Giving first year students the opportunity to work with trained second year students has been shown to have significant benefits for both the mentee and the mentor. For the mentee, hearing their PAL leader’s own experiences of getting through the first year, the reassurance, guidance and support they provide through the ‘bumpy bits’ of the course can have a dramatic effect on assessment marks and progression rates. For the PAL leader, their own subject knowledge is reinforced, they gain confidence in working with small groups and their employability is enhanced.

The aims of the project were to: identify practice within the region in peer assisted learning; find out how PAL leaders are trained and supported; identify the particular benefits that PAL has for first year students studying STEM subjects, and, to conduct a pilot study about on-line PAL, in effect taking PAL out of the classroom.  The project met its aims in a number of ways. A series of regional seminars with supplementary briefing documents brought people together to learn from each other’s experiences. A mapping exercise was conducted to investigate practice(s) within the region. Literature reviews were conducted on PAL and online PAL, and an in-depth study of the experiences of PAL leaders was conducted. The project also examined how online integrative technology can be used to facilitate developmental relationships within a PAL setting, and produced PAL guidelines for those wishing to adopt the model. Voices of project participants interested in PAL were captured through a creative learning journey.

Finally, through the Practice Transfer Adopters’ scheme, project findings were transferred to four universities (Bradford, Exeter, Livepool and Plymouth), so that they were able to establish their own PAL schemes with support from the project working group team.

The final report for the entire project can be downloaded below, followed by a report from the Practice Transfer Adopters' process: