Are you thinking about coming to the Education and Student Experience conference in September? Maybe you’ve never attended before, or you are new to the university. Perhaps you’re not sure whether it would be a good use of your time. With just under a month to go, we wanted to release a blogpost outlining previous conference feedback.

Of course, we would say it’s the best three days in the diary (we do organise it!), but what do attendees from last year say?

Every year we run a feedback survey with people who have been to the conference. And last year 97% of people who responded rated the conference as 4 or 5 out of 5. And 90% said that it met their expectations.

The aspects of the conference that attendees valued the most were that it provided an opportunity to discuss up-to-date topics in learning and teaching, and community building. The mix of internal and external speakers means you have the chance to find out what’s going on in other AU departments, as well as universities in the UK and beyond. And you can meet staff in other departments who may share the same teaching or research interests as you. There’s plenty of time during breaks to meet new people as well as catch-up with colleagues you haven’t seen for a while.

Not only is the conference a great event, but attendees say that it has a direct impact on their teaching practice. Through both the conference papers and workshops, and the conversations, staff say that they use new approaches learnt from the conference in their teaching. After last year’s conference, several staff members told us they were going to explore using AI in their teaching. If you are thinking of applying for AdvanceHE fellowship, the conference is also a great way of taking part in CPD and reflecting on your teaching practice.

One of the messages that attendees suggested that we share more widely is that you’re welcome to dip in and out of the conference. We know that you may not be able to spend all three days attending, but you can come along for a couple of talks that really interest you. And of course, you can stay for as long as you like if you find that you want to carry on the conversation, or another session catches your eye.

So, it’s not just the organising team who rate the conference highly – staff from across the university agree that it’s a good way of meeting colleagues, discussing teaching topics, and learning something that they can use in their teaching. Come along and join them and find out for yourself. We’d love to see you there.

Check out our full programme online and book your place.