#35452 - STUDY OF SAFETY CULTURE IMPLEMENTATION

Faculty of Health and Life Sciences

BSc Environmental Health BSc Safety, Health and Environmental Management

Honours Project

Guide

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

2

Contents

Contents ......................................................................................... 2 1. Introduction ................................................................................. 3

1.1. Welcome to the Honours Project module................................ 3 1.2. The process ....................................................................... 4

2. Choosing a topic ...................................................................... 6 3. Planning your research ............................................................. 7 4. The protocol/project proposal .................................................... 9

4.1. What should the protocol include? ...................................... 10 4.2. Additional documents ........................................................ 12 4.3. What happens to the protocol? ........................................... 14 4.4. Protocol checklist .............................................................. 15

5. Data collection ....................................................................... 16 6. Managing the research process ................................................ 18

6.1. Managing your time .......................................................... 18 6.2. Managing your supervisor .................................................. 19 6.3. Managing your resources ................................................... 20

7. The final report ...................................................................... 21 7.1. Writing the report ............................................................. 21 7.2. How your Honours Project is marked ................................... 23 7.3. Taking it further ............................................................... 24

8. Further advice ....................................................................... 25 9. References ............................................................................ 26 Appendices .................................................................................... 27

Key dates for 2017-2018 .............................................................. 27 Course team contact details .......................................................... 27

Protocol Marking Scheme ................................................................ 28 Honours Project Marking Scheme ..................................................... 29

Tutorial Log ................................................................................ 30 Risk Assessment Form .................................................................... 33 Information for participants ............................................................. 34

This booklet was prepared by Tim South and was last revised in February 2016.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

3

1. Introduction

1.1. Welcome to the Honours Project module

In many ways this module is the culmination of your studies at Leeds Beckett. You will want to make a good job of it, and indeed it is the part of your course that may survive for many years – on your bookshelf, at job

interviews and possibly as a study which you build on in future years. You will use all the skills which you have learned, re-learned or discovered in

yourself during the taught parts of the course. And you will demonstrate to yourself and others that you can integrate knowledge, experience and the critical evaluation of current research in a single piece of work.

We normally distribute this booklet during semester 2 of level 5.

 Most of those reading this will be doing their Honours Project during the following academic year.

 A few SHEM students will be expecting to start work on the Honours

Project during the coming summer for submission in the autumn.  Some part-time Environmental Health students are completing the

UTRP module now but will be doing their Honours Project the year after next.

 Some full-time Environmental Health students may be planning a

placement year during which they will have opportunities to start work on a project for submission two years’ time.

This booklet is intended to guide you through the process of choosing,

planning, carrying out and reporting on your research project. Once you are enrolled on the module, additional guidance will be available on-line, and the course tutors will do their best to advise you. The management of the

whole process, though, is one of the skills on which you are being assessed and many of the decisions will come down to you.

The official module description is available on MyBeckett. Here, to set the scene, are the aims and the learning outcomes from that document.

To give students the opportunity to carry out, in considerable depth, an extended and advanced piece of academic work on a relevant topic of interest to them. To help students develop the capacity for independent work and critical thought.

By the end of this module the student will be able to:

1. demonstrate the skills necessary for the production of a coherent and

scholarly piece of work

2. utilise and reflect on research methods appropriate to the topic

3. develop appropriate research and higher level literature searching and

information retrieval skills

4. organise and manage a significant programme of independent study, including the ability to manage time, materials and ideas

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

4

The first question that sometimes arises is about the level of study involved in the Honours Project; are you expected to do original research? That

question is easily answered; “No”. The box below contains a description of what is involved in study to Honours Degree level. It comes from a publication by the Quality Assurance Agency and lists the qualities normally

expected to be demonstrated in the Honours Project.

So your work is not expected to be completely original, but you should at least make reference to recent research in the field you are studying.

1.2. The process

The process leading up to the acceptance of your Honours Project will be described here briefly, more detail on some of the stages appearing later in

this booklet.

