Inspired by Leeds: cultural spaces to further learning

My birthplace is Leeds, and I spent my formative years there, so it was fascinating to attend a recent conference at Leeds Metropolitan University, on innovative ways of assessing in Higher Education. This is part of their Assessment Learning and Teaching Project.
The Leeds City of today is a far cry from the city I remembered in my youth: sooty and neglected Victorian buildings. I guess that was partly the driving force in my wanting to escape to study in London, where it all seemed to be happening in 69.
As Sally Brown the dynamic Pro- Vice -Chancellor at Leeds Metropolitan, and A National Teaching Fellow gave her opening address, she spoke about her own feelings at embarking on going to University, and coming from an all girls’ school, and the first member of her family to get a university place. It was witty and heartfelt, and resonated with me. I remember being so scared when I got off the train at Kings Cross Station all those years ago, that I shook.
Many things have changed. Leeds is a culturally diverse, exciting city, but the transition from school to the first year in university is still challenging and sometimes traumatising and lonely. Many students drop out in the first few weeks. The question is how can academic staff best support, and help students to integrate, and also get support from their peers.
The right kind of assessment approaches in this first year can help students to feel empowered, strengthen their self belief, and if designed well, can also help them forge friendships and a sense of belonging within a learning community.
Returning to London, it was good to quickly feedback to colleagues at City University some of the initiatives and successful projects put forward at conference. And I also had time to reflect on change, both how my home city had changed and yet also retained wonderful features. Before getting the train back to Kings Cross, I spent an hour walking through the incredible high Victorian Architecture of The Leeds Central Market. This was a weekly shopping event in my childhood, every Saturday morning. It may be of interest to my Business students that in this market a Jewish immigrant called Michael Marks first set up a stall, this was the birth of Marks and Spencers.

After a catastrophic fire in 1974, amazingly much of the glass and iron structure, with its extraordinary Chinese Dragon features survived, and still buzzes with life. How great then to see it reinvented as the setting for the current Pantomime: Aladdin, at Leeds Playhouse. As my first career was a Theatre set designer, there was a sense of a circle completed, and an unusual example of cultural spaces and places used to inspire creativity and learning.