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Teaching and Learning Theses and Dissertations

Theses/dissertations from 2023 2023.

Saudi Parents as Advocates for Their Young Children with Disabilities: Reflections on The Journey , Sadeem A. Alolayan

Theses/Dissertations from 2022 2022

Graduate Teaching Assistants’ Knowledge and Attitudes Toward Students with Disabilities in Higher Education , Yanlys De La Caridad Palacios

High School Teachers’ Perceptions of Promoting Student Motivation and Creativity through Career Education , Kyeonghyeon Park

The Specifics of Specific Learning Disability: An Analysis of State-Level Eligibility Criteria and Response to Intervention Practices , Lora M. Williams

Theses/Dissertations from 2021 2021

Saudi Early Childhood Educators' Perceptions of Gender Roles in Children's Dramatic Play , Dalal Alanazi

Barriers to Reducing the Assistive Technology use for Students with Autism as Perceived by Special Education Teachers in Saudi Arabia , Othman Ahmed Alasmari

Saudi Teachers’ Perspectives on Implementing Evidence-Based Practices Specifically Designed for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder , Ahmad Saad Alghamdi

Perceptions of Preservice Teachers of Students with Intellectual Disabilities About their Preparation for Inclusive Education , Abdullah Aljudaya

Experiences of Saudi Arabian Mothers of Young Children with Disabilities: An Exploratory Study , Samirah Bahkali

Persistence Like a Mother: Nursing the Narrative toward Doctoral Completion in English Education—A Poetic Autoethnography , Krista S. Mallo

Warming Up and Cooling Down: Perceptions and Behaviors Associated with Aerobic Exercise , Balea J. Schumacher

A Multimodal Literacy Exploration: Lived Experiences of Haitian Immigrant Adolescent Girls in The Bahamas , Natasha Swann

Theses/Dissertations from 2020 2020

Perceptions of Preservice Teachers of Students with Autism and Intellectual Disabilities in their Teacher Preparation Programs in Saudi Arabia , Salman Almughyiri

Mapping Narrative Transactions: A Method/Framework for Exploring Multimodal Documents as Social Semiotic Sites for Ethnographic Study , Anne W. Anderson

The Effects of Augmented Reality (AR)-infused Idiom Material on Iranian Students’ Idiom Achievements, Motivation, and Perceptions , Babak Khoshnevisan

An Examination of Changes in Muscle Thickness, Isometric Strength, and Body Water Throughout the Menstrual Cycle , Tayla E. Kuehne

How the Use of Learner-Generated Images and Authentic Materials Affects the Comprehension and Production of Vivid Phrasal Idioms in L2 English Learners , Melissa Larsen-Walker

Explore L2 Chinese Learners' Motivation through L2MSS: Selves, Mental Imagery, and Pedagogical Implications , Yao Liu

Exploring Adult Indigenous Latinxs’ English Language Identity Expressions and Agency: A MALP®-informed Photovoice Study , Andrea Enikő Lypka

Theses/Dissertations from 2019 2019

The Use of Assistive Technology with Students with Severe Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in Saudi Arabia: Teachers’ Perspectives , Khalid Mohammed Abu Alghayth

Saudi Special Education Preservice Teachers’ Perspective towards Inclusion , Sarah Binmahfooz

The Teacher Evaluation Conundrum: Examining the Perceptions of Special Education Teachers , Gordon Brobbey

Illuminating Changes in Preservice Teachers’ Perceptions about Teaching Elementary Mathematicsin an Introductory Methods Course , Elaine Cerrato

International Teaching Assistants’ Perceptions of English and Spanish Language Use at the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez , Edward G. Contreras Santiago

Psychological Responses to High-Intensity Interval Training Exercise: A Comparison of Ungraded Running and Graded Walking , Abby Fleming

The Effects and Students’ Views of Teachers' Coded Written Corrective Feedback: A Multiple-Case Study of Online Multiple-draft Chinese Writing , Jining Han

Autism and Inclusion in England’s Multi Academy Trust: A Case Study of a Senior Leadership Team , Danielle Lane

Promoting L2 Idiomatic Competence among Chinese College Students via WeChat , Zhengjie Li

EFL Student Collaborative Writing in Google Docs: A Multiple Case Study , Quang Nam Pham

Threats to Teaching: An Investigation Into the Constructs of Compassion Fatigue in the Classroom , April M. Steen

A New Literacy Coach and Two English Language Arts Teachers Learn Together: A Narrative Inquiry , Christiana C. Succar

Theses/Dissertations from 2018 2018

General Education Teachers’ Perceptions of Response to Intervention Implementation: A Qualitative Interview Study , Adhwaa Alahmari

A Study of Ghanaian Kindergarten Teachers' Use of Bilingual and Translanguaging Practices , Joyce Esi Bronteng

Deaf Lesbian Identity , Noël E. Cherasaro

Beyond Replicative Technology: The Digital Practices of Students with Literacy-Related Learning Difficulties Engaged in Productive Technologies , Aimee Frier

Once Upon a Genre: Distant Reading, the Newbery Medal, and the Affordances of Interdisciplinary Paradigms for Understanding Children’s Literature , Melanie Griffin

Learning in the Margins: The Educational Experiences of an African American Male with Disabilities , Aisha Holmes

Including children with learning differences: Experiences of independent school teachers , Lisa M. Lockhart

The Effects of Music Choice on Perceptual and Physiological Responses to Treadmill Exercise , Taylor A. Shimshock

Theses/Dissertations from 2017 2017

Perceptions of Arab American Mothers of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: An Exploratory Study , Haifa Alsayyari

It’s Not All Sunflowers and Roses at Home: A Narrative Inquiry of At-Risk Girls and Their Perceptions of Their Educational Experiences , Jessica Aggeles Curtis

Exploring Mathematics Teacher Education Fieldwork Experiences through Storytelling , Melody Jeane Elrod

Improving Reading Comprehension of Children with ASD: Implication of Anaphoric Reference Support with Computer Programming , Seda Karayazi Ozsayin

A Qualitative Content Analysis of Early Algebra Education iOS Apps for Primary Children , Lissa S. Ledbetter

Cultivating Peace via Language Teaching: Pre-Service Teachers' Beliefs and Emotions in an EFL Argentine Practicum , María Matilde Olivero

Collaboration with Families: Perceptions of Special Education Preservice Teachers and Teacher Preparation , Mehmet Emin Ozturk

Perspectives of AP U.S. History Teachers in Title I Schools , Mark Lance Rowland

What Does It Mean to Be a Service-Learning Teacher? - An Autoethnography , Kristy Causey Verdi

Early Childhood Mathematics Through a Social Justice Lens: An Autoethnography , Jennifer Ward

Theses/Dissertations from 2016 2016

Urban English Language Arts Teachers’ Stories of Technology Use: A Narrative Inquiry , Bridget Abbas

Teachers’ Third Eye: Using Video Elicitation Interviews To Facilitate Kuwaiti Early Childhood Preservice Teachers’ Reflections , Hessa Alsuhail

Foreign Language College Achievement and the Infusion of Three Selected Web 2.0 Technologies: A Mixed Method Case Study , Eulises Avellaneda

Emotional Self-Regulation: Voices and Perspectives of Teachers within Diverse Socio-Cultural Contexts , Anna Paula Peixoto Da Silva

The Effect of Exercise Order on Body Fat Loss During Concurrent Training , Tonya Lee Davis-Miller

Subtext of Decisions: Literacy Practices in the Context of Coding , Julia Hagge

The Role of Prep Schools in the Middle to High School Transition of Students in Southeastern Turkey , Mucahit Kocak

“It’s Not Pixie Dust”: An Exploratory Qualitative Case Study of a School-Based Multimodal Tablet Initiative , Erin Elizabeth Margarella