1. Choose a topic This is a crucial stage which can easily be underrated. If you make a bad choice at this stage you will find it much harder to complete a satisfactory

final submission. At this stage it may be possible to allocate you to a dissertation supervisor who will be able to advise you on your protocol. If

not, the module coordinator will take this role.

2. Prepare a research protocol

Once again, this may be seen as a mere preliminary stage before the serious work starts. In fact much of the hard work and difficult decisions will take

place during this stage. Assuming that it has been successful, your protocol will be approved by your supervisor (who will by now be allocated) and by a second marker. You can now proceed to…

Bachelor's degrees with honours are awarded to students who have

demonstrated:

 a systematic understanding of key aspects of their field of study,

including acquisition of coherent and detailed knowledge, at least some

of which is at, or informed by, the forefront of defined aspects of a

discipline

 an ability to deploy accurately established techniques of analysis and

enquiry within a discipline

 conceptual understanding that enables the student:

 to devise and sustain arguments, and/or to solve problems, using ideas

and techniques, some of which are at the forefront of a discipline

 to describe and comment upon particular aspects of current research,

or equivalent advanced scholarship, in the discipline

 an appreciation of the uncertainty, ambiguity and limits of knowledge

 the ability to manage their own learning, and to make use of scholarly

reviews and primary sources (for example, refereed research articles and/or original materials appropriate to the discipline). (QAA, 2008)

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

5

3. Collect and analyse data

This is when the hard work that went into the protocol will seem to be worthwhile. The important issue now is to keep within the schedule that

was included within that protocol; there will be enough unforeseeable delays without inviting disaster through inadequate planning. The overall timescale for completing the dissertation will seem alarmingly short as the

year progresses.

4. Complete the dissertation “Complete”, not “start”. Descriptions such as this break the overall scheme into a linear series of stages. Real life is much messier and to leave all the

writing until the end is a recipe for failure. You are strongly advised to start writing sections of the final report almost as soon as the protocol is printed

out. They will certainly need to be added to and revised as the project progresses but it means the initial analysis will be carried out while the data

is recent, rather than reconstructed from rough notes several weeks later; this applies as much to literature reviews as to measurement and survey data.

5. Submission and assessment

Within the overall plan, you will need to allow time to re-read, correct, and complete your text. References will need to be checked, illustrations inserted and tables of contents generated. The layout will need attention

before the final version is printed and bound. All this takes time and the submission date is non-negotiable. After submission the supervisor and

second marker will read your dissertation and independently allocate a mark. They will normally agree on the final mark.

Your project supervisor will be allocated at some time during the period leading up to the submission of your protocol. Normally this will be a

member of the course team, but sometimes it may be one of their colleagues from elsewhere in the Faculty. So far as possible the supervisor will have a specialised knowledge of your topic and they will certainly have

a genuine interest in the outcome of your work. As well as being involved in the marking process your supervisor will advise and make suggestions

as your work progresses. You will maintain regular contact and keep a log of these meetings. However, subject to both health and safety and ethical requirements, the key decisions about how your project progresses will be

made by you. You may be able to improve on your supervisor’s ideas and, conversely, following all the suggestions made does not guarantee you will

produce an acceptable final product.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

6

2. Choosing a topic Your Project could be based on a number of different topic areas. You will

want to focus on a subject you are interested in rather than something you are only studying because you have to do so to get this particular

qualification. Even so, this could be a very broad area and you are looking for a much more focused research project. How do you come up with a specific proposal?

1. You may already have a question which has been nagging away at you as a result of your work experience or which arose during the

course. Is this your opportunity to resolve the issue? 2. If you know the broad area you want to concentrate on – health and

safety, say, then make an appointment with a tutor who specialises

in that area. They may have a few project ideas waiting for someone to take them up. Or as a result of the conversation you may together

think up a new idea. 3. If you are working in Environmental Health or on placement, talk to

your boss and your colleagues about possible interesting topics. They

may come up with some really good proposals. You will need to be careful that your boss doesn’t talk you into something totally

unsuitable, though – get a tutor to help extricate you if this happens. The advantage of working on an issue that is interesting to your

employer is that they may be very helpful about providing assistance ranging from time to financial support.

