LSBU Informatics lecturer is awarded International Entrepreneurship Educators fellowship
Senior Lecturer in Informatics at LSBU Safia Barikzai receives fellowship from International Entrepreneurship Educators ProgrammeSenior Lecturer in Informatics at London South Bank University (LSBU) Safia Barikzai has been awarded a Fellowship for completing the International Entrepreneurship Educators Programme (IEEP) led by the National Centre for Entrepreneurship in Education.
IEEP is accredited by the Staff Educational Development Association. The programme aims to help educators around the UK promote enterprise education within their organisations and their teaching.
Safia took part in the programme as part of her role as an LSBU Student Enterprise Champion, where she supports academics to teach entrepreneurship skills and provide opportunities for students to gain relevant real world experience. She also serves as course director for the BSc (Hons) Business Information Technology.
"IEEP was a great opportunity for us to develop our educational skills while networking with other educators. We looked at best practices for embedding enterprise and entrepreneurship within our curriculums," she said.
Safia is the first academic from LSBU to be awarded an IEEP fellowship, but several other Enterprise Champions have either completed or are currently on the programme from the Schools of Health and Social Care, Engineering, Business and Applied Science.
"LSBU recognised the need for us to go on this important programme," she explained.
The programme involves visiting a range of UK institutions to learn about their enterprise practices, including the University of Sheffield, Coventry University and the University of South Wales. LSBU also hosted a module on organisational behaviours and gave IEEP participants the chance to speed-mentor LSBU students and graduates.
"As an Enterprise Champion, I value the opportunity to work across different institutions, schools and disciplines. The IEEP programme has allowed us as educators to work together closely and bring students from different subject areas together to work as interdisciplinary teams," said Safia.