History Department Response to Student Feedback
HSTY2003 - Cultural Transmissions (2003)

Unit Coordinators: Prof. Richard Waterhouse and Dr Maggie Mackellar

This course gave a small number of students the opportunity to be involved in a cultural exchange via tele conferencing with students doing a similar course at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

The feedback from this experience was overwhelmingly positive. Students found the exchange with students from another country and institution to be a valuable experience that was both fun and challenging.

As this was the first time this component was run there were several areas that students considered could be improved. These were mainly concerned with having the opportunity to ‘get to know’ the UNC students better over the internet, matching up the topics for teleconferencing discussion more closely and having a longer period of the semester to conduct the course over. These issues will all be addressed when the course runs again in July 2004.

The student feedback for the rest of the course was also very positive. Students particularly enjoyed the use of group work in the tutorials rather than individual presentations.

• “The way the tutorials was done was great. I’ve never been able to participate in tutorials this much. They’ve previously been a waste of time.”
• “The group work was such a great idea – it made the tutorial so much easier to participate in and the learning experience so much better.”

This course also worked well for exchange students. Due to its comparative nature students, particularly from the United States, had the opportunity to learn about America in relation to Australia and felt able to participate in class discussions.

The exchange students added to the discussion in a very positive way.

• “This was my favourite course during my exchange semester at Sydney Uni. As an American History major, this gave me a perspective I would never have gotten at my uni in the US."

The student feedback did highlight that the reading was perhaps too long. This will be addressed the next time the course is run.