Sheila Hope

Biography

I initially read for a B.Sc in Genetics at Glasgow University and gained a 1^st class degree in 1988.

My first post-graduate appointment was as a research assistant in the Department of Cancer Studies (now the Birmingham CRUK Institute for Cancer Studies) at Birmingham University, where I had the opportunity to complete my PhD, entitled Epstein Barr virus and Cell Survival.  I remained at Birmingham on a Wellcome funded post doctoral fellowship until I was appointed as a lecturer at Keele university in 1995.

At Keele, I have supervised or co-supervised 5 PhD students and 1 MPhil student and had considerable cross-school and cross-faculty teaching experience and my focus shifted from research to teaching and I am now Senior Lecturer in the Education and Scholarship family.

Research and scholarship

My main scientific research interest was on the role of viruses in the control of apoptosis and cellular differentiation, although I have side interests in apoptosis, cancer biology and genetics in general. My early research at Keele focused on the role of proteins encoded by Epstein Barr virus and its primate virus analogues. My technical expertise lies in molecular and cell biology.  The most successful period of my research career remains my PhD research - 3 of the resulting publications have between them been cited over 2000 times.  Since establishing my own independent research programme here at Keele, I have held major grants from the Wellcome Trust and BBSRC and studentships from AICR and LRF, plus 3 Nuffield vacation scholarships.

In the past decade, I have re-focused my research towards pedagogical action research and have developed several projects based around the technological innovations I have made in feedback provision and  I have had several Teaching Innovation Awards.

I  completed an MA in Learning and Teaching with Technology in 2013 and was appointed Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in November 2013.

I am the local ambassador for the Biochemical Society and had long-standing membership of the American Society for Microbiology and The International EBV Association.

Teaching

My main aim in teaching is to change the mindset of my students from “What do I need to do to pass this assessment?” to “What skills and knowledge have I gained from doing this assessment?”  This has helped me to develop some authentic assessments over the years from group webpages aimed at a non-scientific audience to themed editorials.

I am also keen to develop the use of new technologies in teaching, assessment and feedback and in recent years have explored the use of various tools for group work and pioneered the use of audiovisual feedback using screencasting software.   In 2012, I was awarded Keele’s Teaching Excellence Award for my work on screencasting. 

I was an early adopter of the “flipped classroom approach”, so was ahead of the curve when the pandemic hit in 2020 in terms of preparing asynchronous teaching materials.

In the past I have had significant cross-school and cross faculty teaching experience, contributing to medicine (PBL tutor, genetics and microbiology), pharmacy (genetics) and forensic science (genetics and school liaison).

Current teaching

Level 4

• LSC-10066   Molecular Cell Biology (module manager and major contributor)
• LSC-10068   Professional Skills for Biochemists (CBL tutor)

Level 5

• LSC-20050  Human Genetics (Module Manager and main contributor)

Level 6

• Project supervisor on double and single project modules and dissertation module (up to 8 students per year)
• LSC-30015  Biology of Disease
• LSC-30026 Case Studies in Biomedical Science (CBL tutor)
• LSC-30051 Case Studies in Biotechnology (Module manager and major contributor)

Level 7

• Project supervisor on MSc Biomedical Science (Blood Science and Microbiology)