Beckie Arden, Study Skills Tutor
Early last year my colleagues and I were searching for somewhere to publish our research that we thought would be useful to share with the wider academic community. This eventually led us to publication in June 2024. Throughout this journey I learned a lot about the academic research process —and now I want to share with you some of the wisdom I gained along the way.
As a Study Skills tutor in the professional services team, with no PhD and without formal research experience, embarking on a project like this was not business as usual. But I discovered that through collaboration and support we could turn our initial idea—exploring how students take digital notes—into a published article. This is the first of three posts where I’ll outline how we took our idea and transformed it into a research project. In the second instalment I’ll share our research findings, and then finally I’ll chat a bit about the publication and publicity journey.
From Idea to Research Project
Our initial goal was to create an online resource to help students decide how to take effective notes in lectures. At first this was intended to be a straightforward information-gathering exercise. We designed a survey asking students about their note-taking methods, what worked, what didn’t, and any challenges they faced in their subject areas.
The results we gathered were fascinating and surprisingly substantial. What began as a tool to improve our service now seemed to represent insights for practitioners beyond our team. And so, we decided to transform this project into some ‘proper’ research!
The Power of Collaboration
I did not undertake this research journey alone. I was fortunate to work as a team with colleagues from Study Skills who brought different skills and experience to the research. For me this collaborative approach was invaluable as it allowed us to divide responsibilities and regularly refine each other’s ideas, which helped the project evolve into something far greater than I could ever have achieved alone.
That said, collaboration posed its own challenges. Scheduling meetings, maintaining consistent communication, and balancing the project with our regular workloads required high levels of commitment, strong communication skills and flexibility. But the joy of working together with a shared vision for the potential impact of this research on our service far outweighed these difficulties. For anyone new to research, I can’t emphasise enough how rewarding it was to find collaborators who share your enthusiasm and are willing to commit time and energy to the process.
Finding Support Resources
During this process, I was struck by how much support is available across the university, though I didn’t always know where to find it. At the time, the Research Service Hub didn’t exist, so I relied heavily on advice from colleagues and countless emails to the university’s DREI (Doctoral Research and Enterprise Innovation) team.
Luckily, the launch of the Research Service Hub at the start of the 2024-2025 academic year has streamlined this process. The Hub’s Research Road Map is an especially valuable resource, laying out each step of the research process in a clear flow diagram and signposting support services at every stage. For instance, the Research Road Map signposts to the incredible Research Support Team in the post-project stages. This team helped us to navigate the requirements of the University of Bristol Scholarly Works Policy, including how to avoid paying a prohibitive article processing fee for open access publishing! They were also the experts when we needed advice on how to store, manage and share the research data pre and post publication.
What did I learn?
- Research is about being curious: You don’t need to be an expert to begin research; you simply need to be interested in something that you think could make a difference and suspect that there might be people out there that would be interested in it too.
- Reach out for available support: Familiarise yourself with university resources like the Research Service Hub and don’t hesitate to ask questions.
- Collaboration is powerful: As part of a team, you can not only share the workload but also shape the project with new perspectives and skills.
- Grow with the flow: Remember that research is a learning experience. Embrace the process, and don’t be afraid to seek guidance from experienced colleagues and support teams.
I would love to hear how my journey relates to other’s experience as first-time researchers. I hope that I can encourage anyone considering their own research project to reach out to the many resources and colleagues that can help turn it into something impactful.
Next time…
In the next blog post, I’ll share the findings from our research and describe how they shaped our approach to supporting students.
