition to reduce the assessment burden and improve feedback processes across all programmes. You will do this by working with student representatives who capture the student voice and the Faculty Review Coordinators who will support you in the implementation of a process for realising these ambitions and improving the student experience of assessment and feedback.

This will be a collaborative process between you and the Faculty Review Coordinators, some areas that you may wish to consider are:

• Data gathering of current assessments
• Creation of assessment calendars and templates
• Creation of a checklist for developing new assessments and practices
• Capturing and including the student voice through working with student representatives

What will you gain?

By taking part in this project, you will have the opportunity to gain a range of skills and knowledge such as:

• Gaining insights into the assessment and feedback processes at the university
• Opportunities to engage with the wider student body to facilitate change
• Collaboration with the student representative network
• Skills in a range of project management areas such as data capture and change processes
• Access to staff networks

The long-term impact will be sustained through the ongoing support of the Assessment and Feedback Monitoring and Advisory Group until 2026, with the intention of integrating successful strategies into Business As Usual (BAU) activities beyond this timeframe and ultimately changing disciplinary assessment culture. Embedding these changes into standard practices will ensure that the benefits are lasting and continue to evolve with student needs.

As part of the project, you will also take place in a workshop with some of the staff partners involved and this will be communicated to you upon confirmation of recruitment.

Project Lead

Amandip Bisel (amandip.bisel@imperial.ac.uk), Head of Education and Student Experience Strategy Projects, Education Office

Pippa Greenwood (p.greenwood@imperial.ac.uk), Education Projects Manager, Education Office

Further Details/Experience Required

Undergraduate students in Year 2 and above across all faculties. We welcome applications from students of other levels of study if you have a particular interest in helping to shape assessment and feedback changes in your departments.

10 weeks part-time, between November and March inclusive of a Christmas break.  

Assessment recruitment ad

Summary

As part of Imperial’s Race Equality Charter (REC) Action Plan, the Graduate School (to be known as the Early Career Researcher Institute from 01 October), has, for the last 3 years, delivered an event (online and in-person) for Minority Ethnic undergraduate students interested in postgraduate education at Imperial.  The event comprises short talks, Q&A and networking. 

The short talks are delivered by a panel comprising students, who talk about their lived experiences at Imperial, and staff who talk about the admissions process, applying to Imperial, top tips, and funding opportunities, as well as the broader support available to Minority Ethnic students at Imperial.

Despite concerted marketing efforts which have resulted in a good number of registrations to attend the event (87, 63 and 156 respectively for the events delivered in 2021, 2022 and 2023), this has not translated into actual attendees (45, 25 and 15 respectively for the event delivered in 2021, 2022 and 2023). 

To help us move forward and deliver an event which is meaningful and helpful to undergraduate students, we are looking for student shapers to lead the design and development of a fully costed revised event which will be delivered by the Early Career Researcher Institute in autumn 2025. 

It is expected that good practice and input from the Faculties will be sought in developing the event, as well as research into what other institutions offer in this regard.

The outline objectives for the event are listed below, but we expect that student shapers will refine these as the project develops:

• Give a sense of what it is like to undertake a Master’s degree and research at Imperial
• Demystify the application/admissions process
• Provide information on funding/scholarships
• Showcase support available to Minority Ethnic students at Imperial
• Contribute towards an increase in the number of Minority Ethnic students studying postgraduate education (Masters and Research degrees) at Imperial.

The project will start in November 2024 and will complete in February 2025.  In November, student shapers will meet with the project team for a briefing session.  During the latter part of November and throughout December and early January, student shapers will be expected to carry out the following tasks:

1. A desk-based review of what other institutions provide in relation to supporting minority ethnic undergraduates thinking about postgraduate education
2. A survey of individuals who registered to attend one of the previous iterations of the event but did not attend on the day. The purpose of this is to explore why they did not attend and to find out what would have made the event more attractive.
3. Discuss good practice initiatives being carried out by the Faculties to support minority ethnic undergraduates thinking about postgraduate education.
4. Host one focus group per Faculty with up to 6 students (Master’s and PhD) and one online alumni focus group. The purpose of the focus groups is to explore further what would be most helpful for students and to explore ideas which came through as a result of the discussions with the Faculty and the desk-based review.
5. During mid-late January, being the design work for the event, which will also include a method to assess its impact.
6. By 14 February 2025, submit the costed proposal to the project team.

Student shapers will be supported throughout the project by a dedicated member of staff from the Early Career Researcher Institute. 

Project Lead

Laura Lane (l.lane@imperial.ac.uk), Head of Strategy and Operations, Graduate School

Further Details/Experience Required

Research degree students across any Faculty or department.  5 positions available.  

We are looking for students across all stages of the research degree, who have insight and understanding of the educational experience of minority ethnic students, the challenges they face within education and navigating Imperial life. 

We would also especially like to hear from research degree students who have previously studied a Master’s degree at Imperial.

12 weeks part-time, commencing 11 November - 14th February

Designing an event for Minority Ethnic UG students recruitment ad

Summary

Imperial Experience is the university's strategy to deliver a holistic student experience. As part of this initiative, the Accessible Student Communications Project was established, bringing together staff from across the institution. The next phase of this project is to facilitate a partnership between staff and students to make meaningful changes.

We seek enthusiastic and engaged students to help the university make policies and processes more accessible to your fellow students. Outputs from this work are likely to feature on the Imperial website. 

A report by Deloitte found that 90% of people do not read the policies they sign, often because these documents are densely worded, overly complicated, and difficult to understand. Students often access these documents under stress, particularly around assessments, making them even more impenetrable. This project is crucial for engaging students and staff to reduce these barriers.

What you will do

This project has three phases:

1. Research and Fact-Finding: Identify which documents are problematic and why and work with Staff Partners on a plan to approach these.
2. Evaluation and Rewriting: Work with staff partners and others in the university to rewrite these documents in plain language.
3. Presentation: Create Animated Inclusive Personae to present the information in a student-friendly way. This might also include designing new forms and email templates.

What you will gain

By taking part in this project, you will have the opportunity to gain a range of skills and knowledge such as:

• Experience working in inclusion, policy, and communication.
• A better understanding of how institutional policy and processes work.
• Working with a diverse group of students and staff.

Project Lead

Pippa Greenwood (p.greenwood@imperial.ac.uk), Education Projects Manager, Education Office

Further Details/Experience Required

Four positions available for students from any department or Faculty, in any year of study, including Postgraduate students.  An interest in work in inclusion, policy, or communication within their chosen disciplines would be desirable but not essential.  

Eleven weeks part-time during term with a full-time week during Easter break.  Between January-March.  

Accessible Comms with AIP recruitment ad

Summary

We’re looking for a student partner to help develop tools that make it easier for staff to provision and manage cloud resources on ImPaaS, our internal cloud platform for teaching. This platform enables students to deploy applications into Microsoft’s Azure cloud easily, without dealing with complex cloud infrastructure, and we want to improve the experience—both for students and for instructors managing multiple student projects.  

As part of this project, you’ll work on automating common tasks, improving usability for non-expert users, and streamlining platform administration. You’ll gain hands-on experience with Kubernetes, containers, and platform engineering, while working alongside a full-time engineering team. This is a great opportunity to apply your technical skills, solve real problems, and contribute to a platform used by students and staff across multiple courses. 

Project Lead

Robert Chatley, (r.chatley@imperial.ac.uk), Director of Software Engineering Practise, Department of Computing

Further Details/Experience Required

8-10 weeks full-time during Summer break.  

Given the technical nature of this project, we are primarily looking for students from the Dept of Computing, but we are open to applicants from other departments, as long as they have in-depth software development skills (see recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Cloud Platform Tools recruitment ad

Summary

Portfolios are widely used in medical school programmes to showcase individual educational, 
research, ethical, personal, and professional development. We have developed initial plans for a student held portfolio with previous Student Shapers. We now wish to take forward those plans but would value Student partnership to do this, so we ensure the portfolio is as student-centred and engaging as possible.

Student partners will:
• Participate and collaborate in the planning, development, and design stages as well as the evaluation process of the portfolio. 
• Use your networks to explore what your peers would like from a portfolio
• Participate in this project to suit your schedule, but must commit to working on the project roughly 3 hours a week
• Be primarily supervised by a Dr Noreen Ryan and the Digital team

The successful candidates for this project would have the following attributes: ability to work both independently and within a team, proficient IT skills, flexible approach, and the ability to critically appraise research papers. 

At the end of this project, you will gain a greater understanding of designing higher education learning & assessment tools. The project will help you prepare for professional practice after you graduate, as portfolios are essential to every medical professional throughout their career. By engaging in this project, you'll have the chance to cultivate invaluable professional capabilities including project management, collaborative teamwork, self-reliance, accountability, and effective negotiation within a supportive and realistic workplace environment.