4. If all else fails, try browsing through professional journals looking for

interesting papers which draw attention to issues that need further research.

As a result of one of the above suggestions you may know exactly what you want to study. It would actually be more helpful if you had 2 or 3 different

ideas. The next stage is to put some flesh on the bones, to refine exactly what you are going to investigate and to work out what sort of data you are

going to collect, how much of it, what resources you will need and so on. At this stage, one of your ideas may look more and more unrealistic. Starting with more than one possible idea gives you a better chance of ending up

with a viable project.

Before you start writing your research protocol you need to make some very specific decisions. Some of those may be forced on you by your choice of topic. Others still remain to be decided.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

7

3. Planning your research Having got a fairly narrow area of study you now need to define absolutely

precisely what your research will aim to establish. This is often known as the research question. It doesn’t actually have to be written as a question,

although often it is. By writing down exactly what you are trying to find out you will clarify your own ideas and also check that there really is a question to answer. It will avoid the situation where you collect a load of information

and then try to find out if it means anything. Even if it does mean something, you will probably wish you had collected different data once you find out

which bit of it is interesting. You may decide you are going to test a particular hypothesis. Basically this

means writing down a statement that could be either true or untrue and then collecting and analysing data that will resolve whether it is true or not.

It may be more appropriate to set up two or more alternatives and design a study which will let you choose between them.

There is distinction between an observational study and an experimental

one. Despite the use of the word “experiment”, this is not about the difference between “hard science” and apparently “softer” disciplines. An

observational study is one where you collect information about what is going on – for example finding out whether employees use personal protective equipment correctly. In an experimental study you could attempt to

influence their behaviour in some way and see how well it works. For example you may explain to half the workforce why the equipment is

provided and how to use it, and then see if their usage improves compared to the rest of their colleagues. You need to be clear which category your study will come into.

There are various approaches to collecting data. Not all of them will be

relevant to your topic, but you must be clear whether you are mainly going to rely on

 A questionnaire

 Interviews  Physical measurements

 Collection of published information  Observations of individuals’ behaviour  and so on

You may be combining two sorts of data collected in different ways, but if

your answer is “all of the above” you are more likely to mean “I haven’t really thought about it”.

If you are collecting information from individuals, you must be clear who they will be. Professionals? Service users? People in the street? There are

different issues to be addressed depending on the background of your participants.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

8

Whatever your data sources you will need to decide how much data will be collected, and where it will come from. Make a realistic estimate of the time

required and think about issues such as travelling to remote locations, or persuading busy people to make time to meet you. You may need to make some compromises between your ideal research design and what can

practically be achieved.

Whatever your data collection approach, it is often worthwhile to plan a pilot study. If you were using a questionnaire, for example, this would mean printing a few copies and getting them filled in. Even if this is only done by

some of your family and colleagues they may be able to point out some ambiguous questions or give you some misleading replies. It would be even

more useful if the pilot group were as similar as possible to the target group for the final study. Having got some pilot results – and this applies equally

to types of data collection other than questionnaires – run it through the procedure you are planning to use to analyse it. It may be that you can collect it in a more useful form if you are aware of problems that will arise

further down the line.

Researchers sometimes decide to research a problem normally associated with one academic discipline by using the methods and approaches which are common in another discipline. For example a sociologist may decide to

demonstrate the superiority of sociological methods by using them to analyse a problem in political science. The most predictable outcome of this

type of research is that it will infuriate most of the sociologists and all of the political scientists who read it. It is not impossible to use this approach; for example you may decide that a particular environmental protection issue

is not well managed and would benefit if the risk management approaches used in the food hygiene field were applied to it. Whatever the appearances,

this is not an easy way to do research and should only be attempted if – in this example – you are an expert in food hygiene and also very knowledgeable about environmental protection. However if you are going

to analyse a familiar problem from an unusual perspective you will need to make this clear in your protocol.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

9

4. The protocol/project proposal In most cases, the research protocol will be submitted during the level 5

research methods module, and will be one of the assignments for that module. You are not obliged to continue with this proposal, though. So long

as you don’t mind repeating some of the work involved, and so long as your proposed project can be completed in the reduced time available, you can start a new project from scratch. In that case you will need to produce a

new protocol by the 3rd week of October (the precise dates are at the back of this booklet). This new protocol must be agreed by your project

supervisor before you start collecting data. The same deadline applies if you are making more modest changes to the protocol you submitted in level 5.

