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Before SUSTech freshmen started their college life here, every one of them took an online course called Academic Success provided by Epigeum, Oxford University Press. It’s a course through which they may understand broadly what higher education is and develop their own learning approach. Many students said they benefited a lot from this course

Dr. Kathy O’Sullivan hosted the lecture.

On October 19^th, we were honored to have Dr. David Lefevre, who is a Co-Founder of Epigeum, as our guest lecturer. He is also a long-serving director of the Educational Technology Unit at the Imperial College Business School and has led a number of high-profile e-learning projects and pioneered the use of database-driven online language learning materials. All the experience makes him an expert on technology – based education.

He shared his Epigeum story with the audience, all the while highlighting the importance of feedback in the learning process. Epigeum evolved from a project at Imperial College London Graduate School. The aim was to promote quality education resources to people worldwide. As it developed, more and more universities come together and now have developed more than 100 courses which are used by more than 230 universities globally. They are cheap in price but excellent in quality, which makes it benefit a lot of learners, including SUSTech students.

While they develop courses, they also do research. For example, research on feedbacks plays an important part in the development process.  “Feedback has a powerful effect on learning. It is considered one of the ten most significant influences on learner achievement”, David said, citing Hattie and Timperley. After they analyze data collected from users, they make recommendations which will help make the courses a better fit for users.

There were many questions afterwards, not least from students. David visited an English class taught by Dr. Hu Yuxiu, where the students had many questions to ask. This is why the CLE Lecture Series is a different type of lecture series, as there is a focus on involving students in the discussion.

Dr. David Lefevre also visited the Teaching Affairs office and Higher Education Research Center to talk about further cooperation. His trip will really help SUSTech with internationalization, and the CLE will continue to try and bring people on campus together to communicate and collaborate on potentially exciting projects.