Project Lead

Noreen Ryan, (noreen.ryan@imperial.ac.uk), Quality Healthcare Domain Lead, School of Public Health

Further Details/Experience Required

Two positions available.  Phase 1B or 1C Medical students.  30 half-day sessions, split across two academic years, between February 2025 and July 2026.  

Evaluating a student professional portfolio recruitment ad

Summary

This project will involve engaging across Imperial’s diverse student body to bring representative voices into CfAE’s (Centre for Academic English) curriculum design. CfAE will partner with you to gather invaluable qualitative data through a series of student-led focus groups on how Imperial can:

• meet the communication demands of the ‘Science for humanity’ mission of Imperial’s Learning and Teaching Strategy;
• support all students in developing the lifelong communication skills that are essential to their career;
• expand and improve how Imperial addresses the crucial communication aspect of student assessment and feedback in a scalable and sustainable way.

In collaboration with student partners, you will develop and engage in three focus group discussions, with incentives and refreshments for participants. The aim of these discussions is to provide us with a clearer understanding of students’ perspectives on Imperial’s emerging communication context following the pandemic and the emergence of generative AI. You will then have 2 half-days to produce an evidence-based set of recommendations on how CfAE’s existing expertise can contribute to improving communication at Imperial and how to market this to ensure student buy-in.

Your recommendations will give us input on how to build an accessible, collaborative and supportive space/environment that fully responds to Imperial students’ expectations – a space where students can improve their communication in an environment they have helped shape.

Through this partnership, you will learn how to run effective focus groups, analyse the qualitative data from these groups and present your findings to the CfAE team in a supportive environment.

Project Lead

June Hammond (june.hammond@imperial.ac.uk) Teacher of English for Academic Purposes, Institute for Extended Learning

Robin Mowat (r.mowat@imperial.ac.uk) Senior Teacher of English for Academic Purposes, Institute for Extended Learning

Andrew Northern (a.northern@imperial.ac.uk) Teacher of English for Academic Purposes, Institute for Extended Learning

Further Details/Experience Required

Four undergraduate student partners from the Faculty of Engineering, the Faculty of Natural Sciences and/or the Faculty of Medicine. We are ideally hoping for at least one student to represent each Faculty.   

Six half-days of engagement between January and March.  

CfAE recruitment ad

Summary

Starting university can be overwhelming—there are countless systems to access, new places to find, and people to meet. We’re looking for a student partner to help design and develop a software application that guides new students through their first interactions with the university. This app would provide essential information on getting started, from accessing key university systems and finding lecture theatres to understanding how coursework is submitted and connecting with coursemates. 

As a student collaborator, you’ll play a central role in shaping the app’s design and functionality, bringing your own experiences and insights into what would have helped you when you first arrived. You’ll work alongside the Dept of Computing EdTech team to build out this application and deploy it on the College’s cloud platform. 

The project is therefore a chance to both contribute something meaningful to the student community, particularly for students joining in the future, and to develop your software engineering skills. 

Project Lead

Robert Chatley (r.chatley@imperial.ac.uk), Director of Software Engineering Practise, Department of Computing 

Further Details/Experience Required

8-10 weeks full-time during Summer break. One position available.

While the project will be developed within the Dept of Computing, we hope that the resulting tools could be used across the university, so we are open to applicants from any department, as long as they have good software development skills. (See full Project Skills in the ad below) 

Building an Onboarding App recruitment ad

Summary

Feedback from PhD students in the Faculty of Medicine has identified a need for increased provision of bioinformatics training and support. In particular, students whose research is primarily wet lab focused, but who need to exceptionally use a specific tool or method to analyse complex experimental data, would like to be able to access high-quality training on-demand. A local network of peer learners, who could provide quick answers to simple questions, would also be beneficial. This project aims to establish a framework that can be used to provide this via the following objectives:

1. Identify the most useful way for ad-hoc bioinformatics learning and support to be structured and delivered.
2. Build an exemplar training unit whose structure can be readily applied to additional topics.

Throughout this project, students will partner with a Senior Teaching Fellow, a Research Associate, and an eLearning Technologist, who together have relevant education and subject-specific expertise.

As a student partner, you will first be asked to review existing introductory bioinformatics training from the MRes Cancer Informatics programme at Imperial. In doing this, you will gain an increased understanding of the topics covered and engage with analytical tools and approaches which you may be able to apply to your current or future research projects. Training related to the R programming language as well as quality control and data visualisation is suggested as a starting point due to its relevance across disciplines. However, there is flexibility to change this based on the interests of all the student partners.

Project Lead

Elaina Maginn (e.maginn@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Faculty of Medicine Centre

Further Details/Experience Required

Research degree students across any Medicine department, in any year.  3 positions available.  

Part-time (half a day a week) for six months, commencing October 2024.  

• focused on wet lab research.
• have limited (or no!) knowledge or experience in bioinformatics skills but wish to learn them.
• interested in developing skills related to learning design and evaluation, particularly those relevant to digital education.

Bioinformatics training resource recruitment ad

Summary

The Clinical Communication team would like to recruit student shapers to assist in designing and developing a guided online learning package for history taking for Ys 2 and 3. This will be based on existing learning materials produced by the Clinical Communication Team. The purpose of the online learning is to avoid any repetition in the classroom and make better use of students’ time, to develop a resource that they can go back to throughout the entirety of the curriculum as they develop different aspects of history taking alongside their clinical learning.

More importantly, this would allow teaching staff to use existing teaching time more effectively by covering other issues connected with patient contact which may not typically be covered on the existing schedule but are often observed or experienced by students on their clinical placements. Several aspects of challenging communication related to patient interactions have been experienced by students in 1C.  These aspects such as de-escalation and managing inappropriate comments are currently covered in 3a teaching but we would like to introduce them earlier to spiral learning and prepare students better for the challenges of clinical placement. The online learning package for history taking would allow us to free up time to advance the students’ learning experience on these more specialised topics to reinforce students’ preparation for practice. It is key that this change is made by fully incorporating the perspectives of students (student shapers) who are on the receiving end of our teaching. For this project we would like to recruit student shapers from Year 4 or 5 as they will have had exposure to the early years learning, will have a good understanding of maximising their learning time both in the classroom and for independent study and will already have familiarity with our teaching on history taking. 

The project aligns closely with the vision of Imperial’s Learning and Teaching Strategy to better apply interactive teaching techniques and to enhance a sense of collaboration and community between students in the classroom and studying online. More specifically, the project will capitalise on the mix of digital vs on campus delivery ensuring this works to best effect to effectively balance learning workload.

Involving students in the design and development of this package alongside the input from the CC team would maximise the opportunity for improved student learning experience. This innovation would afford the mutual expertise (from staff and students) to inform the online materials and also the additional teaching topics within the existing timetabled slots allocated. All of this will have a longer-term impact, building staff student partnerships and ensuring that the responsiveness of teaching and learning is fully optimised. The eventual GOL will be revised and sustained by the CC team in their annual evaluation and revision of teaching materials based on student feedback.

Specific benefits to student partners:

• The Digital team will train students in how to design guided online learning.
• The students will have very close dialogue with staff and understand the collaborative process of educational resource development.
• The students will develop skills in the development of digital educational resource.
• The students will develop team working skills.
• The project will provide the basis for an application as an associate fellow of the HEA.
• The students will develop an understanding and gain insight into developing & designing teaching materials.
• The students will become extremely familiar with the content of the medical history which is likely to greatly enhance their clinical learning and clinical practice.

Project Lead

Ged Murtagh, (g.murtagh@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Lecturer in Clinical Communication, Surgery and Cancer

Further Details/Experience Required

Year 5 ICSM students, two positions available.  

20 half-days a week, between October and March (with a break for Christmas) 

History taking for Medical students recruitment ad

Summary

Computational thinking (CT) is a fundamental skill underpinning modern problem-solving across disciplines. Many courses introduce programming, but broader CT skills—such as algorithmic reasoning, abstraction, and logical structuring—are essential for success in academia and industry.

Students will engage in co-creating tailored and personalised learning materials using cutting-edge AI and digital tools. Participants will engage in the design, testing, and implementation of digital Open Educational Resources (OERs), ensuring accessibility for students from diverse backgrounds and varying levels of prior knowledge.

Project Lead

Matthew Piggott (m.d.piggott@imperial.ac.uk), Professor of Computational Geoscience and Engineering, Dept of Earth Science and Engineering

Rhodri Nelson, (rhodri.nelson@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow in Computational Data Science, Dept of Earth Science and Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Six weeks full-time during Summer break.  

