Publishing MA students Succeed in Pearson-judged Digital Pitch
On the 1st of May 2019, we invited product managers Alistair Nunn and Sze-Kie Ho from Pearson Education to judge the final presentations of our MA Publishing Media students taking the module, Digital Publishing Strategy. Eight weeks earlier, student groups were given a real Pearson user problem, and tasked with developing and testing an app or website that aims to solve this problem, while being a profitable investment for Pearson.
Over those eight weeks, groups conducted user interviews with real teachers, brainstormed potential solutions with pen and paper, prototyped these ideas as functioning apps, and conducted one-to-one user testing. This culminated in a ‘Dragons Den’ style pitch, presenting the team’s research and resulting product.
While all groups did a wonderful job on the day, congratulations are in order for the two teams that came first and second place in the competition. Well done to Maria Pace, Nicole Mekinulov and Oliver Hill who pitched ‘ForeThought’, a way for teachers to tailor their curriculum around recent changes in OFSTED assessment. Judges praised the team for demonstrating excellent engagement with the problem, and presented a compelling and well-considered solution.
Well done also to Beth Summerfield, Hannah Moir and Maddi Oakley who came runner up in the pitch session. They presented ‘Pearson Placement Portal’, a way for teachers to keep track of students undertaking the mandatory 50-day work placement that are part of the upcoming new T-Level qualification. Judges appreciated the team’s explanation of the problem in lay terms, and the process in which they came to their solution. Great work everyone!
On the Publishing MA course, we think it’s really important to maintain strong connections with industry, engaging students with real-world problems, and using professional approaches and tools to solving those problems. Even if it does mean sacrificing May Day morning.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 20 May 2019 around 2pm
Filed Under #Publishing
