Research in Practice Project Activities (RIPPAs)

Research in Practice Project Activities (RIPPAs) are a relatively new form of collaborative, community-forming activity for Computing Science education research and practice at UKICER.

The aim is to bring practitioners and researchers together in computing science education to form networks, exchange ideas, form collaborations and put research into practice, incorporate research into practice or improve practice.

RIPPAs span several months and participants are expected to commit to participating in a small number of online workshops as well as conducting some activity in their context, such as incorporating research into practice, collecting data and/or conducting research.

Participation and Commitment

The specific participation and commitment requirements depends on the RIPPA, but broadly RIPPAs require participants to:

• Attend start-up workshop at UKICER. The workshop will introduce the RIPPA, methodologies and approaches used as well as provide an opportunity for participants to get to know each other and learn about what is happening across the community.
• Perform activity. RIPPA participants are expected to perform some activity as part of the project. This activity could be to conduct research in their own context, incorporate research into their own practice or improve their practice. Participants would then share their contributes back to the group remotely.
• Attend interim workshop. The workshop - which will usually be online, unless RIPPA leaders can facilitate in-person meeting - will give participants an opportunity to share their contributions as well as analyse results and discuss any insights from the activity. The group will then begin to form it into a complete outcome and decide next steps.
• Capstone workshop. The final workshop to pull together any remaining work involved in the activity and form into an artefact that can be disseminated among the community through the optimal channel, such as UKICER or the Computing Education Practice (CEP).
• Relax and unwind at a wrap-up dinner. Wrap-up meal and opportunity to reflect on the experience and plan future collaborations with other rippers.

Outcomes

The focus of RIPPAs is the participants and the expectation is that they will achieve the following from participating in a RIPPA:

• Strengthened knowledge and skills in research and practice. Dependent on the specific RIPPA, the expectation is that participants will strengthen their research knowledge and skills. This could be awareness emerging teaching practice and how to investigate it, appropriate methodologies for computing education research (CER) and/or deepened appreciation of the state of the art in CER.
• Strengthened and expanded network of collaborators. Form connections with academics, scholars and researchers from across the computing science education community with similar interests and challenges. Valuable not only for conducting future research investigations but also to gain insight into innovative practice in other institutions as well as creating bonds with other academics to discuss on-going sector challenges and how to solve them.
• Publication. The expectation is that outcomes of RIPPAs will be high-quality, multi-institutional studies that are authentic and steeped in data from contexts spanning many different from many perspectives. Participants will be authors on such high-quality contributions that are difficult to devise and coordinate for most sole academics.

RIPPA proposals that presenters would like to be considered for delivery at the conference and beyond must be submitted via EasyChair.

RIPPA Proposal Format

RIPPA proposals should be submitted in ACM double-column conference proceedings format. The page limit is two pages, including references. RIPPA proposals must be submitted in an anonymised form for review. RIPPA proposals should include typical submission details such as the abstract, keywords and introduction, as well as: details of the RIPPA's goals and outcomes, methodology or practical tasks involved, a schedule or timeline, and intended take-away knowledge and skills for the RIPPA participants. Authors must make an electronic submission in the form of a PDF file via EasyChair.