Undergraduate students from across Imperial College London with an interest in computational thinking, coding, educational development, and artificial intelligence.   Full Project Skills details can be seen in the recruitment ad below:

Computational Thinking 24-25 recruitment ad

Summary

Educators routinely use role models and historical figures to introduce concepts and relationships. In science and engineering, these characters are typically white, Western men, which impacts students’ self-identity and sense of belonging. Contextualizing the Curriculum (CtC) will expand curricula to include modern-day diverse figures, cultures, and perspectives. This initiative is not solely concerned with knowledge but also place, power, purpose and identity. In this StudentShapers project, we will explore and analyse curriculum gap and barriers to equality, diversity and inclusivity in Higher Education. This important and challenging project will be conducted in partnership with students and staff across multiple job families in Materials and Earth Sciences.

The ongoing and active involvement of StudentShapers, which includes undergraduate (UG) and doctoral (PhD) candidates, will catalyse the success of CtC. This project will build on a collaborative effort between staff and students who will develop an authentic partnership. Imperial students are the best-placed people to determine how and why modern-day relevant figures and diverse cultures impact their studies, sense of belonging and university experience. Students will be involved in gathering, analysing and disseminating data.

What you will do: You will conduct Educational research by assessing current curriculum gaps in the curriculum (e.g. non-Western/ non-white contributions to science and engineering) and exploring how elements of the curriculum can be barriers to diversity and impacts sense of belonging. You will gather feedback from academics and students through focus groups and interviews. You will also contact key stakeholder communities (e.g. RAEng, IOM3, GeolSoc) and help establish an external Advisory Board for the CtC project.

Project Lead

Valentin Laurent (v.laurent@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow in Pedagogic Transformation, Earth Science and Engineering

Eleonora D'Elia (eleonora.delia10@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Materials

Jessica Wade (jessica.wade@imperial.ac.uk), Lecturer in Functional Materials, Materials

Amina Riamah, Undergraduate, Materials

Sophia Quazi (s.quazi@imperial.ac.uk), Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Coordinator, Mechanical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Two UG students from Yr1, 2 or non-graduating Yr 3 ESE or Materials, and 1 PhD from 1st or 2nd year of ESE or Materials .  

Part-time (half-day a week) for 67.5 weeks spread across 18 months.  Commencing January-July 2026.  

Contextualising the Curriculum recruitment ad

Summary

Feedback from students and their reps confirm that student expectations, particularly early in their student journey, differ from those of the department. Difficulties in transition are predictive of the success and retention of students on the programme because transition impacts a student’s wellbeing and ability to focus and retain information. The smoother the transition, the smaller the impact it will have on the student.  

You will design and produce a suite of videos that will show students what to expect at Imperial, taking them through a typical day in the department for the level of study and campus they are joining for their studies.  This resource should give incoming students a realistic insight into what their day-to-day life will be like in the department including familiarising them with areas such as University labs and what to do with free time in their timetables. 

As part of this project our Student Shapers will develop their project management, communication, and resource development skills as they work in partnership with Amelia Barron and Rebecca Lewis. It would be essential for you to have experience of filming and editing content.

Project Lead

Amelia Barron (amelia.barron@imperial.ac.uk) Undergraduate Liaison Officer, Life Sciences 

Further Details/Experience Required

Two UG Biological Sciences students.  

One MSc, one MRes and two PhD students at the Silwood campus.  

For full time-frame details please see the relevant recruitment ad below.  

Transitions Day in Life UG recruitment ad

Transitions Day in Life PG recruitment ad

Summary

This is an opportunity to develop a three-dimensional virtual representation of a chemical production plant, then set off explosions and fires from small to huge scale, for use in process safety teaching within the Department Chemical Engineering. You will be working in partnership with Dr Chris Tighe (Chemical Engineering) to design, code and test a system to visualise and explore process units, equipment and buildings such as reactors, furnaces, heat exchangers, separators, distillation columns, pumps, flare stack, storage tanks, control room etc. You will then define a variety of fire and explosion scenarios around the plant e.g. pool/flash/jet fire, vapour cloud explosion or boiling liquid expanding vapour explosion (BLEVE) at various scales, determining the effects of thermal radiation and blast overpressure vs. distance using consequence models published in the literature. Finally, you will design and implement systems, which allow these scenarios to play out in real time on the virtual plant. The goal of this project is to provide students with an immersive experience, giving them a sense of the scale of process plant, to visualise the impact of an explosion or fire on the plant, and how the layout of the plant can help limit the consequences of such an event in terms of e.g. damage to neighbouring units, access for emergency response and routes for evacuation.

The student undertaking this engagement will gain a deeper understanding of process plant layout and the modelling of fires and explosions, as well as gaining technical skills and experience in coding (in C#/Unity), and in three-dimensional visualisation. They will also gain experience in collaborative software-development as part of a professional team.

This engagement is part of the ViRSE (Virtual Reality Student Experience) project, which is developing a virtual reality platform to ease the development and deployment of ‘multi-player’ virtual reality into Imperial’s teaching across a range of departments and subjects. ViRSE is built on the Unity game engine, and all ViRSE applications (including this project) are also built within Unity; code is written in the C# programming language. Students will not need to build a VR interface, write rendering code, or concern themselves with networking or administrative issues; these are handled by the ViRSE framework and the Unity engine. The development in this engagement will concentrate on the creation of a three-dimensional ‘environment’ specific to the project, and creating and testing the code necessary to make it function, and to interface with the ViRSE system.

All ViRSE student shaper engagements will commence with a two-week full time training course , which will provide the necessary grounding in the C# language, object-oriented programming, the Unity engine, the ViRSE platform, and 3D modelling tools. This course will take place on-campus June 30th  – July 12th 2025. In subsequent six project weeks the ViRSE student partners will lead on the development of the particular applications within Unity, in collaboration with the academic lead, and with the ViRSE team providing technical support and advice. These six project-development weeks are flexible in precise timing, but should take place over summer 2025, before the start of Autumn term of the 25/26 academic year. 

Project Lead

Chris Tighe (c.tighe@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Lecturer, Chemical Engineering

Mark Sutton (m.sutton@imperial.ac.uk), Reader in Palaeontology, Earth Science and Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

One position available.  Eight weeks full-time during Summer break.  

Students with an aptitude for coding and enthusiasm for creating software, familiarity with the layout of typical process plant and an enthusiasm for process safety. We anticipate that students enrolled on programmes in the Department of Chemical Engineering will be best placed to meet these criteria, but all Imperial undergraduates are eligible. Preference will be given to students who are not in their final year.

ViRSE ExploVR recruitment ad

Summary

 Following a grant from Presidents Community Fund the Chaplaincy Multi-Faith Centre aims to 
build a new community garden to create a space of belonging and well-being. The Chaplaincy seeks to collaborate with students to design and build this space for the community. 

For full details of the specific roles please refer to the Facilitator and Coordinator recruitment ads below.  

Project Lead

Andrew Willson (a.willson@imperial.ac.uk), College Chaplain

Esther Anaya Boig (e.anaya-boig@imperial.ac.uk), Student Services

Emilia Garcia Padron, Postgraduate

Further Details/Experience Required

Coordinator role: One position available.  Part-time postgraduate students.  One and a half days a week for 25 weeks in total.  

Facilitator role: Four positions available.  Students from any department or discipline.  Part-time (half day a week) during term time for 25 weeks in total.  

Gardening Project recruitment ad Facilitator role

Gardening Project recruitment ad Coordinator role

Summary

Join EduVision, an innovative project using machine vision to enhance automated feedback in hands-on learning. Work across disciplines, collaborating with Mechanical Engineering, Medicine, Physics, Aeronautics, and Electrical Engineering to develop smarter, real-time assessment methods. 

This project offers a unique chance to gain experience in educational technology, AI applications, and real-world problem-solving, while contributing to meaningful improvements in practical learning. You’ll work closely with staff to refine and implement cutting-edge solutions that enhance student engagement and performance. 

Project Lead

Alexis Ihracska, (a.ihracska@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Nine and a half weeks full-time during Summer break.  One position available.  

The ideal candidate would have an engineering background, as this aligns well with the technical aspects of the project. However, any student with a strong analytical approach and a keen interest in educational technology and research will be considered. 

No requirement on year of study.  (Please see Project Skills in recruitment ad below)

EduVision recruitment ad

Summary

Portfolios serve as useful tools for showcasing the attainment of skills and attributes through exemplars, feedback and reflection. The aim of this project is to design a bespoke and adaptable ePortfolio where BMB students can monitor their professional skills attainment to prepare for diverse careers both inside and outside academia. 

Student BMB partners will:

•   Participate and collaborate in the various stages of portfolio development: 

                1. Identifying key professional skills to develop

               2. Evaluating current college-wide resources available to support identified skills                                     development

               3. Determining if any additional resources are needed to support the identified skills                               attainment

               4. Conceptualising the virtual portfolio 

• Seek inputs from and work alongside fellow BMB students 
• Partner with BMB Teaching Fellows- Dr Nitya Krishnan (Feedback Literacy Lead) and Dr Lydia Durant (Careers and Y2-Y3 Transition Lead). 

