Congratulations to Ashley Spriggs, who won an iPad for her innovative use of the presentation software Prezi.

Ashley was awarded the prize by BU’s Vice-Chancellor John Vinney for her winning entry in a competition led by the team behind the TEL (Technology Enhanced Learning) Toolkit – BU’s online self-help guide to technology in teaching. The competition asked entrants ‘How do you use yours?’, in reference to the range of approaches and software showcased on the site.

“The content of the lecture I was giving was actually quite dry” explained Ashley, Associate Lecturer in Adult Nursing in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences. “I wanted to produce a Prezi presentation but I was too embarrassed to ask people how to do it”.

Ashley found using the TEL Toolkit enabled her to get to grips with this new tech. “The TEL Toolkit is a safe place to go in, have a look at stuff and then try it out. And if it doesn’t work well, no one needs to know about it!”

The competition’s 12 winning runners-up represented all faculties and colleagues from professional services. Vice-Chancellor John Vinney congratulated the winners and highlighted the competition as one way of shining “a spotlight on talent” and “creating an environment and culture where people feel confident enough to innovate, try things out, fail, succeed and innovate again”.

However, there may well be some unintended consequences of Ashley’s prize-winning when she returns home. “Are my kids going to be fighting over the iPad? Yeah they will!” she laughed.

Jonny Branney from the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences bagged second place with Anne Davey from Academic Services in third. Other runners up were from Fiona Cownie (FMC), Richard Scullion (FMC), Richard Ward (FM), Sonya Harvey (Student Support Services), Shahin Rostami (Sci-Tech), Elvira Bolat (FM), Iain MacRury (FMC), Hanaa Osman (FM), Mike Mallia (FM), Susan Mant (HSS)

Find out more about what BU’s TEL Toolkit can do for you.