The aim of the protocol is to demonstrate that you have planned your research project rigorously enough to ensure that it is viable in the sense

that;  The type of investigation proposed has been made clear.  The physical and financial resources required are available.

 Any individual or body whose co-operation is required has confirmed that this co-operation will be forthcoming.

 Any ethical considerations have been fully considered and the ethical release form can be signed.

 Personal risks have been properly assessed and adequate control measures agreed.

 The type of data to be collected and its place within the overall

scheme are clear.  If sampling is involved, then a rigorous sampling strategy has been

adopted.  The level of analysis which is proposed is appropriate for an

Honours Project

 Consideration has been given to the various research styles and approaches available and choices made have been justified.

 The quantity of work which is planned is manageable in the time available.

 Any foreseeable problems such as extreme weather conditions have

been considered and contingency plans made.  An overall timetable has been laid out which allows adequate time

to complete each stage of the project and includes provision for contingencies.

If all this has been done, then the research supervisor will agree that it can proceed. This will require all these aspects to have been covered

satisfactorily but, in particular, no data collection can take place until the risk assessment and ethics submissions have been approved.

If a protocol is uploaded without any prior consultation it is unlikely that it could be approved. It is expected that various aspects will previously have

been discussed with, and a draft protocol shown to, either the project supervisor or the module co-ordinator before it is submitted. The supervisor

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

10

may well make some suggestions or query certain aspects of what is

proposed but will not normally write sections or give explicit instructions as to what it should say.

The length of the protocol may depend on a number of factors but if it runs over about 1200 words then it is probably too long. You may have included

too much detail or have gone into matters that do not belong in the protocol at all. In some cases it may be possible to deal adequately with all the

necessary matters in considerably fewer than 1200 words; what matters is that you have provided enough information, and the right kind of information, for the proposal to be approved.

4.1. What should the protocol include?

It is recommended that the protocol should include the following sections Title

Give the working title of your proposed dissertation. Keep it short!

Aims and Objectives Identify the main aim or aims, which could if you wish be phrased as research questions, followed by any specific objectives needed to meet the aims.

Background / Literature Review

This should indicate how the proposed study links to the current state of knowledge. This can be achieved through an initial literature review – a brief review and discussion of relevant publications in journals, books & internet

reports.

Rationale Explain why you wish to undertake the study, and give a reasoned and justified approach to the proposal. Why, for example, is it of interest either

to you, the profession or to the fields of Environmental Health or Health and Safety generally?

Learning Outcomes Describe the skills and knowledge you expect to acquire in the course of this

module. Some of these will be general in nature while others are specific to the particular topic you have chosen.

Study Design Indicate whether you are planning to review published work or to carry out

an investigative study.

Explain the type of research process you intend to use including a) Type of study b) Type of design

c) Type of data

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

11

Method of Investigation Explain how your data collection will be carried out, indicating what methods

of data collection you will be using (e.g. site measurements, on-line search, questionnaire, interviews) and the main sources for this information. For example if you are using a questionnaire you will need to explain how you

will choose who it is to be distributed to, how many response you are aiming to collect and so on.

Give an indication of how the collected data will be analysed. Are you planning statistical tests? Which ones?

Ethics

Identify the main ethical issues involved and explain how they are to be dealt with. For example you may be collecting personal information or data

which would be of interest to an organisation’s commercial rivals or to enforcement bodies. You will need to make arrangements to ensure that information collected is essential for your purposes, that it will be stored

securely and destroyed when it is no longer needed, and that your dissertation and any other outputs do not breach confidence in any way.