Through engagement in this project, you will gain a greater understanding of designing higher education learning & assessment tools. You will be able to foster several professional attributes, including project management, teamwork and collaboration, reliability, feedback literacy and negotiation within a collaborative workplace environment. Thus, this project will help you prepare for your future professional life, whatever career path you choose. You also will be able to develop learning resources that will benefit you and other students in the BMB community.

The successful candidates for this project would have the following attributes: the ability to work both independently and within a team, proficient IT skills, and a flexible and creative approach. Proficient knowledge of whiteboarding tools such as Miro or Canva is desirable.

Project Lead

Lydia Durant (l.durant@imperial.ac.uk), Teaching Fellow, Faculty of Medicine Centre

Nitya Krishnan (n.krishnan@imperial.ac.uk), Teaching Fellow, Faculty of Medicine Centre

Further Details/Experience Required

Undergraduate students enrolled on the BSc Medical Biosciences (BMB) course across all three years. 6 positions are available: 2 students per academic year across all three years.

EPortfolio for BMB UG students recruitment ad

Summary

The Simulation and Modelling in Medicine and Surgery (SiMMS) Lab is seeking a talented Engineering or Computer Science student to join our ongoing project aimed at revolutionizing medical education with AI.

This project focuses on addressing the gap in clinical communication skills training within Imperial’s undergraduate medical curriculum. By developing an interactive mobile chatbot to behave like a patient, we aim to provide medical students with a low-stakes environment to practice patient interactions and receive tailored feedback.

As a key member of our team, you will play a crucial role in:

• Technical Development: Engineering a user-friendly, cross-platform mobile and web app based on an existing prototype
• Feature Design: Designing and implementing engaging features like gamification and progress tracking to enhance the learning experience
• Collaboration: Partnering with a diverse team of medical students, researchers and medical educators
• Deployment: Preparing the app for limited-scale release to Imperial staff and students, and potentially supporting a wider launch later

Through your involvement, you will gain invaluable experience in:

• Applying your technical skills to a real-world healthcare application
• Designing educational technology solutions
• Collaborating with healthcare professionals to understand clinical needs
• Developing essential soft skills like communication and teamwork

This unique opportunity will allow you to contribute to a project that has the potential to significantly and directly impact medical education and ultimately patient care. If you are passionate about technology and eager to make a difference, we encourage you to apply.

Project Lead

Fernando Bello (f.bello@imperial.ac.uk), Professor of Surgical Computing and Simulation Science, Department of Surgery and Cancer

Further Details/Experience Required

1 position available.  

Any Engineering or Computing students with an interest and experience in web and app development, as well as how AI can be used in education.  Students interested in medical technology are particularly encouraged to apply.  

24 weeks part-time with 1 week full-time during Winter vacation, and 2 weeks full-time during Spring vacation.  

PatientSim recruitment ad

Summary

For this project we are looking for two participants to collaborate on the discovery and testing of novel membrane materials for use in the undergraduate teaching labs. For this project your role would require you to fabricate membranes, test those membranes and develop novel ideas on how these materials can be used to best 3rd year students about the subject of membrane separation. 

For this project we would like to highlight the importance of sustainability in our teaching. The project will consider economic, environmental and educational sustainability. Student partners will take ownership by developing a research plan alongside the project staff partner, Dr James Campbell, therefore previous understanding of membrane separation and materials is a requirement. You will select your own goals, and aims, and timeframe to give you the experience of working on a truly self-motivated project. This would be an ideal bridge to the work carried out during a 4th year research project. 

By the end of the project we intend to produce suite of materials, standard operating procedures (SOPs) and instructional handouts for a range of separation membrane fabrication methodologies. These will then be used in the following year UG labs.  

Project Lead

James Campbell (j.campbell10@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Chemical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

11 weeks part-time (half a day a week) between January and March.  

2 positions available.  Chemical Engineering students with experience working with membranes or studying membrane separations.

Economic and Environmentally friendly membranes ad

Summary

Evidence suggests that as consumers of scientific research, we rate research as better and more reliable if it originates from universities in high-income countries (HICs), as opposed to low-income countries (LICs)(1). This can have an impact not only on the voices and perspectives that are considered “valid” in the global research landscape, but it might also result in ideas and solutions to everyday problems being missed or ignored.

To understand the extent to which this geographic bias exists within the curricula and reading lists at Imperial, Library Services have developed an online tool that automatically analyses course reading lists and creates a map, along with other summary statistics, to show the global distribution of peer-reviewed journal articles being used on a reading list.

A pilot project studying the use and adoption of this tool in the School of Public Health demonstrated that although there is appetite to use it, many of the teaching staff did not know how they were expected to use the tool, and what they were meant to do with the findings the tool presented.

What you will do:

As part of this StudentShapers project, we would like you to learn to use the online geographic bias tool, first to understand how prevalent this bias may or may not be in the reading lists in your area of study. After familiarising yourself with the tool, its strengths and limitations, and the Power BI platform where it is hosted, we would like you to participate in the co-creation of a Toolkit to help teaching staff use the platform, and to assist them in addressing any potential geographic bias in their reading lists and the curriculum.

We would like you to analyse a representative sample of reading lists from the different Faculties at Imperial using the Power BI platform, to understand the geographic provenance of the research that is being taught. We would then like you to work with subject and liaison librarians in each Faculty to develop guidance for teaching staff regarding best practices when using the geographic bias tool and to provide suggestions for how teaching staff could be more inclusive of underrepresented research in their reading lists and curricula.

Project Lead

Ruth Harrison (r.e.harrison@imperial.ac.uk), Head of Scholarly Communications Management, Library Services

Mark Skopec (mark.skopec17@imperial.ac.uk),  Research Associate: Geographic Bias in Curricula, Library Services

Further Details/Experience Required

Six weeks full time during Summer break.  Five positions available.  

If you are a student completing your second year of studies at Imperial, you care about representation and inclusivity in reading lists, and you want the opportunity to shape the curriculum for future generations of students, we would encourage you to apply.

  (Please see Project Skills in recruitment ad below)

Geographic Bias recruitment ad

Summary

We hope to partner with neurodivergent students so that we can understand their experiences with different types of assessments. We will explore how various assessment methods, such as group presentations, reports, and video submissions, impact neurodivergent students' performance, workload perception, mental health, and well-being. We will explore the following key questions: 

• How does assessment type affect neurodivergent students? We will delve into various case studies including those on the "Anatomy of Assessment" project to understand the strengths and weaknesses of different assessment methods for neurodivergent students. 

• What makes assessment truly inclusive? We will focus on gathering student perspectives on creating fair and equitable assessment practices. 

• How do accessible learning resources impact student success? We will investigate which resources students find most helpful and explore ways in which we make assessment choices so that we can accommodate some of the preferences neurodivergent students might have. 

What You will Gain: 

• Develop valuable research and project management skills. 

• Contribute to meaningful change in the assessment practices at Imperial. 

• Collaborate with a diverse group of students and faculty. 

• Enhance your CV with a unique and impactful project experience. 

Project Lead

Vijesh Bhute (vbhute@ic.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Chemical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Sixteen positions available.  Students who have received or in the process of receiving a diagnosis for Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia or Dyspraxia are invited to apply for this project.  From any discipline or year group.  

Summer break full-time for eight weeks between June-August 2025

Shaping the Future of Assessment recruitment ad

Summary

The project aims to redesign the 1st year design challenge in Bioengineering to focus on authentic Bioengineering design problems. This will be done in collaboration with the prosthetics society at Imperial, whose members initial proposed the idea. This student-led society is formed of students from across the college with an interest in prosthetics. The society works on designing and building assistive devices, with an aim to enter these into the international Cybathlon competition. Members of the society have proposed that they could put forward design problems that they are facing as the basis of the design challenge. The StudentShapers project aims to take this idea and develop the appropriate resources to enable this to become part of the curriculum.

This would include:

• Developing the design brief(s) that form the basis of the design challenge.
• Redeveloping the introductory workshop session to be delivered by the staff member
• Scoping, design and co-production of additional digital teaching resources (e.g. videos and or quizzes) to support the design challenge (anticipated to be around transmission systems and actuators).
• Reviewing the assessment and marking scheme
• Design of a celebration event (e.g. Demo day, mini conference)

This would be done as part of a team comprising teaching fellows, department technicians and the student shapers.

Project Lead

Maria Parkes (maria.parkes04@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Strategic Teaching Fellow, Bioengineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Three Engineering or Bioengineering students from Year 2 or above.  Membership of the prosthetics society or project experience in prosthetics would be highly desirable.

One half-day a week for nine weeks during Spring term, starting in January.  

