£1.9 million e-learning facility to boost innovative teaching and learning

Cardiff University is increasing capacity for progressive and innovative teaching with the opening of a brand new e-Learning and e-Assessment Facility (eLEAF).

Situated on the Cathays campus in the Sir Martin Evans Building of the School of Biosciences, the new eLEAF facility has been funded as part of Cardiff University’s £41M Physical Learning Spaces Campus Development programme. The space comprises 165 new workstation computers and, with multifunctional zoning and sliding partition walls, the space can accommodate a range of activities, from training and private study to small and large group teaching and practical classes.

The new facility provides access to an interactive AV system, huddle working pods, multimedia communications, and imaging facilities, which will increase opportunities for interactive teaching activities, and enhance the overall student learning experience.

As well as enabling the adoption of progressive teaching through computer based learning and computational approaches, eLEAF will also offer provision for electronic assessments, enabling the speed and efficiency of assessments to be improved and helping meet a growing student demand for more immediate feedback on submitted work.

“This new facility represents a £1.9m capital investment from Cardiff University and our hosting of this facility is indicative of our commitment as a School to expand opportunities for independent learning, progressive teaching, and cutting-edge research” said Professor Stephen Rutherford, Director of Undergraduate Education at the School of Biosciences.

“For us, one exciting advantage of eLEAF is that it will allow us to significantly increase our capacity for both undergraduate and postgraduate teaching in bio-informatics, computer modelling based approaches and data-driven biology.

Access to large digital datasets is a growing reality for all areas of the biosciences, from protein modelling, to genomics, and landscape ecology. It is vital that we provide students with opportunities to visualise, interact and analyse this data, and the AV and multimedia resource housed in e-LEAF will facilitate our teaching of these new emerging areas of biology.”

Professor Jim Murray, Head of the School of Biosciences added,

“We are very proud to host this new facility. As a School and a University, we have a reputation for scientific excellence, research-led teaching and teaching innovation. The new eLEAF facility will allow us to build on our successes by supporting the delivery of a UK-leading curriculum for life sciences students, and more widely will provide real added value to the students of Cardiff University.”