Although much has been written about research ethics, three key requirements can be identified;

1. Participants must agree to take part in full knowledge of what is involved

2. The researcher must actively prevent the participants being harmed in any way by the research

3. The benefits of the knowledge generated must be sufficient to

outweigh any inconvenience to the subjects

If your research would involve subjecting your subjects to stress, pain, discomfort or risks to their health, then in principle we would need to go through a procedure to ensure that the benefits of your research would be

sufficient to justify this, and we would need to be absolutely sure that they would be giving their informed consent to this. In practice, though, you

would just be told to find another project that did not involve any of these issues.

This section will contain an overview of these issues but a detailed ethical submission will be submitted at the same time as your protocol and is

discussed later. Risk

This section will identify the main risks to your personal health and safety and that of others – participants, collaborators or University staff – as a

result of the work you are proposing. Occasionally, consideration of these issues raises an insurmountable problem and a different project must be chosen. More often, a small number of risks are identified along with ways

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

12

of managing these risks so that the work can be completed safely. For

example;  For a laboratory investigation suitable safety equipment and clothing

may be identified  When collecting samples in an isolated location, you could arrange

for another person to accompany you

 If visiting a small business you may leave details with a family member of where you are going and agree a time by which you will

phone them to confirm you are on the way home Because Leeds Beckett University has responsibility for your safety while

you are working on your dissertation you may need to include some apparently mundane items; for example if you will be driving around you

will be expected to have read the University’s policy on vehicle use and to comply with it. On the other hand you should not include highly improbable

or trivial matters. As with ethics, the protocol itself deals with the broad view and a separate

detailed assessment must accompany it.

Resources Required A brief estimate of resources needed and approximate costs. Include any travel costs and the production of your final report. If you are not going to

pay these costs yourself, you will need to confirm that external support has been agreed. If you plan to use Leeds Beckett’s laboratory facilities, check

with the Laboratory Manager that what you are proposing can be supported. Programme Diary

An outline of your work plan with an indication of key dates for completing the various stages of the project.

References A list of the relevant sources which you referred to earlier in the protocol.

This is likely to be much shorter than the list of references you will include in your final report.

4.2. Additional documents You will include in the protocol itself a brief summary of both the possible

ethical concerns and the personal risks involved, and how these are to be managed. You will also need to submit with the protocol a full assessment of both these matters. These will be retained for our records and for use in

ethical and health and safety auditing. The forms for this are at the back of this booklet and will also be available on MyBeckett.

In the case of risk assessments, it will normally be sufficient to complete and submit the risk assessment form.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

13

The details of the ethical assessment depend on whether or not your

proposed study involves human participants. Human participants include anyone who will be asked to take part in an interview or complete a

questionnaire. If you have no human participants, you must complete

 The relevant sections of the on-line ethics submission

If you are planning to involve human participants, you must 1. Complete all parts of the on-line ethics submission 2. Include a copy of the questionnaire, or a list of the questions

to be asked at interview, 3. Include a detailed explanation of how your participants will be

selected 4. Include an explanation of how data confidentiality will be

ensured 5. Include a copy of the information you will give to participants;

normally this will include

a. An explanation of what information you are collecting and for what purpose

b. A reminder that they take part voluntarily and can ask later for their information to be withdrawn from the study.

c. Adequate contact details, so among other things participants are able to contact you to ask for their

information to be withdrawn d. You must also include contact details for someone other

than yourself whom participants can contact if they

have any concerns about what you are doing – this is normally a course tutor or a manager with your

employer. The participants will keep a copy of this information and will sign a copy for you to keep as confirmation that they agreed

to take part. There is a template on Blackboard, which you can edit if you wish to use as an informed consent form.

You must sign the risk and ethics forms before handing in the protocol. You may already have your supervisor’s signature on both forms

when they are submitted; if not, it will be signed once it has been agreed.

If your work depends on the co-operation of any other body – for example your employer, or a private company which is allowing you access to its employees – then you must also include a letter from a responsible manager

confirming that this co-operation has been agreed.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

14

4.3. What happens to the protocol?

Your protocol will be read by your supervisor and then by another member of staff. They will allocate a mark, which will form a small part of the module mark. The protocol will be returned to you with written feedback (you can

of course expect additional advice at your next meeting with your supervisor).

If the protocol has any serious failings – ie you got a mark of less than 40% – you will need to re-submit it with changes before you start to collect data.