Influence of Language Arts Instructional Practices on Early Adolescents’ Motivation to Read: Measuring Student and Teacher Perceptions , Sarah E. Pennington

Educators' Oral Histories of Tampa Bay Area Writing Project Involvement , Margaret Hoffman Saturley

Anti-Fat Attitudes and Weight Bias Internalization: An Investigation of How BMI Impacts Perceptions, Opinions and Attitudes , Laurie Schrider

Use of a Game-Based App as a Learning Tool for Students with Mathematics Learning Disabilities to Increase Fraction Knowledge/Skill , Orhan Simsek

Theses/Dissertations from 2015 2015

Examining Experiences of Early Intervention Providers Serving Culturally Diverse Families: A Multiple Case Study Analysis , Wendy Lea Bradshaw

"I want to be the Sun": Tableau as an Embodied Representation of Main Ideas in Science Information Texts , Margaret Branscombe

A Case Study of Teachers' in Professional Learning Communities in a Campus Preschool , Victoria Jacqueline Damjanovic

Student-teacher Interaction Through Online Reflective Journals in a High School Science Classroom: What Have We Learned? , Megan Elizabeth Ehlers

Novice Teachers' Stories of Solving Problems of Practice , Yvonne Franco

Facilitating Motivation in a Virtual World Within a Second Language Acquisition Classroom , Andrew Warren Gump

IWitness and Student Empathy: Perspectives from USC Shoah Foundation Master Teachers , Brandon Jerome Haas

Precalculus Students' Achievement When Learning Functions: Influences of Opportunity to Learn and Technology from a University of Chicago School Mathematics Project Study , Laura A. Hauser

The Role of the Interruption in Young Adult Epistolary Novels , Betty J. Herzhauser

A Conceptual Analysis of Perspective Taking in Support of Socioscientific Reasoning , Sami Kahn

Restricted and Repetitive Behaviors as Strengths, not Weaknesses: Evaluating the Use of Social Stories that Embed Restricted Interests on the Social Skills of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder , Maya Nasr

Job Satisfaction of Adjunct Faculty Who Teach Standardized Online Courses , Claudia A. Ruiz

Relationships between the Algebraic Performance of Students in Subject-Specific and Integrated Course Pathways , Derrick Saddler

The Common Core State Standards: Its Reported Effects on the Instructional Decision Making of Middle School Social Studies Teachers , Tracy Tilotta

The Influence of Types of Homework on Opportunity to Learn and Students' Mathematics Achievement: Examples from the University of Chicago School Mathematics Project , Yiting Yu

Theses/Dissertations from 2014 2014

Picturing the Reader: English Education Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Reading Using Photovoice , Michael Dicicco

The Effect of Music Cadence on Step Frequency in the Recreational Runner , Micaela A. Galosky

Balanced Artistry: Describing and Explaining Expert Teacher Practice as Adaptive Expertise , Nina Graham

The Fight Within: Experiences of School District Employees Who Advocate for the Rights of Their Own Children with Disabilities Inside the Districts Where They Work, a Heuristic Case Study , Keri Haley

A Phenomenological Study of the Experiences of Higher Education Students with Disabilities , Allen J. Heindel

Constructing an "Appropriate" Education in Florida Special Education Due Process Final Orders , Michelle Henry

The Effect of Teachers' Epistemological Beliefs on Practice , Milton David Huling

Perceptions, Beliefs and Practices about Technology among Teachers in a Jamaican Infant School , Suzette Anissia Kelly

"Choosing My Words Carefully": Observing, Debriefing, and Coaching Four Literacy Teachers' Through Their Lessons , Iveta Maska

Presentation of Civic Identity in Online High School Social Studies Discussion Forums , Holly Mcbride

In Our Image: The Attempted Reshaping of the Cuban Education System by the United States Government, 1898-1912 , Mario John Minichino

The Hypertrophic Effects of Practical Vascular Blood Flow Restriction Training , John Francis O'halloran

Science Teachers' Understandings of Science Practices before and after the Participation in an Environmental Engineering Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) Program , Dilek Özalp

The Effects of Emotive Reasoning on Secondary School Students' Decision-Making in the Context of Socioscientific Issues , Wardell Anthony Powell

Interagency Collaboration for the Provision of Services to Migrant Children with Disabilities: An Exploratory Study , Georgina Rivera-Singletary

Reflections in the Classroom: Perspectives on Teaching for Social Justice from Secondary Social Studies Educators , Gregory Lee Samuels

A Case Study of the Roles and Perceptions of Writing Coaches , Amy June Schechter

Genres of Children's Websites: A Comprehensive Methodology for Analyzing Digital Texts , James L. Welsh

Theses/Dissertations from 2013 2013

Attitude Toward Digital and Print-Based Reading: A Survey for Elementary Students , Diedre D. Allen

Playing in Trelis Weyr: Investigating Collaborative Practices in a Dragons of Pern Role-Play-Game Forum , Kathleen Marie Alley

Curriculum Gatekeeping in Global Education: Global Educators' Perspectives , Robert Wayne Bailey

Reading Assessment Practices of Elementary General Education Teachers: A Descriptive Study , Sarah Mirlenbrink Bombly

An Investigation of the Effects of an Authentic Science Experience Among Urban High School Students , Angela Chapman

Social Studies Teachers in an Evaluative Role: The Peer Evaluator Experience in the Accountability Era , Martha Barnes Ford

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Interdisciplinary integrative capabilities as a catalyst of responsible technology-enabled innovation: A higher education case study of Design MSc dissertation projects

• Open access
• Published: 03 June 2024

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• Federico Colecchia   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-7447-7117 1 ,
• Fabrizio Ceschin   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-7273-9408 1 &
• David Harrison   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1180-8924 1  

It has been acknowledged that global challenges are in the way of delivering responsible innovation, as reflected in the Sustainable Development Goals – a set of strategic objectives formulated by the United Nations General Assembly, to promote environmentally, societally, and economically-sustainable development. Design higher education has an important role to play in equipping the next generation of professionals with knowledge and skills for tackling pressing system-level challenges. Sustainable design research and ways of integrating emerging technologies in future design higher education curricula have, separately, attracted significant interest in recent years. However, comparatively little effort has concentrated on the role that a broader range of technologies can play in shaping the design higher education provision with system-level sustainability challenges in mind. This article presents an analysis of 180 Design MSc dissertation projects, implemented at a UK higher education institution between 2019 and 2022, focusing on research challenges of societal and industrial relevance. The data set includes a mapping of dissertation projects to relevant technologies, industry sectors, and Sustainable Development Goals. Data analysis suggests a balanced distribution of projects across a range of sustainability goals, although under-represented thematic areas have also been highlighted. The methods adopted for this study, based on a systematic study of relational patterns reflecting associations of dissertation projects with technologies, industry sectors, and sustainability goals, provide a blueprint for future data-driven research on the role played by technologies within student projects in design higher education, with an emphasis on their relevance to sustainable innovation challenges.

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Introduction

It has been recognised that major global challenges, including those underlying the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (UN SDGs, n.d.) are inherently complex and, as such, can often only be tackled effectively from a systems design perspective (Chen et al., 2021 ; Maier et al., 2022 ; Reynolds et al., 2018 ).

A visual representation of the 17 UN SDGs and their main purposes from (Leal Filho et al., 2022 ) is provided in Fig.  1 .

Visual representation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals and their main purposes (Leal Filho et al., 2022 )

The increasing degree of attention that interdisciplinary research methodologies and practices have received in recent years reflects, in part, this demand for innovation across traditional epistemological and methodological silos (Ashby & Exter, 2019 ; Body & Habbal, 2016 ). “Healthcare, climate change, food security, energy, financial markets and quality of life are just a few examples of issues that require scientists and academics to work in a crossdisciplinary way” (Menken et al., 2016 ).

