Editorial: An Introduction to JADE -
Student Edition
It seems a long time now since our fourth JADE Student
Learning Undergraduate Conference (JSLUG) although it was
only 4 months or so ago. It seems a long time since I managed
to get the whole audience of JSLUG to sing ‘Happy Birthday’
to a conference - it really is amazing what people will go along
with when you have the microphone and bank on the innate
politeness of our community! In that time, preparations have
begun anew for the fifth iteration of the conference and over a
third of our fantastic presenters have worked incredibly hard to
produce the brilliant full-length papers you will shortly go on to
read in their hard-earned summer break.
Introduction
Dr Christopher Little
As always, I cannot go on any further without thanking a whole
host of people. The wonderful Steve and Jo at Keele’s Institute of
Liberal Arts and Sciences for their unending support. Dr Russell
Crawford and everyone else who works on JADE as a publication
has been, as always, a huge help in getting to this point. My
amazing colleagues in Student Learning, who continue to develop
and support our students directly and through working with
their teaching teams, a massive thanks again. Anyone else who I
might’ve missed - thank you!
Learning Developer and
Teaching Fellow
Keele Institute for Innovation
and Teaching Excellence
[email protected]
Most important, however, are the students of Keele. This
year saw 46 presentations at JSLUG - our biggest yet. We are
definitely beginning to stretch the limitations of a one-day event!
The students continue to amaze and inspire in equal measure
with the immense quality and hard-work that their presentation
show.
In addition to the wonderful event itself, we have this brilliant
journal edition each year. This year sees a ‘bumper’ crop of
articles. With the publication of JADE, we will have published
a total of 143 abstracts, 58 academic posters and 50 full-
length student papers - no small achievement. Across the past
four years, we have also been successful in securing funding
for 2 students to present at the inaugural World Congress of
Undergraduate Research in 2016, and a further 5 students
to present at the 2018 and 2019 British Conferences of
Undergraduate Research.
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