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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Educ.
Sec. Digital Learning Innovations
Volume 9 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/feduc.2024.1463338
This article is part of the Research Topic Trends in the digitization of education: approaches, innovations and scenarios View all 7 articles

Co-producing a Live Fieldwork Broadcast in the Biosciences

Provisionally accepted
Janine Maddison Janine Maddison *Leah Ada Constantinou Leah Ada Constantinou Ellen Fletcher Ellen Fletcher Callum Turner Callum Turner Richard Bevan Richard Bevan Sara Marsham Sara Marsham
  • School of Natural and Environmental science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, North East England, United Kingdom

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Most live broadcast work in education operates with an expert to novice delivery mode, and in indoor settings such as surgical teaching environments. Those few examples of live broadcasts from outdoor locations have heavy resource requirements, limiting their uptake within Higher Education. Working with undergraduates in a students as partners approach, this research aims to test the feasibility of a low-cost and low-tech solution to co-produce a live fieldwork broadcast within the biosciences. The co-production partnership successfully produced a live broadcast from conception to delivery in 2022-2023 with three placement students and in 2023-2024 with two placement students and three mentors. The students were involved in all aspects of design, development and delivery of the live fieldwork broadcast. A pocket wireless modem creates an outdoor wireless network with a mobile device and wireless microphones used to deliver the broadcast. Semi-structured interviews, student self-assessments and a reflective researcher diary explored the impact of this approach to co-produce a live fieldwork broadcast. Enjoyable aspects of the placement identified were the opportunity for new experiences and a sense of achievement. The live fieldwork broadcast placement enabled the placement students to develop 28 skills, with 73% of skills identified by at least two of the placement students. Most skills developed were transferable (54 % of student identified skills) including teamwork and project planning. The simple and low-cost technology used provides a solution to address the barriers of technology integration within fieldwork and offers insight into the experience of working in partnership during a live fieldwork broadcast.

    Keywords: fieldwork, Live broadcasting, Student placement, students as partners, Biosciences

    Received: 11 Jul 2024; Accepted: 10 Dec 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Maddison, Constantinou, Fletcher, Turner, Bevan and Marsham. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Janine Maddison, School of Natural and Environmental science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU, North East England, United Kingdom

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.