Redesigning the Bioengineering design challenge recruitment ad

Summary

Project details: To fill the identified gap in our online students’ sense of belonging, this project aims to enhance the learner centred component within the current SPH PGT student support system to maximise engagement, attainment and progression of the PGT Online Master of Public Health (MPH) students. Despite the recent launch of the buddy Scheme, PGT Forum and monthly career chats, all of which are efforts and initiatives developed to foster a sense of community for the PGT Online MPH students, students continue to flag the lack bonding and networking opportunities among their peers. Our goal for this project is to enhance the student 
experience and foster a supportive environment which offers a sense of community within, and beyond, the learning environment. Our methods include gathering data on the experiences of student support and community building from the Online MPH students, via student-led focus groups as a means of service evaluation. The data gathered will be used to develop ways of enhancing a sense of belonging, community building and networking opportunities (which we consider to be the primary outcomes of the project) and develop a framework and good practice guidance for online student engagement and empowerment, which can serve as a prototype for online learner community building activities (which we consider to be the primary outcomes of the project).
Project activities:
We will first seek qualitative feedback from 5-10 Online MPH students on the current student support system and community building and networking activities and how well it has worked for them via focus groups.
From analysis of the focus group data, we will identify key themes brought up by students and use this to inform the design of an evaluation survey to gain insight on the effectiveness of the support system which will be disseminated across the Online MPH student body. We will ask respondents of the survey to provide feedback on the student support including what aspects they have found useful and what areas could be improved and how. We will also incorporate data from existing student feedback mechanisms such as, end of term module evaluation questionnaires, and student-staff liaison committee meetings.
The collected data will be used to evolve the student support system and further build a sense of belonging and community,and distil findings to inform student support framework with maximizing attainment and progression at its heart for other fully online programmes across Imperial.

The overall project aims to empower students by making them co-creators of their online community experience, in partnership with School of Public Health student support team. This will be a student-led and staff-supported initiative

Project Lead

Sondus Hassounah (s.hassounah@imperial.ac.uk), School of Public Health
Jenny Husbands,  (j.husbands@imperial.ac.uk), School of Public Health

Wendy Kwok (w.kwok@imperial.ac.uk), School of Public Health

Anna Szajda  (a.szajda@imperial.ac.uk), School of Public Health

Further Details/Experience Required

Eight weeks for one half-day a week, from June 2025.  Two positions available for online MPH students in their second or third year of study (Please see Project Skills in recruitment ad below)

Progression for PGT taught online students ad

Summary

We are seeking enthusiastic and engaged students to join the next phase of our StudentShapers initiative within the Business School. This project builds on the success of last year’s work, which explored how students engage with GenAI tools in their learning. This year, we are repeating our review of student practice to understand how things are changing overtime and we are expanding our focus to include staff perspectives, allowing us to develop a more comprehensive understanding of how AI can best be utilised and supported across the Business School.

About the Project

The rapid development of AI technologies has transformed the way students and staff approach learning and teaching. This project aims to:

• Examine how attitudes, usage, and confidence in GenAI have evolved over time among students.
• Investigate how staff are integrating AI tools into their teaching practices and identify the support they require.
• Evaluate the effectiveness of existing AI training and guidance materials provided by the Business School and the wider university.
• Provide foundational ideas on how best to develop a robust support framework for both students and staff, fostering an AI-literate academic community who know when and how to use AI responsibly in their learning and teaching.

The Role of Student Partners

This project will involve four undergraduate and two postgraduate students working collaboratively with our faculty and IDEA Lab researcher from January 2025. As a student shaper on this project, you will have the opportunity to:

• Conduct in-depth desktop research to contribute to foundational insights by exploring GenAI usage in education and work.
• Design and conduct a student survey guided by the researcher to understand current Business School students' GenAI usage patterns.
• Conduct faculty survey and interviews to gain practical insights and bridge the gap between academia and students.
• Facilitate student focus groups, showcasing leadership and collaboration skills.
• Collaboratively analyse survey and interview data and contribute to the project report with faculty and researcher.
• Contribute to reviewing and enhancing AI training resources.

This role represents a genuine partnership, enabling students to contribute meaningfully to research that impacts both policy and practice within the School and beyond.

Project Lead

Cloda Jenkins (c.jenkins@imperial.ac.uk), Associate Dean (Education Quality), Business School

Nai Li (nai.li@imperial.ac.uk) Head of Research and Impact, Business School  

Further Details/Experience Required

Undergraduate students from the Business School, from the BSc Economics, Finance and Data Science, BPES, Joint Honours and/or iBSc programmes taking modules in the Business School and postgraduate students from any of the Business School MSc Programmes.  From January-June

• Four undergraduate positions available (27 hours across nine weeks on a part-time basis, plus one full-time week in June after teaching and assessments)
• Two postgraduate positions available (37 hours across twelve weeks on a part-time basis, plus one full-time week in June)  

Learning and adapting to GenAI over time recruitment ad

Summary

 This deadline extension is intended to encourage more expressions of interest from Aeronautics and Physics Undergraduate students (except final year) specifically

Lambda Feedback is a web platform for self-study, developed at Imperial. It hosts course content (such as tutorial sheets) that can be viewed in the browser or by PDF. Students can receive automated feedback on their answers, including hand-writing mathematical expressions. The platform also hosts step-by-step worked solutions and comment threads.

Lambda Feedback was first deployed in 2021-22, and is now used across College in all four faculties and by thousands of students. This summer we will be expanding the subjects that use Lambda Feedback, and improving features of the app.

We are looking for students to partner with academic staff to adapt and improve content when moving modules onto Lambda Feedback. We are also looking for students to contribute to the broader project, for example software development, algorithm development, feature design, data analytics, user documentation, marketing content.

Project Lead

Peter Johnson (peter.johnson@imperial.ac.uk), Principal Teaching Fellow, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks full-time during Summer break.  9 positions available.  

 This deadline extension is intended to encourage more expressions of interest from Aeronautics and Physics Undergraduate students (except final year) specifically.  You should have:

• Passion and knowledge for your own subject
• Deep appreciation for the student experience and the key needs of students
• A keen interest in content management and typesetting (md, LaTeX, images – you can learn as you go)

 (see recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Lambda feedback 24-25 recruitment ad

Summary

The project aims to design and prototype a bio-fluids lab which will support the taught theoretical content of the 2nd year Bioengineering BIOE50004 Fluid and Solid mechanics module. This would include developing the appropriate resources to enable this to become part of the curriculum.

Expected project tasks/deliverables include:

• Background research of fluids labs teaching in engineering at the HE level
• Background research into methods employed in fluid mechanics specific to bio-fluids (typically smaller scale, small sample volumes, complex fluid rheology)
• Developing the lab protocol
• Design, manufacture and testing of a prototype lab set-up
• Developing the lab briefing and teaching materials in digital format
• Developing an assessment and marking scheme including development of a feedback process
• Develop an evaluation process to gather student feedback on the lab for future development and to share more widely

This would be done as part of a team including students, teaching fellows (Dr Maria Parkes)  and academics (Dr Nic Newell, Prof. Darryl Overby).

 Project Lead

Maria Parkes (m.parkes04@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Strategic Teaching Fellow, Department of Bioengineering

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks full-time during Summer break.  Two positions available.  

Suitable for students who have completed at least 2 years of  an engineering course. It would be advantageous if this was Biomedical engineering, but a student who has taken a fluid mechanics module and can demonstrate an interest in Bioengineering applications would be suitable.  (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Biofluids Labs recruitment ad

Summary

Imperial Experience is the university's strategy to deliver a holistic student experience. As part of this project, an investigative report highlighted the important role of community building initiatives to support diverse and inclusive student engagement and enhance the student experience.

We are looking for engaged and enthusiastic students to help establish an initiative to foster connections across Imperial’s diverse student community.

Research into initiatives to support community building and the international student experience at other UK Higher Education institutions uncovered several initiatives to encourage connections within a diverse student body.

The project seeks to build on this work and develop a unique student-led initiative that celebrates the global campus community at Imperial and the opportunities that this provides to all students.

The project has three phases:

1. Fact finding and data analysis: reviewing existing initiatives, research and policy documents and seeking feedback and input from key stakeholders (students and staff).
2. Establishing the Global Connect initiative: working with staff partners to develop a proposal for a Global Connect initiative and proposed activities.

 Project Lead

Laura Bulmer (l.bulmer@imperial.ac.uk), Senior International Relations Manager Education and Mobility, International Relations Office

Muna Ali (muna.ali@imperial.ac.uk), Education Projects Coordinator (Non-Academic Experience), Education Office

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks part-time between May and July.  Two positions available.  

All students from any year of study including postgraduate students are eligible.   (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Fostering Connections recruitment ad

Summary

What makes this project unique?
We are inviting you to take part in a unique collaboration where you will be directly involved in shaping the future of assessment and feedback for students across Imperial. This opportunity is not to be missed and the scale of this project will see you operate in a network which stretches the breadth of the whole institution.