This has implications for design higher education, which has increasingly focussed on developing knowledge and skills across discipline boundaries over recent years, so that future graduates can be equipped for addressing challenges requiring the adoption of system-level strategies (Menken et al., 2016 ). Broader scope of interdisciplinary dialogue has been advocated with reference to research training programmes (Tobi & Kampen, 2018 ), combined with stronger links between academic and industry stakeholders towards the solution of well-defined problems (Mainzer, 2011 ). The fast-paced change to the role that design has been playing in the research and innovation landscape is highlighted by the evolution of the field from an initial emphasis on product and service design to a focus on socioeconomic challenges such as those associated with delivering equitable healthcare provision and addressing climate change (Khayal & Farid, 2021 ; Lawrence et al., 2020 ; Ceschin & Gaziulosoy, 2016 ). As a result, design has grown into an interdisciplinary field of enquiry and locus of academic and industrial innovation. The field is therefore in a privileged position for shaping graduate profiles to address future workforce requirements, particularly considering the critical role played by user-centred and system-level design in research and innovation (Kumar, 2009 ). Considering the extent of recent technology development, especially in relation to information technology and computing, it has also been argued that polymathic thinking, i.e. the ability to establish connections and to examine “the intersection of ideas to understand how different 'trades' link, overlap, impact or depend upon one another”, building on “proficiency and expertise across multiple fields” (Manoharan, 2019 ), is needed for tackling contemporary challenges (Rodgers, 2007 ).

Whereas interdisciplinarity in design research has been praised as often essential for tackling complex societal challenges, a close relationship between interdisciplinary academic research and industry practice has been recognised as an important source of competitive advantage, which further highlights the value of interdisciplinarity in design as a catalyst of innovation (Hacklin & Wallin, 2013 ). This underlines the value of design higher education programmes that rely on an overlap of multiple theoretical and methodological lenses for tackling concrete design research challenges of relevance to private sector organisations. Successful design interdisciplinary programmes in higher education, with an emphasis on project-based integration between design and engineering skills (Self et al., 2019 ; Voûte et al., 2020 ), illustrate the value of “an intertwining of education, research, and practices in the industrial and wider societal context” (Voûte et al., 2020 ).

Considering the potentially-disruptive opportunities associated with the adoption of emerging technologies including Artificial Intelligence (AI), immersive technologies such as Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality, and the Internet of Things, it has been recognised that design higher education programmes can benefit from innovation, if future graduates are to be prepared to tackle the above-mentioned system-level challenges effectively. Increased breadth and depth of interdisciplinary collaboration as well as strengthened connections across design researchers, practitioners, and stakeholders including third-sector and clinical organisations, have been advocated with a view to “addressing real problems and attempting to craft more sustainable futures” (Voûte et al., 2020 ).

It has been observed that “new insights and better answers to complex problems” often originate from “contrasting, connecting, adding and adapting concepts, theories and methodologies from different disciplines” (Menken et al., 2016 ). This underlines the importance for the design higher education provision to embed interdisciplinary skills development in their programmes and to facilitate student exposure to multiple perspectives around well-defined design challenges across a range of stakeholders, including universities, research institutions, and private organisations (Voûte et al., 2020 ).

This priority, in turn, requires academics to be familiar with research cultures and methodologies across discipline boundaries, beyond their core areas of expertise and across multiple research and innovation contexts, so that students can be exposed to a range of methods across disciplines and professional practices and learn how to bring them together.

Education for sustainable development (Kioupi & Voulvoulis, 2022 ), design for sustainability (Ceschin & Gaziulusoy, 2016 ), research into the potential of design for addressing the UN SDGs (Chou, 2021 ), and strategies for embedding emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, and the Internet of Things in future design higher education curricula (Self et al., 2019 ; Voûte et al., 2020 ) have, separately, attracted significant attention in recent years. However, a comparatively-smaller body of research has focused on the role that technologies can play in design higher education with reference to the UN SDGs. CERN IdeaSquare, an innovation space with access to technology and expertise from the European Organization for Nuclear Research, has been facilitating initiatives towards radical innovation capable of addressing societal needs (Thong et al., 2021 ). However, the emphasis is on ‘deep technologies’, namely technologies with potential for disruptive change that “demand significant intellectual and economic capital to pursue” (Siegel & Krishnan, 2020 ). Despite the recognition of a need for additional investment in technologies and infrastructures towards achieving the UN SDGs (Leal Filho et al., 2022 ), little research has concentrated on the role that a broader range of technologies can play in design higher education, with a view to equipping future design professionals with knowledge and skills for tackling system-level challenges.

This article contributes to filling this gap by reporting and analysing data from 180 Design MSc dissertation projects completed at Brunel University London between 2019 and 2022. The aim is to generate objective representations of the role played by a range of technologies in the students’ work, with reference to sustainable design research themes reflected in the UN SDGs.

The objectives of the study are listed below:

Objective 1. To assess how balanced the distribution of dissertation projects is across technologies, industry sectors, and UN SDGs;

Objective 2 . To identify areas for improvement to the MSc programme, with a view to encouraging a more balanced distribution of dissertation projects across the SDGs.

Following a discussion of the methods adopted for this study (Section " Methods "), results are presented (Section " Results ") in the form of network graphs, made available online for interactive exploration, providing a visual representation of relational patterns relevant to associations of dissertation projects with technologies, industry sectors, and sustainability themes. The manual annotations of individual dissertation projects, identified by custom keywords reflective of project scope, are provided as part of the results with reference to technologies, industry sectors, and sustainability themes. A discussion of the results from data analysis is presented (Section " Discussion "), followed by conclusions and recommendations towards further development (Section " Conclusions and recommendations ").

A Design MSc dissertation module at Brunel University London was used as a case study to assess the extent to which technologies, industry sectors, and UN SDGs are represented across student projects. Dissertation projects provide students with an opportunity to pursue a piece of interdisciplinary research driven by a contemporary design challenge. The projects, implemented each year over a period of five months, address design challenges of societal and global relevance.

As part of their dissertation work, students research and evaluate well-formulated specialist integrated design research questions, based on review of published academic research and other information available in the public domain, and through engagement with research participants following approval by the Brunel Research Ethics Committee. Students can demonstrate appropriate use of methods relating to digital design, design and innovation management, and product design simulation and manufacture, as appropriate depending on project scope, aim, and objectives. The projects require integration of knowledge, methods, and skills across user-centred design (Blessing & Chakrabarti, 2009 ), established systems engineering principles (Albers et al., 2005 ), and product engineering design methodology (Pahl & Beitz, 2013 ), depending on project scope.

The project specifics are the outcome of a consultation process involving students and academics. Where projects are proposed by (and implemented in collaboration with) UK businesses, the specifics of the work are defined jointly by students, academic supervisors, and business representatives. The primary goal behind this decision is to achieve alignment of the design research with the relevant business development strategies, while at the same time ensuring compliance with academic requirements.

Data about 180 Design MSc dissertation projects implemented at Brunel University London over three academic years (2019–20, 2020–21, 2021–22) were analysed, following a categorisation of projects by relevant technologies, industry sectors, and sustainability themes. The categorisation was performed manually by the authors based on the full dissertation reports submitted by the students. Technologies were extracted from the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) Technology Classification (Schmoch, 2008 ). A list of industry sectors was obtained from the Industry Classification Benchmark (ICB) (FTSE Russel, n.d. ). Custom keywords were employed for highlighting sustainability and more general design research themes of relevance to individual dissertation projects. The assignment of technologies, industry sectors, and design research themes to dissertations was iteratively refined following review by all authors. All 17 UN SDGs were considered, with a view to assessing the degree to which the dissertation projects are relevant to individual sustainability themes without enforcing any a-priori selection.

