Academic from Oldham shortlisted for national Times Higher Education Award

Chris Jones

Technology and Entrepreneurship tutor, Chris Jones, who is originally from Oldham, has been shortlisted for the ‘Most Innovative Teacher of the Year’ in the national Times Higher Education (THE) Awards.

The ‘THE’ Awards, widely recognised as the ‘Oscars of Higher Education’, celebrates the achievements of institutions and their staff across the UK.

2021 marks the 17th annual year of the prestigious awards and saw almost 600 institutions enter into 20 categories.

Chris has been shortlisted among seven other individuals within the ‘Most Innovative Teacher of the Year’ category.

He joined Pearson Business School in 2017 and has bought a wealth of industry experience, technical skills and innovative teaching styles.

He has been described by students as someone who goes “above and beyond” to make modules “extremely fun”, “engaging” and “educational”.

Despite the move to online teaching during the pandemic, Chris made extra efforts to ensure classes were interactive which included the use of real-time and live assistance during lectures.

He also introduced a direct evaluation platform where students could suggest feedback online anonymously which led to a reconstruction of the traditional teaching setup.

“I feel honoured to have been shortlisted in this year’s Times Higher Education Awards,” said Chris.

“Working with the other tutors at Pearson Business School has been a great environment to experiment with new ideas, mostly thanks to our amazing students, as they are the ones who put up with me trying things out.

"They are the ones who keep giving me useful feedback and they are the ones who ultimately make it work.

"Without them I'm just a mad man screaming into the void (which is what is has often felt like during covid).

"I look forward to attending the finals in November.”

The winners of each category will be announced on November 25 at an in-person ceremony in London. 

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