Background
Assessment and feedback are critical components of the learning experience at Imperial and we recognise that it is an area where improvements are needed to support the student experience. The University has made a commitment to improve assessment and feedback experiences by setting up a 2 year project to review and refine assessments across all faculties. The University has set up an Assessment and Feedback Monitoring and Advisory group to spearhead a 
comprehensive university-wide improvement in these areas. As part of the initial phase of this initiative, staff Faculty Review Coordinators have been recruited to work within faculties and departments to progress this work and ensure collaboration between students and staff on this project. The next phase of this initiative is to facilitate a partnership between yourselves, as students, and staff in faculties, in making meaningful changes to how assessment and feedback 
are received by staff and students alike.
This project is coordinated by the Education Office however, you will be working with your peers, elected student representatives and the staff Faculty Review Coordinators in Imperial Business School

What activities can you get involved with?
The project has an overall ambition to reduce the assessment burden and improve feedback processes across all programmes. You will do this by working with student representatives who capture the student voice and the Faculty Review Coordinators who will support you in the implementation of a process for realising these ambitions and improving the student experience of assessment and feedback.
This will be a collaborative process between you and the Faculty Review Coordinators, some areas that you may wish to consider are:
• Data gathering of current assessments
• Creation of assessment calendars and templates
• Creation of a checklist for developing new assessments and practices
• Capturing and including the student voice through working with student representatives

What will you gain?
By taking part in this project, you will have the opportunity to:
• Gain insights into the assessment and feedback processes at the university
• Engage with the wider student body to facilitate change
• Collaborate with the student representative network
• Develop project management areas such as data capture and change processes
• Develop staff networks

The long-term impact will be sustained through the ongoing support of the Assessment and Feedback Monitoring and Advisory Group until 2026, with the intention of integrating successful strategies into Business As Usual (BAU) activities beyond this timeframe and ultimately changing disciplinary assessment culture. Embedding these changes into standard practices will ensure that the benefits are lasting and continue to evolve with student needs.

 Project Lead

Amandip Bisel, (amandip.bisel@imperial.ac.uk), Head of Education and Student Experience Strategy Projects, Central Education Office

Pippa Greenwood (p.greenwood@imperial.ac.uk), Education Projects Manager(Learning and Experience Projects), Central Education Office

Further Details/Experience Required

10 weeks part-time between April and July.  Three positions available.  

Business School students from all levels of study are eligible.   (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Assessment and Feedback: Business school recruitment ad

Summary

Students will research the barriers to good time management for students with SpLDs, as well as existing solutions. They will then develop a solution which will integrate with Imperial systems (e.g. outlook / CELCAT) in order to better manage their schedule, deadlines, coursework, revision, and other day to day tasks. The software will be designed to help students learn good time management skills and will motivate task completion.

 Project Lead

Chloe Agg (c.agg@imperial.ac.uk), Principal Teaching Fellow, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Divyakshi Goyal (divyakshi.goyal23@imperial.ac.uk),  Undergraduate, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks full-time during Summer break.  One position available alongside student partner/co-creator of project as above.  

All undergraduate students are eligible.   (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Support for SpLDs recruitment ad

Summary

This project brings together the Central Learning Analytics Team and student partners to co-organise and co-host Imperial College’s first Learning Analytics Hackathon.

The project is structured across six phases, beginning in the summer with planning and preparation. Initial work will include establishing a collaborative framework, exploring best practices for hackathons, and preparing promotional materials. Student partners will also have access to Imperial’s anonymized learning analytics dataset. They will be encouraged to explore the data, identify key themes or challenges, and develop a bank of project ideas that can be used during the hackathon.

In the autumn, attention will turn to student hackathon participants recruitment, co-hosting pre-hackathon sessions, and co-delivering the main event on October 25^th (final date to be determined with students). The hackathon will offer a unique opportunity for students across the university to engage with real educational data and develop creative, data-driven solutions to improve learning experiences.

The final phase will focus on curating and analysing the outputs of the hackathon. Student partners will present key insights and findings to stakeholders across Imperial, contributing meaningfully to the development of learning analytics and digital education at Imperial.

*LEARNING ANALYTICS is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of data about learners and their contexts, for purposes of understanding and optimising learning and the environments in which it occurs.

 Project Lead

Mehdi Moussaoui (m.moussaoui@imperial.ac.uk), Data Analyst (Learning Analytics), Central Education Office

Helen Walkey (h.walkey@imperial.ac.uk), Learning Analytics Product Manager, Central Education Office

Further Details/Experience Required

5 weeks full-time during Summer break, and 8 weeks part-time during Autumn term.  And finally attendance at the Hackathon event itself, final date TBC.  Three positions available.  

All Undergraduate students from any year of study are eligible.   (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Learning Analytics Hackathon recruitment ad

Summary

The project aims at developing digital tools to enhance pedagogy and improve the learning experience for Advanced Manufacturing module. The student partners will collaborate on creating visualisation tools and resources designed to support a deeper understanding of complex threshold concepts, encouraging student body to engage more actively with the module content.

The project will empower student partners to design the digital tools based on the infiltration concept from Darcy’s law. The project will unfold in stages, beginning with brainstorming ideas, followed by designing the tools and simulations, and developing the apps/tools, and finally testing these to see the robustness and ease of use.

The process will be highly collaborative, with student partners engaged as a team to complete individual tasks, which will then be combined to develop the final tools and apps. Regular dialogue and continuous collaboration between staff and student partners will be integral to the whole process.

 Project Lead

Siti Ros Shamsuddin (s.shamsuddin07@imperial.ac.uk), Principal Teaching Fellow, Department of Aeronautics

Further Details/Experience Required

5 weeks full-time during Summer break.  Open to all students enrolled in Department of Aeronautics, preferably Y3 students.  Two positions available.  

(See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Infiltration Method for Composite Manufacturing ad

Summary

Early intervention in year 9 and 10 can have the most impact in terms of aspirations and students’ educational pathways. To successfully expand our Outreach activities and raise aspirations in under-represented groups within HE and STEM, the Department of Aeronautics has identified a need to develop more interactive formats for our events to proactively engage with our younger Outreach audience. These ‘hands-on’ activities will demonstrate the importance of maintaining a strong foundation in Maths and Physics, demystifies Aeronautics, counteracts the barriers that STEM/Aeronautics is not for ‘people like me’ and demonstrates the scope and impact of a degree in Aeronautics.

Core to the success of this project is an in-depth understanding of our target audience – in terms of their current understanding of Aeronautics, the barriers that prevent different Outreach audiences from progressing to a STEM degree, and how to relate the interactive activities to their current KS3/4 curriculum so they connect the importance of their GCSE and A Level subjects to the opportunities that Aeronautics opens. As our current undergraduate students are both influential peers to our target audience as well as having recent lived experiences of the school and HE journey, we value your insights and in-depth understanding of the decisions, interests and external influences that impacts the choices made by key stage 3 and 4 students.

The purpose of this StudentShapers project is to research, design and produce interactive, educational Aeronautical themed activities for students ages 13-16, in line with Key Stage 3 and 4 learning outcomes. The exercises must be accessible in a range of format and for different GTAs and staff to deliver, to ensure that future practitioners can be trained. StudentShapers and the staff partner will present their final proposal to the Director of Operations for budget approval of consumerables and equipment before production of resources. You will be encouraged to bring forward your ideas and recommendations, with regular discussion and feedback from the Recruitment, Admissions and Outreach Manager. The StudentShapers and the Recruitment, Admissions and Outreach Manager will have equitable input in the planning, execution and delivery of final outputs.

This project will influence practice by allowing the expansion of our departmental Outreach activities in new and innovative ways, increasing societal engagement and allowing under-represented groups within STEM to experience first-hand our ethos of discovery and academic enquiry – this in turns creates diversity in our applications and subsequently our community. 

 Project Lead

Jennie Long (j.long@imperial.ac.uk), Recruitment, Admissions and Outreach Manager, Department of Aeronautics

Further Details/Experience Required

6 weeks full-time during Summer break.   Undergraduate students within Aeronautics are eligible.  Three positions available.  

  (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Raising Aspirations in Aeronautics ad

Summary

This engagement uses the ViRSE (Virtual Reality Student Experience) project. ViRSE is a virtual reality platform designed to ease the development and deployment of ‘multi-player’ virtual reality into Imperial’s teaching across a range of departments and subjects. ViRSE is built on the Unity game engine, and all ViRSE applications are also built within Unity; code is written in the C# programming language. Students will not need to build a VR interface, write rendering code, or concern themselves with networking or administrative issues; these are handled by the ViRSE framework and the Unity engine. The development in this engagement will concentrate on the specific ‘domain’ problems of developing workflows for four teaching appllications, their design and implementation, the generation and polishing of appropriate 3D models, and the creation and testing the code necessary to make this function with the ViRSE system.