If there are less serious problems you may be advised that it would be a good idea to revise it before starting work.

If the ethics and risk forms are satisfactory your supervisor will sign and

keep them. This should be the normal outcome if you have previously discussed and shown them to him/her. Otherwise you may be asked to revise them or the associated documents for re-submission within a couple

of weeks.

Once the protocol has been accepted, and the risk and ethics forms have been signed by you and your supervisor, you can start collecting data.

The procedures outlined here are not intended to be an encumbrance. The forms and the submission dates are there to ensure that every student has

a good chance of completing a satisfactory dissertation within the overall timetable. Sometimes an opportunity arises to start work on a really good project which cannot be delayed until the normal protocol deadline. In that

case you should complete a protocol at least in draft form and – crucially – full ethics and risk forms, and discuss them with your supervisor or the

dissertation co-ordinator. So long as the ethics and risk forms have been signed, you will be able to start work; in an emergency another member of staff will be able to do this.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

15

4.4. Protocol checklist

Before you submit your protocol;



Have you shown

a draft to a tutor?

Does your

protocol include all these

sections?

Title

Aims and Objectives

Background / Literature Review

Rationale

Learning Outcomes

Study Design

Method of Investigation

Ethics

Risk

Resources Required

Programme Diary

References

Have you included a completed and signed risk assessment?

Do you need a letter of support from an outside body, and if so is

it included?

Have you

included a signed ethics

form? Either;

The Stage 1 form for projects not involving

human participants, or

Both Stage 1 and Stage 2 forms for projects with human participants

plus details of how your participants will be selected

plus a copy of your questionnaire or interview questions

plus a copy of the information to be provided to participants

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

16

5. Data collection You will almost certainly plan to do your data collection in a controlled,

systematic way and keep your results in an organised, accessible form. This is not what will happen in practice, for a number of good and not-so-good

reasons;  You are busy and need to concentrate on more urgent priorities  You have an unexpected opportunity to collect more data. This is

more important than the clerical work of organising the last lot of results

 You don’t really know what to do with your results yet; you’ll look into that later

The shoe box approach to data management involves getting a large box and throwing all your results in to sort out later. They will be in a variety of

forms – scraps of paper, old envelopes, computer printouts etc. Quite a lot of your written notes will be legible. Some of your measurements etc will have enough information attached to let you work out what they were about.

The published sources you printed out will need to be read again because you have forgotten which of them were useful. And you’ll have some

computer files which will help so long as you can remember what you called them.

The advantage of the shoe box approach is that you will have all your results in one place. This will save hours of searching under furniture, in discarded

files and in the paper recycling container. The disadvantages should be obvious.

It is not always possible to keep records at the time of data collection which are as detailed as you would like. For example it may be raining (try writing

on wet paper) or your interviewee may talk much faster than you can write down what they say. You may get a rare opportunity to collect additional

data before you have finished collating your previous notes. All is not lost because you will retain quite a lot of information in your memory – but only for a limited period. If you go through your record as soon as possible –

after data collection, at lunchtime or, at worst, at the end of the day – you will be able to insert missing details (the weather? Was the interviewee

male or female?), make things legible, and spot any important gaps before it is too late to collect the missing information.

It helps if you planned ahead. It is much easier to tick boxes on a prepared survey sheet than to write detailed comments on a blank sheet of paper. It

will also be easier to collate your results later, and the survey sheet will remind you of everything you need to record.

As soon as possible – within days rather than weeks – start producing tables summarising your findings. If you are doing any calculations or statistical

analysis start setting that up as soon as you have any data so that you can test your proposed method of analysis while there is still time to improve

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

17

the form in which your data is collected. If you are in danger of running out

of time, the part-analysed data will help you to decide what further work is essential and what can safely be left out. Keep your original data in case

you need to refer back to it, but by the time your data collection is complete you should have it all summarised in a much more user-friendly form.

If your project is based round previously published research, then reading and analysing published work is the core of your data collection, and the

comments above apply to this as to any other data collection. You will need to keep records of your search procedures (databases used, key words, etc) and you will need to start summarising your findings as soon as possible.