A total of 102 dissertations were associated with one or more WIPO technology fields, 90 with one or more ICB industry sectors, and 134 with one of more UN SDGs. Out of 134 projects deemed relevant to one or more UN SDGs, 121 were associated with at least one technology or industry sector. The remaining student projects addressed design research topics that were not relevant to any WIPO technologies or ICB industry sectors or did not directly address any of the UN SDGs. Examples include design of inclusive support services for parents, children, and pet owners, design for reduced levels of occupational stress and increased workplace productivity, and design of innovative solutions for the retail sector.

The academic team comprised 23 supervisors, with core expertise spanning user-centred design, design for manufacture, computer-aided design, design for sustainability, emerging technologies and innovation, inclusive design, immersive technologies, robotics, product and furniture design, industrial design, narrative design, electronics and sensors, design innovation, design history, graphic design, and healthcare design innovation. Academic supervisors had 5 + to 40 + years of professional experience, with research and innovation profiles often spanning academic research and industry practice. The broad spectrum of expertise of the academic team facilitated allocation of individual dissertation projects to a suitable academic for supervision. Each project was assigned a second supervisor in a supporting role, typically with complementary expertise to the first (or primary) supervisor. Second supervisors played an important role during assessment of the dissertations, as they were less significantly involved in the implementation of the projects.

The WIPO technology classification adopted for this study (Schmoch, 2008 ) was developed with the aim of facilitating cross-country analysis of international patent records. It is based on International Patent Classification (IPC) codes and builds on a previous classification, namely ISI-OST-INPI, proposed by Fraunhofer ISI and by the Observatoire des Sciences et des Technologies (OST) with the French patent office (INPI) in 2005. The 2008 WIPO technology classification covers 5 technology areas and 35 technology fields. Technology fields cover electrical engineering, audio-visual technology, telecommunications, digital and computer technology, control systems, and medical technology, among others. A full breakdown by technology areas and technology fields is reported in Table A1 (FTSE Russel, n.d. ).

Whereas ISI-OST-INPI reflects an international trading landscape driven by a small number of countries at an advanced stage of industrialisation, the update to the 2008 WIPO classification was driven by a need to include emerging countries. Key requirements in the development of the 2008 WIPO technology classification were (i) to cover all IPC codes, (ii) to select technology field size in such a way that numbers of international patent applications could be evened out across technology fields, and (iii) to ensure an appropriate level of differentiation in order to avoid excessive detail blurring general structures (Schmoch, 2008 ). Whereas it was acknowledged that a degree of heterogeneity within technology fields can hardly be avoided, experience with ISI-OST-INPI and with prior classifications highlighted that introducing specific technology fields on grounds of topical interest is ultimately of limited usefulness, as topicality is often short-lived. The 2008 WIPO classification was designed to operate at a higher aggregation level towards longer relevance as the technological landscape evolves. Moreover, the area of information technology is associated with a higher number of technology fields than in ISI-OST-INPI, therefore providing a higher degree of granularity. The MSc dissertation topics covered in this study were selected based on relevance to current challenges in design research and design industry practice, and there is no requirement on dissertation projects to cover a range of technologies. For this reason, not all WIPO technology areas and fields are represented in the MSc dissertation projects analysed in this study.

Table 1 summarises the scope of the 2008 WIPO technology fields relevant to the MSc dissertations reported in this article, and provides additional information about the corresponding dissertation topics.

For this study, industry sectors were obtained from the Industry Classification Benchmark (ICB) (FTSE Russel, n.d. ). The ICB classification was designed to aid international comparison of companies and is based on four levels, namely ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, and ‘Subsector’. To illustrate the level of detail associated with the different levels, information from the ICB classification for ‘Industrials’ is given in the Appendix (Figs. A1 , A2 , A3 , A4 and A5 ). Whereas ICB is used for allocating businesses to Subsectors based on revenue sources, the classification was not used with reference to individual businesses in the context of this study. Instead, Design MSc dissertation projects were associated with relevant industry sectors based on project scope, aim, objectives, and nature of the outputs. Considering the topics of the design dissertations analysed for this study, ICB information at the Sector level was deemed appropriate for mapping dissertation projects to industry sectors.

Information about ICB Sectors relevant to the MSc dissertations considered as part of this study, adapted from (FTSE Russel, n.d. ), is provided in Table 2 . Dissertation projects deemed relevant to industry sectors in Table 2 were not necessarily implemented in collaboration with an industry partner, but rather reflect the relevance of dissertation work to selected industry sectors.

Network graphs were generated from the data, in order to provide interactive visual representations of how individual dissertation projects are positioned with reference to technologies and industry sectors. The data were processed using Python 3.6.9 custom scripts relying on the following libraries: NetworkX 2.5.1, Pyvis 0.1.9, VisJS 4.16.1. Interactive network graphs were generated, providing access to keywords reflecting themes relevant to individual dissertations as well as labels from the manual annotation process based on the WIPO Technology Classification (Schmoch, 2008 ), the Industry Classification Benchmark (ICB) (FTSE Russel, n.d. ), UN SDGs, as well as custom keywords reflecting design research themes, extracted from the body of the student dissertations.

A full anonymised list of dissertation projects with the corresponding manual annotations (technologies, industry sectors, UN SDGs, and design research themes) is provided in Table A2 . Information relevant to individual dissertation projects can also be accessed interactively via the network graphs.

Figure  2 displays a network graph showing the mapping of individual student projects (red nodes) to technologies according to the 2008 WIPO classification (blue nodes). Technology node labels are displayed in the graph. An edge between a red and a blue node indicates that the corresponding technology was relevant to the dissertation project. The size of the blue nodes is proportional to the corresponding number of edges. Larger blue nodes therefore relate to technologies relevant to a higher number of dissertation projects within the dataset analysed in this study. Nodes were positioned using the Barnes Hut force-directed layout algorithm (Díaz et al., 2002 ), whereby connected nodes are brought closer together and a trade-off with repulsion between nodes leads to a surveyable layout. Individual node locations ultimately reflect the relational embedding of each node in the context of the entire network as opposed to local properties exclusively. This results in nodes with a higher number of edges and a higher degree of ‘topological importance’ within the network being positioned towards the centre of the graph, which in turn improves the interpretability of the visual representation.

Network graph showing individual MSc dissertation projects (red circles) and the technologies relevant to them (blue circles). Technologies have been labelled in the graph

A network graph displaying a mapping between dissertations and ICB industry sectors is displayed in Fig.  3 . Red and blue nodes correspond to individual dissertations and to industry sectors, respectively. Key industry sectors are labelled in the graph, the four unlabelled smaller network fragments corresponding to ‘Waste and Disposal Services’, ‘Travel and Leisure’, ‘Retailers’, and ‘Gas, Water and Multi-utilities’. Edges between red and blue nodes indicate which dissertations are relevant to which industry sectors. As in Fig.  2 , blue node size is proportional to the corresponding number of edges. The network graph shows a hierarchical arrangement of clusters, with ‘Health Care Providers’, ‘Technology Hardware and Equipment’, ‘Software and Computer Services’, ‘Industrial Engineering’, and ‘Household Goods and Home Construction’ forming a larger cluster distinguished from smaller and often isolated clusters. It is worth noting that node position in the network graphs is determined by graph layout algorithms and reflects local relational patterns as well as global network connectivity. For example, ‘Health Care Providers’ being closer to ‘Technology Hardware and Equipment’ and ‘Software and Computer Services’, and farther from ‘Household Goods and Home Construction’, carries information about ‘Health Care Providers’ having higher thematic similarity with ‘Technology Hardware and Equipment’ and ‘Software and Computer Services’ than ‘Household Goods and Home Construction’, as reflected in the data. Smaller clusters disconnected from the rest of the network correspond to industry sectors that have been discussed in one or more dissertations in isolation, i.e. without reference to any other industry sectors. Examples are ‘Food Producers’, ‘Personal Goods’, ‘Industrial Transportation’, and ‘Alternative Energy’. The presence of such isolated clusters highlights an opportunity for encouraging dissertation topics and projects of relevance to multiple industry sectors, which is expected to increase further the economic and societal relevance of the student dissertations. The corresponding network graph showing associations between dissertation projects (red nodes) and UN SDGs (blue nodes) is displayed in Fig.  4 .

