WELCOME TO UNITU

WGSU Student Voice department have been upgrading how we gather feedback! We know how important it is to listen and to hear your voice. We have taken this on board and would like to introduce you to Unitu.

Unitu is an award winning Student Voice platform that is being used at a number of Universities across the UK. Built around the student representation system, Unitu, an online platform, helps universities and student unions to collect and examines student feedback, to enable faster improvements to the student experience. It's a space where students, course reps and staff can collectively raise, discuss and resolve both academic and more general experience issues.

Wrexham Glyndwr University (WGU) and Wrexham Glyndwr Students’ Union (WGSU) will be implementing Unitu from September 2021 across the university for all students (excluding those studying at partner institutions) to be able give feedback and for specific staff members at school level to respond in a timely manner.

What is Unitu?

Unitu is YOUR student voice platform. It’s a safe online space where students, Reps and staff can collectively raise, discuss and resolve both academic and more general experience issues, give praise, ask questions or post constructive feedback anonymously. It allows the University to respond to and act on feedback in real time to ensure you have the best possible student experience with us here at Wrexham Glyndwr University.

How does Unitu benefit you?

Transparency and time-saving – When staff respond to student feedback on one of Unitu’s boards, all students on the board can see the response. This saves staff time in instances where multiple students would have previously asked the same question via email.

Course Rep Elections – The Students’ Union will now run the course rep elections through Unitu. This will ease pressures on staff and resources plus reduce any time required to manage the process. Holding elections via Unitu will create more awareness, with students engaged with the platform from early on, and their reps from the start of term.   

“Closing the Loop” on student feedback – When staff respond to student feedback posts on Unitu, they have the opportunity to record the outcome in the ‘Together we Changed’ section of the Unitu board. This evidence of positive change reassures students that their feedback and views are being considered by their department. This can even help departments achieve higher Student Voice scores in surveys such as the NSS.

Quicker access to student feedback – Some staff have previously been frustrated that they only seemed to receive student feedback at their termly Student Voice Forum (SVF) meetings, where some issues may have been “bubbling under” for several weeks. Unitu allows students and Student Reps to flag any issues promptly, so that they can be swiftly addressed, or discussed in greater depth. 

Connection with students studying remotely – With more teaching being delivered digitally in than ever before, Unitu enables students off-campus to give their feedback whenever it suits them. While students across different time zones may find it hard to attend synchronous events such as SVF meetings, they can submit their questions / ideas / praise / issues flexibly on Unitu.

Download the app, login and get to know Unitu! You will be able to share feedback, give praise, ask a question or make a suggestion.

Google: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.unitu

Apple: https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/unitu/id938109264

Desktop : https://unitu.co.uk/login/

Why are we using it?

We are aware and often actively encourage you to set up groups on Facebook and other social media platforms. However, it is very difficult for staff and the wider University to engage in these discussions and respond to feedback. By encouraging you to submit your feedback on Unitu, it will create greater transparency and enable us to respond to your feedback in a timely manner.

What happens to the feedback on Unitu?

Faculty boards are monitored by staff and student reps. As issues, questions and ideas are raised and discussed staff and Reps can respond and provide updates on progress. All of the Boards are monitored by the Students’ Union and University staff who will be able to respond and deal with University wide issues. Departments will be integrating the feedback from Unitu into the Student Voice Forums, which will ensure matters are dealt with and resolved as soon as possible.

How does it work?

Unitu is structured as a discussion board, broken down into two key areas. In the first area, you can ask questions, post ideas and raise issues between you and your classmates in private. If a topic attracts enough comments and likes, your Rep will move the discussion into the second area where staff are able to view it and then work with you to resolve issues or develop ideas.

In brief, on the Unitu platform:

Students share prompted or spontaneous feedback on their experiences by making a post on their Unitu board. This feedback can be a Praise / Issue / Question / Idea. The content of the post is not visible to staff at this stage.

Student Reps review the feedback posts and respond where appropriate.

Reps can choose to share the feedback with staff in the department, by moving it to the next level ‘Opened’. Here staff can see the content of the feedback and can provide a response, such as explaining how a change will be made in response to the feedback.

Staff can then move the feedback to the next level ‘In Progress’ or the final level ‘Closed’ dependent on their response.

Notable changes and improvements in the department / programme are then recorded in the ‘Together We Changed’ section of the Unitu board.

You can find a comprehensive introduction to how Unitu works on the Staff Training section of the Unitu website.

Watch this short video for more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lsmMdVt6aQ&feature=youtu.be

What is a feedback board?

A feedback board is a central space for where students, Reps and staff interact with feedback that is raised by students. You can find a full introduction to the feedback board here. 

the feedback board works in a few ways:

The feedback board is split into two sections, Private and Public.

Private is where students and Reps (if they have access) within a specific feedback board are able to raise, discuss, resolve or escalate feedback to the Public area. Staff do not have access to the Private area of the feedback board, however they can see how many feedback posts have been created, what programme it relates to and the year of study of the author of the post. Once a post has received enough votes and cannot be dealt with by Reps and students, the elected representatives can escalate the feedback to the Public area.

Public area is where staff members are able to open feedback, review, comment and update students through commenting in the discussion thread or by moving into one of two columns; “In progress” or “Closed”.

 Who will see it?

Everyone on your programme has access to see your Department board. On the University-wide board, all students from the Departments using Unitu have access. In the public area, staff can view the posts. These will be key staff members in your Department. 

What happens if any inappropriate feedback is posted?

All users agree to terms of use when activating their Unitu account. This includes the three strike policy for inappropriate content;

1) Reported to the University

2) Lose the right to anonymity

3) Lose access to Unitu

In addition to this, both staff and students can report any inappropriate or defamatory comments to Unitu. The content will be removed and disciplinary action will be taken against the individual responsible for the post.

Resources

https://unitu.co.uk/content-policy/

https://unitu.co.uk/course/student-rep-training/

https://unitu.co.uk/course/unitu-staff-training/

Check out the video of Anish, the founder and CEO of Unitu, where he gives more detail of exactly how the platform works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxOMHHJCVtw

How do I log on to my account?

Once your account is created you will receive an email notification from Unitu that provides the login instructions. As single sign-on is enabled, you can access Unitu using your usual GLyndwr University credentials. 

The URL to visit to log in to your account is: Glyndwr.unitu.co.uk