If your literature search is for background information to inform your

primary data collection, then you still need to start summarising and recording what you have found as the search progresses. Otherwise, you

will probably have to read and analyse all your sources again when you come to write up the final report.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

18

6. Managing the research process

6.1. Managing your time

By now you will have put a great deal of planning into your project and will be collecting and analysing data. This section reviews some of the resources available to help you.

If you put a bit of thought and effort into the protocol it should be paying

off now in terms of clarity about your objectives, a realistic programme for achieving them and a broad understanding of how your project fits into existing knowledge about the field. However good your protocol, things will

not go exactly as planned and it will be much easier to adapt to unexpected problems (or, indeed, unexpectedly good events such as a massive

response to a questionnaire) if you keep an eye on the big picture. The submission date is the objective you are aiming towards which must be

met and you will need to keep checking progress against the programme diary in your protocol. You can certainly change this as things develop – in

fact it is a good idea to keep it up to date with reality. However if the work is progressively sliding further behind the programme, and your revisions mainly involve squashing the final stages into a shorter and shorter period

just before hand-in, then you are clearly in difficulty.

It is quite common for your original plans to turn out to be slightly ambitious and to need to trim them slightly in the interests of completion. You may

already have planned into the programme some possible short cuts. The trick is to do it such a way that you still end up with a convincing report. For example if you were going to spend 6 days on site collecting data and

this has to come down to 5 days it is unlikely that the overall quality of the work will suffer perceptibly. If on the other hand you cut several types of

data collection down to the extent that none of them are really adequate, it would probably have been better to have removed one of them from the plan altogether. Minor changes to your original plans are inevitable, but if

you are faced with cutting out a substantial part of what you were planning, or of changing its nature significantly, you will need to discuss the

possibilities with your supervisor. The final checking, formatting, printing and binding may take a couple of

weeks as there will be great demand for the available facilities at that time, so make sure you leave time for these stages.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

19

6.2. Managing your supervisor

Make sure you speak to your project supervisor a couple of weeks after the protocol is handed in to get at least some preliminary feedback and advice on when you can start collecting data – it is your responsibility to arrange

a meeting as the supervisor will not be able to follow up all the final year students he/she is supervising.

You will need to discuss progress at least 4 times with your supervisor during the module. Particularly if you are studying part-time, it may be

difficult to fit in this number of face-to-face meetings. It would be acceptable in this case for some of them to take the form of an extended

telephone discussion or of an exchange of material and views via email. Your supervisor needs to sign your meetings log as confirmation that the

discussions took place, in whatever form. It is up to you to arrange a meeting with your supervisor; the recommended

times are as follows;

Week Expected stage Comments

First half of October Drafting protocol Final allocation of

supervisors may not have taken place at this stage

First half of December Collecting data

First half of February Data collection

complete

Full results should be

available

First half of March Analysis/conclusions Sections of the project

complete in draft

By the time you submit your project your supervisor will probably have seen some sections of it, at least in draft form. If there are obvious problems with what you have done, he or she will point them out. If it looks OK,

though, the final improvements will be up to you. Even if your supervisor agrees to read through the completed project, you will not be told whether

it is going to pass or fail. This is because the marking process is a rigorous one involving two independent markers who will each spend some time carefully reading your work before comparing their views and awarding a

fair mark; no supervisor will have enough time before submission to do much more than check for obvious mistakes.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

20

6.3. Managing your resources

Apart from your supervisor, the Leeds Beckett University Library will be one of your key resources. It is worth spending some time finding out what is available, even if you have not managed to do so up to now. If you have

not found out how to use the resources available via the Library website do so straight away. You can download information without charge from a

number of database; for example all current British Standards, as well as papers published in a wide range of academic journals. Several databases can be accessed, and different material is available in each of them so it is

worth searching more than one. Other databases are available outside Athens via the library.