Network graph showing individual MSc dissertation projects (red circles) and the Industry Classification Benchmark industry sectors relevant to them (blue circles). Industry sectors have been labelled in the graph

Network graph showing individual MSc dissertation projects (red circles) and the UN SDGs relevant to them (blue circles). SDGs relevant to a higher number of dissertations have been labelled in the graph

The network graphs displayed in Figs. 2 , 3 and 4 are available online and can be explored interactively via the following links: technologies network graph , industry sectors network graph ; UN SDG network graph . Text containing additional information about individual nodes can be accessed by hovering over the nodes of interest. All personal identifying information (relating to both students and academic supervisors) was removed from the data for the purpose of publication.

Given the nature of the layout algorithm employed for node positioning, the position of each node in the graphs displayed in Figs. 2 , 3 and 4 reflects the corresponding relational patterns with other nodes, considering not only local connections but also the topology of the graph in its entirety. As a result, nodes connected via edges to a higher number of other nodes across the network tend to be positioned more centrally in the graph. Such network graph features are useful for visualising complex relational patterns and have been relied upon in a range of studies across research domains such as bibliometrics, focusing on statistical analysis of publications including academic literature and patents (Glänzel, 2012 ), and social network analysis (Meghanathan, 2017 ), among others.

Key technologies of relevance to the MSc dissertation projects analysed in this study stand out in Fig.  2 as having a higher number of edges connecting them to individual projects, and therefore correspond to blue nodes with larger size. Whereas some (red) project nodes cluster around one single (blue) technology node, e.g. with reference to environmental technology and medical technology, others are connected to more than one technology node and are therefore visualised as nodes positioned more centrally in the graph. These include projects relying on Information Technology as well as on technology relevant to systems control and digital communication.

The graph displayed in Fig.  3 shows dissertation projects clustering around industry sectors, most projects being relevant to a single sector. A smaller number of projects, primarily relevant to hardware equipment and software services – in some instances in relation to healthcare provision – have more than one industry sector relevant to them. This often reflects broader research interests of students and academics.

Regarding pertinence of the dissertation projects to the UN SDGs, a prominent number of projects is relevant to sustainable cities and communities and to health and wellbeing, as shown in Fig.  4 . Most projects tend to cluster around a single SDG, although some span more than one sustainability theme. This minority of projects which span more than one SDG, including health and wellbeing, sustainable cities and communities, and reduced inequality, again reflects the range of interests of the students and of the academics involved.

It should be noted that there is currently no academic requirement for dissertation projects to span multiple technologies, industry sectors or UN SDGs, and the relational pattens highlighted in Figs. 2 , 3 and 4 reflect the students’ design research interests and the supervisors’ research expertise. On the other hand, it can be argued that a more balanced distribution of dissertation projects across SDGs could be a desirable feature of the MSc teaching provision. To achieve this in future, students and supervisors could be encouraged to address a broader range of design research themes relevant to sustainable innovation.

Conclusions and recommendations

This analysis of 180 Design MSc dissertation projects implemented at Brunel University London from 2019 to 2022 has highlighted relevance to a range of technologies, industry sectors , and sustainable design research themes. A good degree of project diversification was observed across the UN SDGs. Technologies relevant to digital communication, systems control, and data processing software, as well as medical technology, were found to be pertinent to a higher number of dissertation projects in the dataset analysed. Regarding industry sectors, a significant number of student projects were relevant to healthcare provision, household goods and home construction, personal goods, as well as software and computer services. Approximately 20 dissertation projects were implemented in close collaboration with a UK-registered business qualifying as a Small and Medium Enterprise. In those instances, the project briefs were initially proposed by the businesses, primarily operating in the healthcare, software and computer services, and household goods sectors, and refined in collaboration with Design academics. Industry partners contributed to the projects with a varying degree of involvement, typically by providing feedback on design concepts and additional guidance to the students. Planned improvements to the Design MSc provision include enhancing the number and scope of such collaborative projects in the future, to increase further the economic and societal relevance of the student dissertations.

The results hold potential for informing future revision of the Brunel Design MSc provision at module and programme level. A current minority of dissertation projects, often corresponding to nodes positioned outside graph relational cores, were found to be relevant to multiple technologies and sustainable design research themes. It is argued that conditions could be put in place for such projects, complementing others addressing a single technology or SDG, to play a more prominent role in future, with a view to encouraging students to develop broader skillsets. The analysis also suggests that academic supervisors with broader knowledge and more pronounced integrative capabilities, often but not always reflecting a higher number of years in professional practice including experience outside academia, can be equally well suited to supervision of dissertation projects around contemporary design challenges as are those with more specialised academic profiles.

Except for a minority of dissertation projects that were directly initiated by students based on own research ideas, most project briefs were based on preferences expressed by students across a range of design research themes and topics suggested by academics. Raising academic supervisor awareness of how dissertation projects have been associated with technologies, industry sectors, and sustainable design research themes in recent years, and encouraging academics to consider a broader range of technologies and UN SDGs when presenting dissertation project ideas to the students are therefore expected to be beneficial with a view to promoting a more balanced distribution of future projects across SDGs. More generally, the methods employed in this study provide a blueprint for future data-driven analyses of the role played by a range of technologies in the context of student projects in higher education, with an emphasis on their relevance to sustainable design research themes. Insights generated from such analyses can, in turn, inform interventions to strengthen further the design higher education provision, with a view to empowering future design professionals to become catalysts of responsible technology-enabled innovation over the course of their careers.

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Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank all academic staff in the Brunel Design School for their important contribution supervising the MSc dissertation projects that have provided the data for this study.

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Federico Colecchia, Fabrizio Ceschin & David Harrison

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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and data analysis were performed by Dr Federico Colecchia in coordination with Dr Fabrizio Ceschin and Prof David Harrison. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Dr Federico Colecchia and all authors commented on versions of the manuscript prior to submission. The data underpinning this publication can be accessed from the data repository of Brunel University London, Brunel Figshare, under a CCBY-NC licence: https://doi.org/10.17633/rd.brunel.25555212.v1 . All authors read and approved the final manuscript. No funding was received for conducting this study. The authors have no competing interests to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.

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Table A1 provides a breakdown of the 2008 WIPO technology classification by technology areas and fields. The relevant IPC codes are included. The hash symbol in the right-most column is used to indicate all IPC codes starting with the relevant string. Parentheses are used in conjunction with logic NOT operators where ambiguity could otherwise arise. Commas in the right-most column correspond to logic OR operators.

Table A2 contains a full anonymised list of the MSc dissertation projects analysed for this study, including manual annotations (technologies, industry sectors, UN SDGs, and design research themes)

Figures  A1 , A2 , A3 , A4 and A5 illustrate the level of detail associated with ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, and ‘Subsector’ in the ICB classification with reference to ‘Industrials’ (FTSE Russel, n.d. ).

