From the ALT M25 Summer Meeting to the RAISE Conference 2025, recent events highlighted the sector’s ongoing focus on equity, inclusion and partnership in higher education. Both gatherings emphasised the importance of student voice, co-creation and culturally responsive approaches as central to creating meaningful and engaging learning experiences.
Making digital life better for international students: M25 LTG summer meeting 2025
In July, we joined colleagues across the sector at the ALT M25 Learning Technology Group Summer Meeting to explore the theme Making Digital Life Better for International Students. The event focused on how technology can help create more inclusive, responsive, and culturally aware experiences for students arriving from across the globe.
Key messages from the event included:
- Digital access is more than infrastructure (Dr Fiona Harvey, UCL)
Fiona opened the event by reminding us that access is not only about having Wi-Fi or a device. She shared real student cases from the Social & Historical Sciences faculty to illustrate how confidence, familiarity with academic norms, and emotional comfort online are equally important. This prompted participants to reflect on often-overlooked barriers that shape the digital experiences of international students.
- Scaling global online programmes requires flexibility (Dionysis Dimakopoulos, UCL)
Dionysis highlighted design decisions from UCL’s global online programmes. He showed how backend systems, consistent visual design, and clear pedagogy enable diverse international cohorts to succeed. Importantly, he stressed that scaling is not about standardisation, but about building flexibility and inclusion into programmes from the start. New design components in QMplus can help us apply these ideas to our own learning materials – learn more about them in our Components for Learning article. - Exploring AI with students, not just for them (Dr Tim Neumann with Nick Wong and Fengyun Tang, UCL)
Tim, joined by student presenters Nick and Fengyun, introduced FACILE, an initiative where staff and students work together to interrogate generative AI in learning. Their session highlighted transparency, responsibility, and co-creation as key principles. The lively discussion, enriched by the student perspective, captured the spirit of partnership in shaping AI use. - Onboarding matters for student success (Samuel Catterall-Young, RCA)
Samuel facilitated an interactive group activity where participants identified common challenges faced by international students entering UK higher education — from VLE access issues to social disconnection. Together, the group proposed practical strategies such as personalised communications, low-stakes induction activities, and early peer mentoring networks. These ideas showed how thoughtful onboarding can ease transitions and create stronger student engagement.
Placing student voices at the centre
Throughout the afternoon, international students shared reflections on their digital learning journeys. Their insights reinforced the importance of designing with students, ensuring institutional strategies address lived realities rather than assumptions. To hear Queen Mary students’ perspective on this, check out our interview with TELT ambassadors, Anu and Vandy.
RAISE Conference 2025: Who we engage with and how we engage them
The RAISE Conference, held at the University of Glasgow in early September, provided an opportunity to consider the changing landscape of student voice, with particular focus on inclusivity and diversity and supporting meaningfully, impactful engagement with students.
Prof. Rebecca (Beccy) Freeman, Deputy Pro-Vice Chancellor (Education) at the University of Warwick, opened the first day with her keynote on shaping the culture of student voice. Beccy introduced Warwick’s student engagement framework, adapted from the IAP2 Framework for Public Participation, with six options for engagement: Encounter, Inform, Consult, Involve, Co-create/Co-design and Empower. She shared key examples of co-creation, including applying a ‘compassionate’ lens to formal university communications, placing the student experience at the centre and explaining processes and regulations more simply and clearly; and student-created resources for personal tutors supporting LGBTQUIA+ students. While student voice initiatives often sit alongside the curriculum, Beccy emphasised the importance of valuing student voice within the classroom, curriculum and assessment.
A particular highlight was a presentation exploring factors influencing attendance at timetabled classes, by Tom Lowe, Emma Elkington and Irene Brew-Riverson from the University of Westminster. They highlighted that students’ decisions on attendance are influenced by a range of factors, including learning preferences, the cost-of-living crisis, what is happening in the session and what else is on. Focusing on what is happening in the class itself, students reported that several factors impacted their decisions to attend, including perceived difficulty and relevance of the topic. They reported that they were more likely to attend classes that
- had a practical link to their discipline;
- provided scenarios to help bring ideas to life; and
- included activities, discussion and interaction.
The physical classroom environment had little impact on attendance; instead, the ways in which educators interact with students and create a safe, encouraging learning environment is much more important.
Other highlights included sessions on student representation for distance learners by Jazz and Gareth from Open SU; using peer review to develop students’ feedback literacy by Alexandra Moores from the University of Kent; and neurodivergent students and critical thinking by Liz Staples from Plymouth Marjon University. The Digital Education Studio’s Dr Jo Elliott and student partner Alex Shoebottom also shared their work on the Future Ready project, featured in this month’s DECoP webinar.