TEU Update 12 March 2026

Workshops for Early Career Educators: Assessment Design & ESD

The final two workshops in this series are available for registration now:
 

Assessment Design, Wednesday March 18th, 2-4pm 

This session will introduce early career educators to key concepts of assessment design, exploring authentic assessment, assessment of, for and as learning, and rubrics, including how to choose the most relevant rubric design for you. We’ll also discuss group assignment design, case studies around designing in or out use of Gen AI, and the affordances offered by Loop. Join us for time to reflect and discuss practice in assessment design. 

ESD, Wrap-Up and Discussion: Wednesday March 25th, 2-4pm

This session introduces one of the most important emerging themes within higher education, regardless of academic discipline: education for sustainable development (ESD). Participants will explore the social, economic and environmental challenges involved, before looking at one of the best responses to them: the Sustainable Development Goals. Following this, we’ll have time to reflect on the workshop series overall, and discuss our ongoing learning in teaching and learning practice, including its challenges and its opportunities. 

Register your place now. 

These workshops are part of an online series aimed at early career educators, and/or colleagues new to teaching at DCU, called the Educator’s Compass: finding your way in teaching and learning. Queries to maeve.odwyer@dcu.ie.

Managing Space in Loop Reflect

A reminder that students should visit the Reflect Help page for guidance on saving space in their Loop Reflect Account. If they are running out of space they can examine which files are using most of their data by clicking the Hamburger menu at the top right hand corner of their Loop Reflect page, choosing the dropdown arrow beside Content and selecting Files.

Loop Reflect Awards 2026

On Tuesday, March 10th, we celebrated the outstanding achievements of our students in the 2026 Loop Reflect Awards. This event highlights the creativity, dedication, and hard work that students have put into showcasing their learning journeys.

A huge congratulations to the winners: 

First Place Winner: Simon Madden from DCU Business School (Accepted by Dr. Orla Feeney, on behalf of Simon Madden)

Second Place Winner: Alanna Coughlan from the Faculty of Science & Health

Third Place Winner: Cherrymae Monera Fabria from DCU Business School

Highly Commended: Valeriia Yunyk from DCU Business School

Highly Commended: Charlie Savage from Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences (Accepted by Dr. Ruth McManus, on behalf of Charlie Savage)

Congratulations to all of the entrants, we received a large number of outstanding portfolios, making the selection process extremely competitive. Many thanks to all involved in the awards including the judging panel, the TEU team, Monica Ward, Seán Greene (VP of Academic Life) and Malha Muhammed (VP of Diversity & Inclusion).

Creating Collaborative Classrooms

Tuesday 14 April, 13:00

Room F119, first floor, F Block, St Patrick’s Campus

Learning through discussion, collaboration and production (Laurillard, 2012) are often some of the most impactful ways for students to co-construct knowledge. These types of learning can be leveraged in small group teaching scenarios in particular, and can be facilitated through the pedagogically effective use of available classroom technologies at DCU, such as the new Samsung Flip Interactive Displays.

Join us at this practical lunchtime session to explore ways of creating collaborative learning opportunities for students in small group sessions.

Registration is essential. Places will be limited at this interactive and collaborative session. Please bring devices (e.g. smartphone, tablet or laptop). Note that parts of this session will be recorded using a 360 degree camera.

Register for the DCU Spring 2026 Universal Design Badge Course

This semester, we will be facilitating a UDL Badge course locally for DCU staff. Along with offering the "Universal Design in Teaching and Learning" badge, this instance of the programme will also offer a second track for professional staff in "Universal Design Beyond the Classroom", focusing on opportunities to apply universal design principles in non-academic roles. Participants who complete the course will be awarded a digital badge recognised by the National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning. The course will run from mid-April to early June. 

Register your interest for the course via this form. For more info on the content of the UDL badge course, see this page, or you can reach out to steve.welsh@dcu.ie with any specific questions.

Loop Guidance

Check your Turnitin Similarity text-matching settings

If you want student submissions to Loop Assignments to be text-matched, you must ensure these settings are applied before students start submitting. You can read more on Turnitin settings on the Loop Staff Support Page.
 

Please also notify students that they must accept the End User Licence Agreement (EULA) before uploading a file to a Loop Assignment to be processed by Turnitin Similarity. They only need to do this once for the entire site. There is a helpful Turnitin Similarity resource on the Loop 101 for Students support page which you may also wish to share with your students.

Loop AI Question Generator Drop-in Sessions (Fridays at 11am)

The Loop Team is piloting an experimental question generator that leverages an AI technology to create quiz questions in Loop based on simple prompts from the lecturer. The Question Generator is currently available on a pilot basis and can be accessed from all course pages under the More tab. 

You can read more on the Loop AI Question Generator Support Page (available for self-enrolment). While the tool is currently available for experimentation, we encourage you to attend one of our upcoming drop-in info sessions to orient you to the tool and evaluation considerations. We’re holding drop-in sessions on Friday mornings at 11 AM at this Zoom link (also available from the TEU calendar).

SOTL Spotlight 
In this section, we will regularly share conferences, call for papers and other items related to the Scholarship of Teaching & Learning across disciplines

Colleagues applying CBL in their teaching may be interested in an International Conference on Challenge-Based Education (CBE), which will be held on October 27th and 28th, 2026, at the Bizkaia Aretoa (Bilbao), under the theme "Educating for Social Impact." The deadline for submitting proposals is April 30, 2026. Complete details regarding the different formats, requirements, fees, and submission process can be found on the official website.

Pedagogical Innovations for a Changing Planet: Environmental Chemistry & Engineering Education August 23-27, 2026

DCU colleagues Dr Jenny Lawler & Dr Brian Freeland (School of Biotechnology) invite submissions of abstracts (deadline March 30th) to a session (online/virtual only) they will co-chair at the American Chemical Society Fall Meeting. This half-day virtual symposium will showcase cutting-edge teaching approaches that prepare the next generation of scientists and engineers to address complex environmental challenges.

President's Awards for Excellence in Teaching - Nominations Closing

Nominations  for the DCU President’s Awards for Excellence in Teaching will close tomorrow, Friday March 13th.

Details and nominations process available here.

Where to Find Help and Support

Submit a request at DCU Help for Loop queries
More complex query or prefer to chat? Join a Loop drop in clinic
Find comprehensive resources on our Loop Staff Support Page - enrolment key is 'staff'
 

For advice on teaching practice, including on the use of technology, email teaching.enhancement@dcu.ie
Request a workshop or extended consultation

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