ICB classification with reference to ‘Industrials’: ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, ‘Subsector’. (FTSE Russel, n.d. )

ICB classification with reference to ‘Industrials’: ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, ‘Subsector’ (continued from Fig. A1 ). (FTSE Russel, n.d. )

ICB classification with reference to ‘Industrials’: ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, ‘Subsector’ (continued from Fig.  A2 ). (FTSE Russel, n.d. )

ICB classification with reference to ‘Industrials’: ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, ‘Subsector’ (continued from Fig.  A3 ). (FTSE Russel, n.d. )

ICB classification with reference to ‘Industrials’: ‘Industry’, ‘Supersector’, ‘Sector’, ‘Subsector’ (continued from Fig.  A4 ). (FTSE Russel, n.d. )

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Colecchia, F., Ceschin, F. & Harrison, D. Interdisciplinary integrative capabilities as a catalyst of responsible technology-enabled innovation: A higher education case study of Design MSc dissertation projects. Int J Technol Des Educ (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-024-09901-w

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Wagner Student Jo Al Khafaji-King Named 2024 National Academy of Education/Spencer Dissertation Fellow

Jo Al Khafaji-King, a PhD candidate in Public Policy and Administration at NYU Wagner, was selected as one of 35  National Academy of Education (NAEd)/Spencer Dissertation Fellows , from a highly competitive pool of over 380 applicants. The fellowship supports scholars across disciplines whose dissertation topics focus on the improvement of education. 

In addition to financial support for their dissertation, as an NAEd/Spencer Dissertation Fellow, Al Khafaji-King will attend two NAEd professional development retreats and receive mentorship from an NAEd member or other esteemed scholar.

Al Khafaji-King is also a Institute of Education Sciences-funded Predoctoral Interdisciplinary Research Training (IES-PIRT) fellow. Framed by the economics of education and sociology literature, their studies focus on discipline policies and behavior management in K-12 schools in the U.S. and their effects on marginalized students. 

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Graduate Students Receive Dissertation Fellowships

Northwestern University School of Education and Social Policy graduate students  Forrest Bruce (Ojibwe) and Karla Thomas have received highly competitive  NAEd/Spencer Dissertation Fellowships  to support their research and career development.

Bruce, who earned his bachelor’s degree from the School of Education and Social Policy in social policy in 2017, is a  doctoral candidate in learning sciences  who studies land-based education and the design of community-based learning environments that support Indigenous ways of knowing and being.

He worked in Chicago Public Schools’ American Indian Education for a year before joining the Indigenous STEAM research project, first as a research coordinator then later as a graduate student.

Thomas, who is pursuing a PhD in  human development and social policy,  researches parent, teacher, and community acts of resistance, defiance, and dream-building in the face of anti-Black and anti-LGBTQ education policy. Her ongoing collaborative research efforts explore the invisible ways Black parents and communities participate in the struggle for a just Black education through activism, political advocacy, and educating educators and communities on issues of race and racism.

A member of the Edward A. Bouchet Graduate Honor Society, Thomas also received the Multidisciplinary Program in Educational Science Fellowship, and is a member of the inaugural cohort of ARIS Scholars for Social Justice.

Thomas earned a master’s in business administration from the Kellogg School of Management and a master’s in human development and social policy from the School of Education and Social Policy. She received a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Mississippi.

Bruce and Thomas were among the 35 young scholars who received the $27,500 award to research issues that can improve education. The fellowships support those whose dissertations show potential “for bringing fresh and constructive perspectives to the history, theory, analysis, or practice of formal or informal education anywhere in the world,” according to the National Academy of Education.

• Read more about Forrest Bruce’s dissertation.
• Read more about Karla Thomas’s dissertation.

Must have elements

Your MSc Dissertation must include:

Executive Summary

• Other necessary stuff

Usually between 45-60 pages (excluding the appendix)

no firm formatting requirements

• standard font
• suitable font size (11-12)
• numbering (pages, chapters, sections, equations, tables, figures,…)
• good design (visually appealing tables and figures)

1 page. See pp9 in the Guidelines.

No more than 6 pages. Recommended 2-3 pages.

clearly , succinctly , and non-technical (if possible).

The Executive Summary should cover:

• Background to the scientific problem and why.
• How you approached the problem.
• Key findings and conclusions
• Recommendations and the benefits

Other stuff

Acknowledgements

Table of Contents

Table of Figures

Abstract (Summary Page)

No more than 300 words.

• short version of executive summary
• a quick description of what is covered in the dissertation
• see the checklist in the Guidelines

Introduction/Background/Literature Review

1-3 chapters.

• background about the general area
• Define/propose the research problem
• background/motivation about the specific research problem
• existing literature (how people resolve the problem)

What else should be included?

• Organisation of the dissertation

What literature should you review?

• The important works (milestones) in the general topic
• Existing works in the your specific (and relevant) research problem
• The most relevant works (you are studying or comparing with), and works directly link to them
• Other relevant works
• The recent development
• The applications in other fields

Methodology

1-3 (or more) chapters.

This is usually the most flexible part in your dissertation.

• self-contained
• use explicit, clear, and simple formulas/terms
• consistency in notations
• write in your own words and logic

Numerical Studies (Results)

1-2 (or more) chapters. Typical types of numerical studies are:

[1]. Monte Carlo simulations (synthetic data)

[2]. Real data applications

Use informative tables and figures (visualization).

This could be the major chapters if you are doing a application-focused dissertation.

Conclusions

What you could include in the conclusions:

• summarise your dissertation
• outline your contribution, discuss the key results/learning outcome
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• any possible future improvement/directions

Reference, Appendix, and Others

Reference format.

• Standard and Consistent style (APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard)
• preferably in alphabetical order

Cite a Journal Paper

• Davies, R. B. (1977). Hypothesis testing when a nuisance parameter is present only under the alternative. Biometrika , 64, 247–254.

If a paper is a preprint (on arXiv):

• Lugosi, G. and Mendelson, S. (2016). Risk minimization by median-of-means tourna- ments. arXiv preprint , arXiv:1608.00757.

Cite a Book

• Huber, P. J. (1981). Robust Statistics . Wiley, New York.

Chapters in a book:

• Vershynin, R. (2012). Introduction to the non-asymptotic analysis of random matrices. In Compressed Sensing 210–268. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

Cite a Conference Proceeding/Paper

• Yang, L., Zhan, X., Chen, D., Yan, J., Chen, C, and Lin, D. (2019). Learning to cluster faces on an affinity graph. In Proceedings of the IEEE/CVF Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition , 2298–2306.

Avoid (trusting) citing:

• lecture notes
• web/internet references (articles/websites/Wikipedia…)

It is allowed although not recommended to cite above types of reference, .

In general, we should only trust scientific works that has been peer-reviewed.

Contains supplementary material that is not an essential part of the dissertation, but may provide comprehensive information.

It could contain, for example:

• Proofs or Auxiliary Lemmas (if they are not the main contribution in your dissertation)
• Additional numerical results

Written English

in your own words/notations

in formal academic style:

• complete sentences
• no contractions
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present tense should generally be used

do not use “I” or “you”.

UK English spelling

Take home message

• Read literature (academic papers) and try to mimic their writing style/organisation
• Read the Guidelines
• I will provide a latex/Word template (towards the end of this month)
• Start writting as early as possible

• Open access
• Published: 30 May 2024

Pathology skills lab: use of macroscopic tumor models in pathology teaching

• Marit Bernhardt 1 ,
• Christine Sanders 1 ,
• Oliver Hommerding 1 ,
• Dora Nagy 1 ,
• Tobias Kreft 1 ,
• Xiaolin Zhou 1 &
• Glen Kristiansen 1  

BMC Medical Education volume  24 , Article number:  596 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

87 Accesses

Metrics details

The shortage of pathologists in Germany, coupled with an aging workforce, requires innovative approaches to attract medical students to the field. Medical education must address different learning styles to ensure that all students are successful.

The pilot project “Practical Pathology” aims to enhance students' understanding of pathology by providing hands-on experience in macroscopic gross analysis through the use of tumor dummies built from scratch.

