The Centre for Engineering Education (CEE) supports, promotes, and celebrates the outstanding teaching within the Faculty of Engineering. Laura Neasmith introduces an exciting new initiative designed to connect our experts with external organisations. Read on to discover how Practice Exchange and Partnerships are set to empower our community and further enhance our commitment to excellence in engineering education.
At the Centre for Engineering Education (CEE) in the Faculty of Engineering, we’re all about supporting teaching staff and Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) to deliver exceptional teaching and create a fantastic student experience. Our goal? To make Sheffield an acknowledged leader in engineering education.
That’s why we’ve evolved our approach to external engagement into something more powerful: Practice Exchange & Partnerships. Through this work, CEE connects educators, researchers and external partners to share ideas, test new approaches and shape the future of engineering education together.Whether you’re looking for a keynote speaker, an expert advisor, or a partner for educational innovation, CEE can help you connect with the right people across the Faculty of Engineering.
What is a Practice Exchange?
Practice Exchange is at the heart of what we do. It creates
space for educators to learn from one another — within Sheffield and beyond —
by sharing real teaching challenges, emerging ideas and practical innovations.
These exchanges can take many forms:
from visiting speakers and informal discussion events, to joint workshops,
international visits and longer-term collaborations that lead to new projects
and research.
The aim is simple but powerful: to bring people together around teaching practice, so that new ideas can be
explored, refined and taken forward in a supportive, open environment.
Practice Exchange in Action: Building connections
In 2025, CEE launched a collaboration with Sheffield Hallam University to bring together engineering educators from across the city.
Two informal Practice Exchange events created space for
colleagues to share teaching ideas, explore common challenges and learn from
one another. The first, hosted in The Diamond, featured short talks on topics
including bioengineering labs, spreadsheet-based finite element analysis,
inclusive teamwork and MEE Project Weeks. These sparked lively conversations
about how similar approaches could work in different contexts.
A reciprocal event at Sheffield Hallam continued the
dialogue, introducing ideas such as low-fidelity simulations for lab
preparation and digitally enhanced learning activities.
Participants valued the chance to meet peers working on
similar problems and to build relationships beyond their own institutions —
showing how powerful early-stage sharing can be in generating new
collaborations and fresh approaches to teaching.
During his visit, Dr Li met educators from across the
Faculty and explored how teaching and learning happens in The Diamond — from
design and make spaces to aerospace projects and engineering design teaching.
These conversations allowed both sides to compare approaches and identify
shared interests.
He also delivered a well-attended EATS lunchtime seminar on using file metadata to help detect plagiarism, sparking new discussions and opening up future collaborative opportunities. Follow-up conversations are already under way, with plans for joint educational research and further exchanges.
Our Specialist
CEE works with a wide network of education-focused staff
across the Faculty, including:
- Principal
Fellows of the HEA
- National
Teaching Fellows
- Academic
leads in engineering education
- Specialists
in curriculum design, assessment, inclusion and digital learning
Why This Matters?
Engineering education is changing fast — with growing
emphasis on hands-on learning, inclusive practice, digital innovation and
strong links between universities and industry. Practice Exchange &
Partnerships helps Sheffield stay at the forefront of those changes by creating
meaningful connections that lead to better teaching, stronger curricula and
richer student experiences.
If you’re interested in collaborating, learning from our
educators, or exploring what a partnership might look like, we’d love to hear
from you.
Contact us at: cee@sheffield.ac.uk
Neasmith, L. (2025). “Introducing Practice Exchange and Partership”. Centre for Engineering Education Blog, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK. October 2025. https://www.ceesheffield.co.uk/2025/01/introducing-collaborate-with-us-tool.html