Theology and religious studies: Curriculum redesign

What does a haunted museum have to do with the future of theology and religious studies?

Philippa, Freddy and Anthony talk openly about their experiences redesigning the curriculum, how it felt to work alongside academics, the confidence they’ve built, and how it’s helping to shape their decisions for the future. 

How did you approach the project and what did you work on?

Philippa: So, the overall aim of the curriculum redesign was to find ways to improve our current curriculum, and assess what current students were doing, and how well that was all working.  

Freddy: The teachers looked at what they thought was going well with the course, what could change. And then we were the student voice, essentially, saying what we thought could change or what we thought was going well. 

Philippa: We created a set of ‘graduate attributes’, they’re what we wanted to see from graduates, and what we hope graduates will gain from a theology and religious studies degree.

Freddy: Then we got onto different ‘graduate indicators’ - so what skills would lead us to achieve those graduate attributes. 

Anthony: Also, some of it would be looking at module design too, and how exactly we teach first years more on essay writing, you know, those skills you need for the next few years while you’re at university as well. 

Why did you feel it was important to get involved?

Anthony: I thought it would be like a really good opportunity to get into curriculum design because I had an idea that, like, I wanted to get into education in some form, whether that would be teaching or something else.  

Philippa: I thought it sounded really quite interesting. I mean, it's not something that you could say every day you could get involved with. I thought this was really important as well, to get student voices across. 

Something you talked about was field trips, can you explain any exciting changes there?

Philippa: Once we'd finished all our initial graduate attribute work, we looked at all these extra topics, and field trips was one of them. We did a student survey, and the results were that all students across all year groups wanted more field trips as a way of increasing the community feeling. 

Anthony: Yes, I thought that was the thing we were most excited to talk about, because we feel that, you know, we should take more advantage of Nottingham because there’s many places that can link to theology.  

Philippa: So we went to visit some of the places just to see whether they were suitable. And there is one that sticks out. It’s The Haunted Museum.  
So we have a module called ‘the life and teachings of Jesus’, we learn about exorcisms in that module, and obviously they've got an exorcism section in the museum, so that works nicely. 

Also, there were these ‘devil boxes’ that had Hebrew engravings, and something we talked about in the curriculum project was the idea of having more biblical work and how we really wanted ‘biblical studies’ to stay. It's such an important part of our degree. So that linked in really nicely as well, because we study Hebrew. 

How did it feel to work alongside staff, and have student ideas and opinions included? 

Anthony: It was great to be able to talk to staff as if, you know, we're on the same page and on the same level. We included some stuff that they didn't think about, such as the field trips. But then the stuff they mentioned was a lot to do with modules. It was definitely strange at first, but it was really interesting. 

Philippa: It was really important to be able to compare and see what the students felt about the course in comparison to the staff, so we could really work together to create a shared understanding what we want the new degree to look like. 

Freddy: So, we had an example of when a student comes to a university open day, they will be addressed by teachers who will say like, four ‘buzz sentences’ that help describe the course. And we as students were looking more at how we can apply this to job prospects.  

We were thinking like, by the end of it you will have presentation skills, whereas the teachers were more concerned on addressing the mysteries around the degree. That changed quite quickly when both groups realized that we need to be more mindful of each other, which we did. And yeah, eventually ideas started to merge together more comfortably 

Anthony: That was really interesting, to see how staff thought about the course as well and not just our perspective. 

Will the skills you've gained be helpful in your future careers?

Philippa: Oh absolutely. It's all about teamwork in what we were doing. We spent quite a bit of time looking at the national curriculum and what appeals to students about religious studies.

I feel like that's something I'm gonna be able to bring next year when I'm teaching, because I've got that knowledge about the curriculum and how it links to a university level. When I did my PGCE interviews I could talk about this. 

Freddy: Working with people my age, and people with the same ideas as me, really helped me realise that was the style of work I enjoyed the most. 
So now I've kind of spread my wings a little bit more and looked more into the museum sector. Looking closely at creative positions, working as a team to create exhibitions and whatnot. 

Anthony: I think data analysis was a key part of it. Another aspect would be communication and presentation. I have been taking part in these extra-curricular activities to get a better sense of what I’m both good at and would love to pursue further in the future.  

Freddy: General computer-based skills, Excel and Word, they sound simple, but everyone uses them. Sometimes it's the very small skills that you don't realise you don't know much about until you’re doing it. Now it’s second nature and you’re quite thankful that you've actually had some experience in it.

Any advice for students thinking about getting involved in a university project? 

Freddy: I feel like the sooner you start, the more beneficial it will be for you in the long run. That start can be whenever you want. You know, there's no actual ‘start’. But these opportunities are here. They're free. The university’s here to help you and as soon as you get involved, you just get this confidence.  

I was shy when I first started. I won’t lie, I'm talking quite confidently now, but it’s only because I've done them.  

Philippa: I always think back on my first year because I was very different to how I am now. I mean, I was terrified, to be honest, to do absolutely everything.

It was such a unique project that it would have almost felt wrong to not do it, because it didn't seem like an opportunity like this was going to come again. It's kind of like you just have to go for it, and you’ll grow and develop.