An evaluation survey, completed by 63 participating students provided positive feedback on the course methodology, its relevance to understanding the pathology workflow, and its improvement over traditional teaching methods. The majority of students recognized the importance of hands-on training in medical education. Students with previous work experience rated the impact of the course on knowledge acquisition even more positively.

The course improved students' understanding of pathological processes and potential sources of clinical-pathological misunderstanding. An increase in motivation for a potential career in the field of pathology was observed in a minority of students, although this exceeded the percentage of pathologists in the total medical workforce.

Peer Review reports

Introduction

Despite the increase in the number of medical students in Germany, the number of pathologists is not increasing at a comparable rate [ 1 , 2 ]. Instead, the number of practicing pathologists is expected to decrease due to demographic changes. By 2022, approximately 60% of practicing pathologists were 50 years of age and older [ 2 ]. Studies have shown that medical students often overlook a career in pathology due to a lack of interest and understanding of the subject matter [ 3 ]. Medical education offers the opportunity to inspire future generations of medical students for the subject of pathology in all its variety.

The National Competency-Based Learning Objectives Catalogue for Medicine (NKLM) is a federal German document that defines educational objectives for medical schools throughout the country. It serves as the basis for an upcoming reform of German medical education, known as the Medical Education Master Plan 2020, which aims to comprehensively overhaul and redesign medical education. One of the central goals of the reform is to ensure competency-based medical education with an emphasis on early practice orientation [ 4 , 5 , 6 ].

In this context, the Central German Institute for Medical and Pharmaceutical Examinations (“Institut für Medizinische und Pharmazeutische Prüfungsfragen”, IMPP), which is responsible for the preparation of exam questions for state examinations in medical schools, has developed a competence-objected subject catalog (“Gegenstandskatalog”, GK). It summarizes the content that can be included in examinations or state exams. For the subject of anatomical and surgical pathology, knowledge of macroscopic and microscopic changes in the context of inflammatory and neoplastic diseases is required [ 7 ].

Traditional pathology education typically involves both a macroscopy and microscopy course, where students examine specimens and analyze changes that, taken together, contribute to a diagnosis. Beyond that, a practical orientation is often not fully feasible. [ 7 , 8 , 9 ] However, the daily work of a pathologist is much more than working with a microscope. It includes performing autopsies and participating in interdisciplinary case conferences, molecular analyses, and macroscopy, in which relevant areas of the specimens are selected for further microscopic examination after gross evaluation [ 10 ].

Involving students in the dissection of real surgical specimens for educational purposes is debatable. First, correct grossing is essential for diagnosis and must not be compromised by inexperienced medical students, however eager they are. Furthermore, in order to ensure optimal sections for histology, both internal and external standards must be adhered to for routine specimen sampling [ 11 ]. Second, formaldehyde, which is unavoidable, has now been classified as a carcinogen and unnecessary exposure should be avoided [ 12 ]. Third, there is a low, but still not negative, risk of injury and subsequent infection when using “real” specimens [ 13 ]. Fourth, the acquisition of similar specimens from routine samples for large groups of students is difficult, especially if turnaround times are being affected. Although remainder of specimens that have already been signed out may be used after flushing with water to minimize formaldehyde exposure, still a laboratory with fume hoods must be provided as a work station. In addition, programs may not have access to patient specimens for this purpose and providing comparable material to all students may pose an additional challenge. In summary, the use of routine specimens for teaching purposes of medical students is unadvisable and it is important to consider alternative methods of macroscopy education.

In order to meet the requirements of the NKLM and to familiarize students with the profession of pathologists, the Department of Pathology at the University Hospital Bonn has introduced the course "Practical Pathology" as a pilot project in the winter semester 2022/2023. This course aims to make the daily work of pathologists literally "understandable" by adding some virtual flesh to the dry theory.

Material and methods

Construction of tumor models.

For the "Practical Pathology" course, we created tumor models of a skin spindle excision with squamous cell carcinoma. The skin substitute used was brown artificial leather molded into the shape of a spindle. A cotton thread was attached to the tip of the spindle, marking 12 o'clock. A tumor was created by applying acrylic sealant commercially available at a local hardware store (acrylate sealant Racofix Acrylic White, 21,719, Sopro Bauchemie GmbH, Wiesbaden, Germany). The design of the model took into account the feasibility of using marking ink on it and the ease of producing tumor models quickly, easily and at low cost (Fig.  1 ).

Course material: tumor specimen model, cassettes, ink, ruler and pencil ( A ). Specimen after inking B  and cutting C  with report form seen behind

Use of tumor models in teaching

Students worked in pairs and each received a tumor model. In addition to the tumor models, students received a pathology requisition form designed for the course with clinical information. Cotton swabs and two different tempera paints were provided for inking the resection margins. Each pair of students was given a ruler, scalpel, and histocassettes to submit their sections. A pathology report mask for recording clinical details and macroscopic descriptions was distributed together with the tumor models (Fig.  1 ). A lecturer from the Institute of Pathology was always present to answer questions. After a group discussion on macrodissection methods and objectives, students performed dissections in pairs. The group then reviewed their results and discussed potential problems, such as tangential sectioning of small particles or improper visualization of resection margins.

Students completed an anonymous and voluntary evaluation survey that inquired about their pre-medical work experience, learning outcomes in understanding pathology workflow, and their motivation to continue to study pathology as a subject (Fig.  2 ). The survey also assessed students’ perceptions of the course's variety of techniques and its relevance to future interdisciplinary work. Agreement or disagreement was rated on a five-point scale, with 1 representing a low level of agreement ("strongly disagree") and 5 representing a high level of agreement ("strongly agree").

Evaluation sheet handed out to student to document their experiences

Statistical analysis was performed using IBM SPSS Statistics 27 software (IBM, New York, USA). Data were presented descriptively as absolute and percentages. In addition, means and ranges were determined. The Mann–Whitney U test and the Wilcoxon rank-sum test were used to compare groups. Significance was defined as a p -value of < = 0.05, and multiple testing was adjusted to the α-level using the Bonferroni correction.

Of all students enrolled in their fifth semester ( n  = 139), a total of 63 completed the evaluation form. Of these, 23 (36.5%) had previous work or volunteer experience prior to their studies. Professional work experience, if any, was mainly in nursing (12.7%) or emergency services (6.4%). 4.8% of the participants had done a volunteer service. The remainder, 12.7%, included both medical (physiotherapist, medical assistant/physician assistant) and non-medical (mechatronics technician, chemical technician) jobs, as shown in Fig.  3 . Overall, none of the students had previous experience in histopathology i.e. from work experience as histotechnician.

Percentage of students that had been working prior to entering medical school A  and distribution among professions /services B

Overall, the course received positive evaluations. Students perceived it as an improvement over traditional teaching (mean 3.47; SD 0.953) and appreciated its methodological diversity (mean 3.61; SD 0.894). They also recognized the importance of practical “hands on” courses for the success of medical education (mean 4.32; SD 0.964). Regarding the acquisition of knowledge about the daily work of pathologists, most participants reported that the course gave them a better understanding of the workflow (mean 3.60; SD 0.815). According to the students, information about the workflow was not taught in other classes (mean 2.14; SD 0.948) or known from professional activities before entering medical school (mean 1.75; SD 0.933).

Interestingly, students who endorsed previous employment had significantly more positive ratings regarding knowledge acquisition from the course than those without prior job exposure (mean 4.00 vs. 3.38, p  = 0.016). Regarding prior knowledge of pathology workflow, previous work experience had no significant effect ( p  > 0.999 in each case) (refer to Table  1 ).

