A report of the STAR conference is available from
here
The conference programme is available here.
The conference has two themes-
1. Institutional strategies
for retention-
This will include the activities of centralised departments (staff
development, student support, centralised student retention teams, etc.)
2. Practices for retention
This will include curriculum development, student induction, study skills
initiatives, mentoring, etc.
The plan
Visitors can arrive on the 13th.
There will be an event and dinner in the evening. The Conference will
run from the morning of the 14th to lunchtime on the 15th. The University
can provide accommodation for anyone wishing to stay after the conference
to investigate the north coast or play golf, or visit the Bushmills
distillery or whatever. Just e-mail STAR@ulster.ac.uk
with your requirements. It is nice here in June.
Delegates will be welcomed by Denise McAllister
(PVC Teaching and Learning, University of Ulster). The conference dinner
address will be from the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ulster,
Richard Barnett.
There will be two parallel sessions running for
most of the conference (Institutional strategies and individual practice).
Several speakers have agreed in principle to
contribute to the conference. They include:
1. Betsy Barefoot (North Carolina) - Student
retention has been a greater problem in the USA for several decades.
A range of solutions have been shown to work. Would they work here?
2. Mantz Yorke (Lancaster) - speaking on the
findings of a recent HEA sponsored survey of the attributes of first
year students
3. Alison Halstead (Wolverhampton) - speaking
on institutional strategies in a widening participation university;
and
4. Anne Chirnside (Napier) - speaking on her
experiences of supporting student mentoring in a centralised department.
Summarisers will be primed to attend all the sessions in a theme and
address a plenary before lunch on Friday.
The cost
| |
Early bird (by 31st March) |
Late (but before 31st May) |
| Full conference with
accommodation |
£120 |
£150 |
| Full conference without accommodation |
£50 |
£75 |
| Day rate |
£20 |
£20 |
Past contributors to the STAR project will be subsidised, probably
by meeting reasonable travel costs.
The conference is free to a limited number of members of the University
of Ulster but the usual penalties will apply for non-attendance.
The benefits
Delegates will receive the STAR studies in their conference
pack. Offers of papers already received (even before a call for papers
has been sent out) indicate that there will a good range of presentations
and posters from enthusiastic and experienced practicitioners. Our expectation
is that there will be a strong showing on aspects of student mentoring
and the facilitation of e-learning. We will supplement these with facilitated
roundtable discussions, posters and, where appropriate, workshops. We
will build in plenty of networking opportunities into the programme.
All contributions offered will be anonymously peer reviewed prior to
acceptance. Although the abstracts will be published in the conference
booklet we do not anticipate publishing conference papers.
Travel
Air
Travelling from mainland Great Britain you can expect
to pay about £60 or less for a return flight to Belfast International
airport (Wednesday- Friday) if booked well in advance. EasyJet BMI baby
and Jet2 fly into Belfast International AIrport. Coleraine is about
50 miles from the International airport but there is an Airporter Bus
which can be pre-booked at http://www.airporter.co.uk/viacoleraine.html
. The current timetable shows buses leaving for Coleraine at 16.50 and
20.00. These do not presently stop at the University but that might
change between now and next June. There is space on the application
form to indicate if you would like to be picked up at the airport. We
can arrange this if there is sufficient demand but there will only be
one pick up at 4:00pm. Similar arrangements can be made for the return
journey arriving at the airport at around 4:00pm. We will inform you
of the arrangements immediately after the early bird deadline (31st
March).
Belfast City, or Harbour or George Best Airport is south of Belfast.
If you have to fly into Belfast CIty then contact STAR@ulster.ac.uk
for advice on travelling to the Coleraine campus.
Bringing your car
Ferries sail to Northern Ireland from Scotland (Stranraer,
Cairnryan, Troon) or from England (Heysham, Liverpool). The ferries
from Scotland take between 1 and 2 hours. You can expect to pay about
£200 per vehicle. There is a pleasant drive along relatively uncongested
roads to Coleraine. The University has a car parking scheme and you
should expect to pay £3 per day for parking on campus.
The University provides good maps at http://www.ulster.ac.uk/information/location/colerainesigns.html
but double check some of the travel information: for instance I doubt
that the ferry from Stranraer to Belfast takes 11 hours. I will try
to get this checked and corrected before June!
Looking forward to some stimulating discussions in June.
Tony Cook