All ViRSE student shaper engagements commence with a two-week full time training course, which will provide the necessary grounding in the C# language, object-oriented programming, the Unity engine, the ViRSE platform, and 3D modelling tools. This course will take place on-campus June 30^th – July 11^th 2025.

In subsequent six project weeks the ViRSE student partners will lead on the development of the particular applications within Unity, in collaboration with the academic lead, and with the ViRSE team providing technical support and advice. While the timing of these six development weeks is potentially flexible, we would prefer them to be the six weeks immediately after the training course.

The assignment of the six student partners to these four projects will be flexible and determined in discussion with all parties; the intention is that four students will be assigned primary ownership of a project, and that the remaining two will ‘float’ between projects as required.

Please see the recruitment ad below for the full details of each of the four sub-projects.  

 Project Lead

Mark Sutton (m.sutton@imperial.ac.uk), Reader in Palaeontology, Department of Earth Science & Engineering

Maria Parkes (maria.parkes04@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Strategic Teaching Fellow, Department of Bioengineering

Rebecca Bell (rebecca.bell@imperial.ac.uk), Reader in Tectonics,  Department of Earth Science & Engineering

Sophie Morse (sophie.morse11@imperial.ac.uk), Imperial College Research Fellow, Department of Bioengineering

Further Details/Experience Required

8 weeks full-time during Summer break.   Students with an aptitude for coding and/or 3D modelling and enthusiasm for creating software, and students from ESE and Bioengineering with knowledge of the particular project subjects listed. We anticipate recruiting a mix of students from ESE, Bioengineering, and other departments at Imperial. Preference will be given to students who are not in their final year.

 Six positions available.  

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

ViRSE 24-25 recruitment ad

Summary

This project aims to build on the findings of recent surveys which elicited the opinions and ideas of both staff and students in the department about sustainability in the chemistry undergraduate curriculum. Current students, according to the survey, perceive that there is substantial scope for the curriculum to be improved (summer-research-report-on-sustainability-in-chemistry-higher-education, Dalia Taleb, 2024). There is also growing recognition among staff in the department that we need to re-evaluate our teaching provision more extensively with respect to sustainability and embed this across the whole course, not just in the final year. This project will involve students and staff working in partnership to implement changes desirable to both.

Informed by their interests, and the survey results, student partners will form pairs or small groups and be matched to engage with appropriate staff to develop new materials for the curriculum area eg. case studies for inclusion in lectures, tutorial / workshop questions using sustainability contexts (and using green metrics, life cycle analysis), lab activities. The staff involved may be the staff partners leading the project, or others from a group of staff who have committed to implementing outputs from this project related to their teaching. Staff partners will coordinate matching students and staff; students may engage with more than one staff member, or on more than one curriculum area, over the course of the project.

 Project Lead

Laura Patel (laura.patel@imperial.ac.uk), Principal Teaching Fellow, Department of Chemistry

James Wilton-Ely (j.wilton-ely@imperial.ac.uk), Professor of Inorganic Chemistry, Department of Chemistry

Dalia Taleb (dalia.taleb19@imperial.ac.uk), Undergraduate, Department of Chemistry

Further Details/Experience Required

6 weeks full-time during Summer break.  

Department of Chemistry undergraduates are eligible.  In particular year 3 and 4/5 students, having taken the Y3 Environmental and Green Chemistry course or Y4/5 Sustainable Chemistry module.

 Six positions available.  

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Teaching of sustainability in Chemistry recruitment ad

Summary

Educators routinely use role models and historical figures to introduce concepts and relationships. In science and engineering, these characters are typically white, Western men, which impacts students’ self-identity and sense of belonging. Contextualizing the Curriculum (CtC) will expand curricula to include modern-day diverse figures, cultures, and perspectives. This initiative is not solely concerned with knowledge but also place, power, purpose and identity. In this StudentShapers project, we will explore and analyse curriculum gap and barriers to equality, diversity and inclusivity in Higher Education. This important and challenging project will be conducted in partnership with students and staff across multiple job families in Materials and Earth Sciences.

The ongoing and active involvement of StudentShapers, which includes undergraduate (UG) and doctoral (PhD) candidates, will catalyse the success of CtC. This project will build on a collaborative effort between staff and students who will develop an authentic partnership. Imperial students are the best-placed people to determine how and why modern-day relevant figures and diverse cultures impact their studies, sense of belonging and university experience. Students will be involved in gathering, analysing and disseminating data.

What you will do:  develop databases of diverse role models and content that contextualises knowledge and understanding, including contributions from different cultural backgrounds. Invite external and/or internal academics from minority ethnic background to give lectures and/or seminars in the ESE and Materials departments to different levels of the undergraduate curriculum.

Project Lead

Valentin Laurent (v.laurent@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow in Pedagogic Transformation, Earth Science and Engineering

Eleonora D'Elia (eleonora.delia10@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Materials

Jessica Wade (jessica.wade@imperial.ac.uk), Lecturer in Functional Materials, Materials

Amina Riamah, Undergraduate, Materials

Sophia Quazi (s.quazi@imperial.ac.uk), Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Coordinator, Mechanical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

For this call, we are recruiting 2 UG StudentShapers who are Yr1, Yr2 or non-graduating Yr3 UG students from ESE or Materials Departments + 1 PhD StudentShaper in their 1^st or 2^nd year from ESE and Materials Departments

Part time (0.5 day per week), starting in June 2025, for a total of 67.5 weeks spread across 18 months (until November 2026), including breaks for holidays and revisions/exams for UG students or time to focus on thesis for PhD student

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

CtC WP2 PT - Diversify Curriculum Content ad

Summary

Educators routinely use role models and historical figures to introduce concepts and relationships. In science and engineering, these characters are typically white, Western men, which impacts students’ self-identity and sense of belonging. Contextualizing the Curriculum (CtC) will expand curricula to include modern-day diverse figures, cultures, and perspectives. This initiative is not solely concerned with knowledge but also place, power, purpose and identity. In this StudentShapers project, we will explore and analyse curriculum gap and barriers to equality, diversity and inclusivity in Higher Education. This important and challenging project will be conducted in partnership with students and staff across multiple job families in Materials and Earth Sciences.

The ongoing and active involvement of StudentShapers, which includes undergraduate (UG) and doctoral (PhD) candidates, will catalyse the success of CtC. This project will build on a collaborative effort between staff and students who will develop an authentic partnership. Imperial students are the best-placed people to determine how and why modern-day relevant figures and diverse cultures impact their studies, sense of belonging and university experience. Students will be involved in gathering, analysing and disseminating data.

What you will do: You will co-develop with staff and other students a completely new CtC I-Explore module. This module will enable the broader Imperial student community to develop their own inclusive resources and practices (e.g. broadening learning to recognise contemporary scientists and reflecting on the consequent advances in science). There might be future opportunities to help with the delivery of this module.

Project Lead

Valentin Laurent (v.laurent@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow in Pedagogic Transformation, Earth Science and Engineering

Eleonora D'Elia (eleonora.delia10@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow, Materials

Jessica Wade (jessica.wade@imperial.ac.uk), Lecturer in Functional Materials, Materials

Amina Riamah, Undergraduate, Materials

Sophia Quazi (s.quazi@imperial.ac.uk), Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Coordinator, Mechanical Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Full-time for 8 weeks during Summer break.  Three positions available.  

Students from any department or Faculty are eligible.  

(See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

CtC WP2 FT - IExplore module ad

Summary

Imperial’s strategy aims to make the Class of 2030 “the most talented, the most enterprising and the most diverse we have ever had the privilege to serve”. Essential to this aim is gaining a rich understanding of what students gain from their educational experience beyond their academic attainment so that this can be supported and measured.

In partnership with the ICU Deputy President for Education, Emina Hogas, we have been exploring how Imperial’s definition of educational gain could be developed. There is strong enthusiasm from the student rep network for having a set of measures in place which help students articulate what they have gained from their time at Imperial.

This definition will also support Imperial’s Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) submission to the Office for Students (OfS), as we are required to submit a narrative statement explaining how we measure and support Educational Gain. Following the recommendations of the Pearce report in 2021, the OfS introduced ‘Educational Gain’ (EG) as a new metric within the 2023 TEF. Described loosely as ‘what our students gain from our educational experience and how we evidence that’, the OfS did not provide prescriptive guidelines for how EG might be defined and measured, instead recognising the context specific nature of EG across different geographical areas, subjects and institutions. Building a robust, co-created definition of EG will be crucial in maintaining Imperial’s TEF Gold rating in the next TEF.

