| Summary: | The broad aims of this fellowship were to enhance the learning experience and learning outcomes of engineering students, and to embed enabling strategies and processes for engaging engineering students and academics, systematically. It was motivated by the demand for engineers and the critical need to increase enrollment and retention rates of students in engineering programs. A case study approach was designed in accordance with best practice to explore the proposition that a mismatch between learning styles, teaching styles and institutional norms impedes student commitment to and success in learning. It involved current students and academics across three universities; Queensland University of Technology (QUT), CQUniversity and The University of Melbourne (UoM). The chosen sites reflect a range of institutions whose cultures could be expected to have an impact on students' success rates and learning outcomes. Learning styles of participating students and academics were assessed using Felder and Silverman's online survey tool, Index of Learning Styles (ILS) Questionnaire, developed in an engineering context. To identify the major features of various approaches to teaching, teaching styles were assessed using Grasha's Teaching Style Survey. The case studies included class observations, focus groups with students and interviews with volunteering academics. The data acquired from these activities were then compared with the learning and teaching styles survey results to triangulate on the phenomenon. Feedback was provided to participating academics through written personalized analyses, and to a wider audience via a series of workshops. Barriers to learning were explored in student focus groups and a thorough critical review of the literature. The fellowship provided an insight into factors affecting the learning teaching nexus and identified gaps between teaching objectives and classroom practice, suggesting ways of addressing them. It also provided an in-depth treatment of the barriers to student learning and suggestions for dealing with some of them. Further, it provided a number of guides including a self-evaluation and reflection model. [Executive summary, ed]
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