History Department Response to Student Feedback
HSTY1031 - Renaissance and Reformation (2005)

Unit Coordinator: Dr Margaret Sampson

95% of students agreed and strongly agreed that they were ‘satisfied with the quality of this unit’. 86% agreed that teachers in the unit were responsive to student feedback, 85% that they helped students to learn effectively and 87% that they made learning outcomes clear to students.

According to the students surveyed, HSTY1031 succeeded in creating a ‘great...well organised, enjoyable’ learning environment in which ‘things were clear, staff were enthusiastic and everyone was keen and willing to participate and learn’. HSTY1031 was described as ‘an excellent learning experience, well structured and run’. Students attributed this success to the enthusiasm for the course shared by the lecturer, the three tutors and the students themselves: ‘lecturers and tutors were passionate about it’, ‘[they were] dedicated to teaching and assisting us as students,’ ’both tutor and lecturer were simply fantastic. I loved the course.’

There were some criticisms. A few suggested that we perhaps tried to cover too much material: ‘dense but enjoyable,’ ‘jam-packed but fun – loved the course’.
Several students would have preferred a more precisely targeted course to a large survey course. Many thought the reader was too large and the readings too much to expect of students every week. Some (including the lecturer in charge) would have preferred two single lectures to the repeated double lecture session. Almost all students praised the extensive use of online resources in HSTY1031: ‘fantastic to have both lecture notes available on WEBCT prior to lectures as well as mp3 files’. Most were happy with the assessment and thought the work-load realistic.

HSTY1031 in 2005 was a joy to teach and to learn for almost all concerned:

• ‘This course… has made me want to learn more about this period and history in general.’
• ‘I actually felt myself intrigued, challenged and part of a group of students and teaching staff that felt the same way.’
• ‘This is the best course that I have undertaken at uni. I really felt that learning was the aim of the unit of study and the lecturer and tute leaders’ enthusiasm was infectious.’