The MNT Conference 2021 – How can sustainability goals increase the quality in STEM education?

This focus for the MNT2021 (STEM) Conference was on sustainability and how this perspective can contribute to increase quality in education and teaching. The MNT conference is held every second year and the 2-days event was hosted by the University of Agder this year. However, due to the ongoing corona situation the conference was held online.

bioCEED also contributed this year with interesting presentations. First out were Oddfrid Førland and Roy Andersson with “Conferences as a learning arena in a pedagogical course” followed by Kristin Holtermann et al. “Er vi bedre på læringsaktiviteter enn læringsutbyttebeskrivelser?” The latter presentation, in addition to the presentation by John Georg Seland et al. “Improving learning outcomes from the undergraduate chemistry laboratory” were presentations of SoTL group projects done as part of the bioCEED Collegial Project Course.  Course participants were encouraged to submit proposals to the MNT Conference.

Our student representatives were invited to contribute to an open discussion session on assessment “ En samtale om vurdering” where master student Ørjan Sørstrønen Vabø from UiB participated in the panel. The discussion revolved around assessment forms in higher education. Which assessment forms the students preferred and got the best learning outcome from, how assessments should be designed, what type of knowledge they should assess, and how assessment had been working during corona.

All conference submissions can be found here.

From Førland and Anderssons presentation: Conferences as a learning arena in a pedagogical course