The implementation of the practical pathology course did not lead to an increase in motivation in the field of pathology. The majority of participating students were neutral regarding whether the course played a significant role in inspiring self-motivation for in-depth study (2.92; SD 0.955) or for enrolling in pathology courses in the required elective area (2.83; SD 0.853). In general, the motivation of students to pursue a career in pathology was largely unaffected (2.38; SD 0.923). However, 3.2% of respondents reported an increase or significant increase in motivation in response to this question. The results did not differ significantly whether or not the students had work experience prior to medical school (in-depth study mean 2.85 vs. 3.04 p  = 0.291, elective mean 2.80 vs. 2.87 p  = 0.501, career mean 2.48 vs. 2.22 p  = 0.529).

The teaching of interdisciplinary relationships was positively evaluated. In addition to making clinical connections (3.70; SD 0.994), the course's potential to prevent misunderstandings (3.46; SD 0.997) between clinical staff and pathologists was considered relevant.

In the traditional curriculum of medical education, pathology plays a central role as a didactic core discipline in the advanced / second part of medical education following pre-medical courses. This reflects the way we, as pathologists, see ourselves, in medicine, where diseases are defined and classified primarily in terms of (pathological) anatomy and pathophysiology. Despite this, surveys show that only less than half of medical students are aware of the actual day-to-day work in clinical pathology. In particular, the amount of autopsy work is often overestimated, which may be due to the traditional but outdated image in the media [ 14 ]. As a corrective measure, both the German Society of Pathology (DGP) and the Professional Association of German Pathologists (BDP) now provide online information about the profession [ 10 , 15 ].

Medical school education provides an excellent opportunity to expose future health care professionals to the content and day-to-day practice of the specialty. This is critical, as one of the most commonly cited reasons in surveys for not choosing pathology as a specialty is lack of exposure and knowledge of the subject matter among medical students [ 3 ]. Factors that influence specialty choice among current students include interest in the field, intellectual challenge, work-life balance, career opportunities, professional standards, workplace atmosphere, and workplace prestige [ 14 , 16 ]. These are factors that generally include pathology as a specialty. However, regarding the specific question of preferred specialties, it is evident that the inclination toward internal medicine, surgery, general medicine, and psychiatry is often present before medical school and remains largely unchanged throughout medical school [ 17 ]. Inspiring undecided students to consider a career path is also a potential goal of teaching. The presented course concept was evaluated and showed that 3% of the students reported being inspired to pursue a career in pathology as a result of their participation. Considering that pathologists represent only 0.5% of all physicians in Germany, this is an encouraging result [ 2 ].

Exposure to the clinical environment or clinical practice is often claimed to be important in the choice of specialty [ 18 ]. In addition, students with premedical experience in health sciences tend to perform better in medical school [ 19 ]. In our cohort, previous work experience did not appear to influence motivation for pathology education or residency. However, motivation for pathology was not significantly lower in this group either.

In didactics, we often speak of different learning types and, more recently, of different learning styles. A common concept in medical didactics is the "VARK" model—visual, auditory, reading/writing, and kinaesthetic—which identifies four distinct learning styles. These are the visual style, in which content is conveyed using pictures, graphics, etc.; the auditory style, in which knowledge is conveyed through lectures and/or discussions; the reading/writing style, in which teaching and learning is text-based; and the kinaesthetic style, in which knowledge is acquired through direct practical application [ 20 ]. While it was initially thought that most people preferred a single learning style, it has now been shown that most people use a variety of learning styles [ 21 , 22 ]. In addition, different teaching methods have been associated with different efficacy. For example, a lecture is associated with an efficacy of 5%, meaning that students will remember 5% of the content presented. In contrast, learning by performing a task is said to achieve efficacies of up to 75% [ 23 ]. The required competence orientation of medical education, which the NKLM already bears in its name, refers to the skills, abilities and professional attitudes of future physicians. The three levels of competence are factual knowledge, action and reasoning knowledge, and action competence. The ability to explain and classify terms and concepts falls under the category of action and reasoning knowledge, while action competence pertains to the ability to carry out activities independently or under supervision.

The teaching of pathology currently meets the criteria for multimodal didactics and the NKLM in several aspects [ 24 ]. Microscopy teaching incorporates auditory, kinaesthetic, and visual elements, allowing students to complement their factual knowledge with practical knowledge and skills. The digitization of histological specimens also provides the opportunity for self-directed learning through online platforms independent of traditional coursework [ 8 , 9 ]. However, simulation-based learning, as is common practice in other disciplines, for example with resuscitation training, suturing courses or other widely available so-called skills labs, has, to our knowledge, not been routinely established in pathology [ 6 , 25 , 26 ]. Skills labs similar to ours, such as grossing of a salivary gland model presented by Alcaraz et al . are unique and rare pilot projects [ 27 ]. This is particularly unfortunate because the use of simulation-based learning in teaching would be beneficial for strengthening practical skills. A wide range of learning styles can be accommodated, possibly more than in a case-based seminar or a lecture alone [ 27 , 28 ]. Students’ evaluations seem to agree, as they consider the use of practice-based courses relevant to their academic success. With regard to the integration of new teaching and learning methods, it is important that existing resources are not further strained. With a material cost of about 10 euro cents and a production time of about 1 min, the models adopted by our department offer a cost-effective and time-efficient solution. This makes them highly suitable for long-term implementation with minimal impact on the teaching budget. In addition, the tumor models presented can be used in any standard lecture hall as they are made from dry materials and do not drop or vaporize preservatives. Alternative options used i.e. in suturing or fine needle aspiration skills labs such are animal specimens or fruit [ 29 , 30 ]. Although especially animal specimens are closest to human material in terms of texture, they need to be purchased freshly before every course, while models like ours may be prepared in larger scale at the beginning of every new semester.

In addition to increasing students' enthusiasm for pathology, the course aimed to improve their understanding of the laboratory workflow from specimen receipt to report release. Previous studies have shown that up to one-third of clinical colleagues does not understand or does not fully understand the information contained in the report [ 31 ]. In addition, up to 15% of submitted specimens lack clinical information beyond patient biographical data [ 32 ]. This may be taken as a hidden compliment, but it clearly overestimates the knowledge of the pathologist. It includes the assumption that the pathologist, as the “doctor’s doctor”, is endowed with a supernatural sense that renders detailed clinical information superfluous – which has long been scientifically refuted [ 33 ]. The most commonly cited justification for the lack of clinical information is the concern that too much information might interfere with an unbiased diagnosis [ 34 ]. Therefore, the course not only focused on macroscopic processing, but also emphasized the importance of including relevant information on the submission form to aid in the reporting of findings. The course was successful in positively influencing students' understanding of potential clinical-pathologic misunderstandings. However, it remains to be determined whether this effect will continue to benefit their future clinical work, making it a possible topic for further study.

The multimodal design of medical education has been associated with improved learning outcomes long before the introduction of the NKLM and problem-based learning. The implementation of a simulation grossing course is positively evaluated by students as it improves the quality of teaching and minimizes misunderstandings between pathologists and clinicians. In addition, the course provides an opportunity to explain students the critical role pathology plays in patient care and to inspire them to consider pathology as a career option, thus mitigating the shortage of future pathologists.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets used and analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Abbreviations

Bundesverband Deutscher Pathologen / Professional Association of German Pathologists

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Pathologie / German Society of Pathology

Gegenstandskatalog / competence-objected subject catalog

Institut für Medizinische und Pharmazeutische Prüfungsfragen / Central German Institute for Medical and Pharmaceutical Examinations

Standard Deviation

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Cornelia Becker and Hanna Gutmann for their help with data acquisition and most of all the students for their participation.

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The course outline and survey was designed by MB, CS, DN, TK, OH and XZ. MB, DN and XZ collected the data. MB and GK wrote the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final paper.

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Correspondence to Marit Bernhardt .

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Bernhardt, M., Sanders, C., Hommerding, O. et al. Pathology skills lab: use of macroscopic tumor models in pathology teaching. BMC Med Educ 24 , 596 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-024-05575-z

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