Curriculum Innovation through Research with Communities: Learning circles of Educators and Technology

The Curriculum Innovation through Research with Communities: Learning Circles of Educators and Technology (CIRCLET) project aimed to enhance higher education by empowering educators to improve student and community outcomes by redesigning curricula to include Community Engaged Research and Learning (CERL). The project included blended and online approaches.

The project supported educators in redesigning courses, enabling students to undertake curriculum-based research projects that addressed community ideas and needs. This initiative strengthened the connection between higher education, research, communities and real-world learning, supporting educators, students and community partners to positively impact society.

Project Objectives:

- Enhanced educator skills and confidence in CERL through accredited and informal learning, mentoring, learning circles, Learning Teaching Training Activities (LTTAs), and an online Continuing Professional Development (CPD) module.

- Redesigned academic curricula to facilitate higher quality CERL, with increased use of online and digital resources.

- Disseminated intellectual outputs via websites, events, conferences, publications, and extensive networks to maximize impact, particularly among educators and CERL support roles.

The project was structured around learning circles. Partner universities invited proposals from educators to redesign academic courses with CERL. Educators received support to redesign courses and participated in a cross-university reflective learning circle. These learning circles connected transnationally through online meetings and learning events, encouraging collaboration on transnational publications. A CPD module cohort formed another transnational learning circle, using e-learning platforms to promote high-quality interactions.

Collaboration involved five university partners: three research-intensive universities from Belgium, Hungary, and the UK; a new technological university from Ireland; and an established online learning centred open university from Spain. These partners worked with community organizations to develop research topics and provided support for curriculum-based engaged research, mainly through Science Shops (www.livingknowledge.org), pooling expertise across learning circles, policy, CERL resources, science communication, e-learning, and digital skills.

The core activity of course redesign via learning circles produced resources for educators, such as:

- Guidelines for module redesign incorporating CERL

- Examples of local CERL practices

- Learning circles for curriculum redesign

- An online CPD module on embedding CERL in the curriculum 

- Interactive CERL resources

To expand practice, educators developed transnational peer-reviewed papers, and partners presented at relevant conferences. National and international networks ensured widespread dissemination and utility of outputs.

Outcomes:

- Over 50 revised academic modules

- Over 100 educators upskilled

- Over three thousand European students engaged with society, enhancing their competences and employability

- Collaborative research produced with over 150 community partner organizations, supporting local communities and disadvantaged groups

- Development of innovative practices within partner universities to foster a supportive CERL culture

The long-term impact was to enable more educators and students to undertake high-quality, curriculum-based research projects with communities across Europe.

CIRCLET was funded by the British Council, the national funding agency in the UK for Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership funding. 

5 universities across Europe collaborated to develop training and tools to help lecturers to improve their teaching. They helped lecturers to work with charities or community organisations to design projects for students that would help the charities achieve their goals. The project team designed and ran a new qualification for lecturers in this area of working with communities. They also developed and ran learning circles to support lecturers, in 5 countries, every year for 2 years.

By the end of the project, 104 lecturers had been supported to work with more than 3,000 students and 165 community organisations on community engaged research and learning projects. 53 modules were redesigned as a result of our collaborative learning experiences.