Following the 2023 TEF exercise, the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA) funded an Imperial-led project (headed by Dr Camille Kandiko Howson) which collaborated with 14 other HEIs to analyse other institutions’ TEF submissions with regard to their definition, measurement and evaluation of EG. Dr Kandiko Howson also conducted a Student Shapers project with Imperial students to review TEF submissions across the sector and the QAA project report in order to develop student-facing resources for understanding and using the concept of EG. Crucially, while neither project provided a definition of EG, the QAA report outlined a schema for developing EG within an institutional context, and highlighted the importance of co-creation with student partners in developing definitions, measures and evaluation frameworks for EG.

This project will build on this work, using the schema developed during the QAA project to develop an Imperial-specific definition of EG in collaboration with student partners. The resulting definition will be co-created with a wide range of students, ensuring that it is broad enough to capture the concerns, goals and aspirations of all Imperial students, and flexible enough for students to adapt it to their own specific contexts. The deep engagement and equal partnership approach of the Student Shapers programme, will ensure that participating students have direct and tangible input into the definition of EG.

Overall, this will be a co-designed and co-run research project, during which student and staff partners will work together to design and implement research that gathers the views of a wide range of Imperial students on their thoughts and opinions around EG.

The students will lead on the direction and implementation of the research project, with staff partners using their research and evaluation experience to guide them. Student partners will in turn use their experience as students to determine the best routes to engagement with the wider student body, to create an authentic peer-to-peer atmosphere during the fieldwork phase, and to interpret findings from a student perspective.

The project will begin with 6 weeks of full-time activity during the summer vacation, during which the following activities will take place:

• Induction activities, including teambuilding, and meeting colleagues in the Strategic Planning & Insight Division
• Project planning, including ways of working, key milestones and agreeing outputs
• Meeting stakeholders in the Careers Service, ICU (including departmental reps) and the Centre for Higher Education Research and Scholarship (CHERS) to understand their views and background to the project.
• Presentation by the Strategic Planning & Insight Division of the underlying rationale for the project, including background information on EG, TEF and intended outcomes so students gain relevant knowledge to undertake the project, and build an awareness of one aspect of Higher Education regulation.
• Educational research training run by CHERS to develop expertise to design and conduct the research
• Review of previous research (e.g. CHERS ‘Belong, Engagement and Communities’ project) and data held by Strategic Planning & Insight.
• Co-creation of research design
• Understanding/awareness of the ethical approval process for educational research

The second phase of the project will take place over 10 weeks during term time, starting in October 2025 and ending in December. This phase will include the following activities:

• Preparation for fieldwork (e.g. planning recruitment of research participants (focus groups/interviews), assembling contact information for survey participants, etc.)
• Fieldwork
  • Analysis
  • Running workshops to discuss your research findings and arrive at definition of EG
  • Presentation of findings to Strategic Planning & Insight team
  • Agreeing on next steps

By engaging with Imperial student partners in a collaborative way, this project will enable students to determine and refine the knowledge and skills—beyond just their academic studies—that they would like to gain. By allowing students to define the specific ways in which they can grow and realise their potential during their time at Imperial, this work will align particularly with aim 2 of the Learning and Teaching Strategy, ‘to deliver degree programmes that challenge students to achieve their full potential through discovery-based learning.’

 As well as this, by giving a wide range of students input into the development of Imperial’s definition of EG, the project will also align with aim 5 of the L&T Strategy, specifically the sub-aim of ‘engaging students in positive change by establishing ways for them to contribute to their own and their peers’ educational experience.’

 Project Lead

Adam Keogh (a.keogh@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Education Evaluation Officer, Strategic Planning and Insight

Louise Hanger (l.hanger@imperial.ac.uk), Education Evaluation Manager, Strategic Planning and Insight

Carole Hobden (c.hobden@imperial.ac.uk),  Associate Director of Strategic Planning, Strategic Planning and Insight

Further Details/Experience Required

Six weeks full-time during Summer break, followed by 10 weeks at part-time during term-time, between October and December. 

Four positions available.  Any undergraduate student from any department is eligible. 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Co-Creating a Definition of 'Educational Gain' recruitment ad

Summary

This project addresses key challenges and opportunities in the Department’s computing and programming education, informed by student feedback, staff observations, and curriculum reviews.

Topics include:

• Programming: MATLAB, Python, C++
• Simulation Tools: 3DEXPERIENCE (CAD), StarCCM+ (CFD), Abaqus (FEA)

Common concerns raised:

• Difficulty accessing beginner-friendly guidance (especially for 3DEXPERIENCE)
• Inconsistent software usage across modules
• Gaps in supporting resources and confidence-building materials

Project Aims

1. Evaluate the current computing education experience from both student and staff perspectives
2. Improve teaching materials, aligning them with real-world applications and industry standards
3. Recommend evidence-based improvements to module structure, duration, and delivery

What You’ll Do

• Design and distribute surveys to assess confidence, usability, and learning challenges
• Lead focus groups to gather deeper insights from different year cohorts
• Engage staff via interviews and consultations (e.g., with Directors of Teaching and UG Studies)
• Co-create resources, including: Supplementary self-guided learning content, real-world-inspired problem sets, and improved software documentation and usability guides

 Project Lead

Masoud Seifikar (m.seifikar@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Teaching Fellow in Computational Engineering, Department of Aeronautics

Further Details/Experience Required

Eight weeks full-time during Summer break. 

Two positions available.  Aeronautics undergraduate student are eligible. 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Optimising Computing and Programming Education recruitment ad

Summary

Practical chemistry is a core part of any chemistry degree and an important route to develop core scientific skills such as planning, problem solving and judgement, as well as practical and analytical skills. However, laboratories can also present challenges, such as high cognitive load and the need to manage uncertainty within experimental processes. Teaching materials that are clear, accessible, and help set expectations are one important aspect of helping students get the most learning from laboratories and increasing inclusivity.

In this project we are partnering with students to build understanding of how current teaching materials for laboratories (e.g. lab scripts) are experienced and used by students and update materials to increase their accessibility and readability. The focus of this project will be the physical teaching laboratories, with the goal of generating good practice guidance for writing clear lab scripts to share with staff. Students will collaborate with each other to review existing materials for experiments, identifying examples of good practice and areas for improvement. We will then explore alternative ways of presenting information that increases readability and accessibility, to support updating of the scripts and resources for these experiments. Training around inclusive design and accessibility will be provided and good practice guidelines and examples created by the project will be shared.

 Project Lead

Charlotte Sutherell (c.sutherell@imperial.ac.uk), Principal Teaching Fellow, Department of Chemistry

Benji Fenech-Salerno (b.fenech-salerno@imperial.ac.uk), Teaching Fellow in Physical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry

Further Details/Experience Required

 One part-time week (23rd-27th June) and 6-week full-time project between July-August.  Four Positions available.  Chemistry undergraduate students of any year of study are eligible.

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Inclusive teaching materials in chem labs recruitment ad

Summary

In the two core mechatronics-focused modules across the undergraduate and postgraduate taught courses in Design Engineering, students design and build the circuitry, mechanical systems, and housing for their self-directed projects. Videos documenting the projects and module structure for Cyber Physical Systems can be seen at: https://youtu.be/q6A_MlYL0fs?si=Pz4uShePhu95sJq4 and https://youtu.be/xPZsWItjvds?si=oauJ7LE8Yd4z0C5p.

Whilst students are encouraged to explore unique designs and fabrication methods using the resources available in the teaching workshop, it has been difficult for the workshop to anticipate and provide the electrical components needed for the student designs. As a result, students try to source their own components which can be of a lower quality or under-documented without sufficient data sheets describing their safe use. This can lead to selecting parts that will not work properly or are used incorrectly.

We want to address this by building an open-ended kit for students. This involves (1) identifying a core set of components such as motors and drivers that will be sourced via university suppliers and will conform to the module risk assessment; (2) ensuring compatibility between those components and that they operate within required voltage and current ranges; (3) designing a custom circuit board for the safe powering of those components.

The project will have two phases, with some flexibility in timing for both of those phases. The first phase would be full-time during the first two weeks of July and the second phase occurring full-time across two weeks in late July or early August. The deliverables of the project will be (1) a list of components such as motors, LEDs, and other actuators; (2) online documentation about the components including full data sheets; (3) a custom printed circuit board design that can support the powering of all actuators in the kit; (4) sample projects including microcontroller code showing how to use the kit.

 Project Lead

Rebecca Stewart (r.stewart@imperial.ac.uk), Senior Lecturer in Interactive Systems, Dyson School of Design Engineering

Further Details/Experience Required

Four weeks during Summer break in total, with the first two weeks to be run in the first two weeks of July.  Second two weeks either in late July or August, to be finalised.  

Two positions available.  Any student with the skills listed in the ad are welcome to apply. Students who have already completed the DE2 module Physical Computing or IDE1 module Cyber Physical Systems are particularly encouraged to apply. 

 (See recruitment ad for Project Skills details)

Mechatronics Projects recruitment ad