Through the Leeds Beckett Library catalogue you can also search the

catalogues of many other university libraries. Some of these have reciprocal arrangements allowing you to work in their libraries and sometimes also to borrow material; this is very useful if you live nearer to one of them than

to Leeds Met. Hard-to-get sources can normally be ordered from the British Library in Boston Spa, or to speed things up you can go to Boston Spa,

having booked ahead the journals you would like to be made available. All this information is available on the Library website or the on-line catalogue. If it is still not clear what is available, ask at the enquiry desk or make an

appointment there with our Faculty’s Academic Librarian to find out more.

The Skills for Learning pages of the Library website contain a great deal of useful information about data collection and analysis, academic writing, the Harvard referencing system etc. Check regularly to see if there is any

content relevant to the stage you are at. In particular, you would be well advised to download the guide to the Harvard referencing

system “Quote unquote” if you still have any doubts about how this should be done.

If your project involves the use of the University’s laboratory facilities, then discuss with the Laboratory Manager at an early stage what you need to do.

You will be able to agree when you can work in the laboratory, and what equipment and materials are available.

If you are using facilities provided by an outside body – an employer, for example, or a company you agreed to share your findings with, then make

sure that you have arrangements for the secure storage of data which you agreed to keep confidential. Check that any sections of your final report dealing with this data have been reliably anonymised. Make sure that you

destroy the confidential data at the end of the process. If you agreed to provide useful information in return for their co-operation – some kind of

risk assessment for example – it would be wise to get your supervisor to check it is correct before you send it to them.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

21

7. The final report

7.1. Writing the report

You are expected to hand in two printed copies of your report, plus a CD containing all the files it consists of, by the submission date given. They should be handed in with an assignment form using the normal assignment

submission system. If for any reason you cannot meet the submission deadline, you should see the course leader and fill in a mitigation form which

will be considered by a mitigation panel. Your reports should be word processed on standard office paper using a

simple font such as Arial. Where necessary, appendix material which is not computer generated can be bound in.

You can download a suitable cover from the virtual learning environment. Although a number of bindings are acceptable we recommend a plastic

comb binding since these open flat, which makes them easy to handle. You may want to have a cloth bound copy to produce at interviews etc; if so this

should be an additional copy which you do not hand in.

Style guidance

 Length; 6-8,000 words  The word limit does not include the Abstract, References or

Appendices  Use Calibri, Arial, or a similar simple font  11-12 point size

 1.5× line spacing is best  Justified on both sides

 Leave a line between paragraphs  Number the chapters; start each chapter on new page  You can also number the 2nd-level headings but do not use a

very complicated system of numbered headings  Number the pages and include a table of contents

 Do not number the paragraphs  Print on one side of the paper  Include a copy of your protocol as an appendix

 Include other appendices if they help to inform the reader, but do not include irrelevant appendices to pad it out, or to get

round the word limit  Although other assignments are marked anonymously, on this

occasion we know who you are, so you should put your name on

the cover below the title

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

22

There is a great deal of advice available on how to write good, clear English

for academic and other purposes, and your supervisor will if necessary suggest some sources and comment on your drafts.

The long standing convention is that academic reports are written in impersonal language. This means that you do not refer directly to yourself

or any collaborators, either in the first person (I, we) or third person (the researcher, the author etc). It can be difficult to observe this convention at

the same time as writing clearly and simply. For example most of the verbs used will turn out to be passive ones and this makes the sentences more complicated. For this reason some organisations are now abandoning this

convention. Until this becomes general practice we will continue to expect impersonal forms of language.

Subject to the above, you should try to make your language as clear and

simple as possible. It is normally easier to write more complicated sentences than simple ones, so it is good practice to read through your drafts at least once looking for simpler ways of expressing the same ideas.

If you are using abbreviations, no matter how familiar they are to you, you

must explain what they mean. Normally the first time they arise the term is spelt out in full followed by the abbreviation to be used in brackets, eg

Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)…

If you use a lot of abbreviations, or if they are likely to be confusing (for example if you use similar abbreviations with different meanings) then it may be helpful to list them all in a glossary. If they only appear a few times

it may be better to spell them out in full each time; to save time they can be added to the autocorrect list of your word processor.

Use graphs, maps, diagrams and photographs as necessary to clarify and illustrate the text. A picture can indeed be worth a thousand words. But

dissertations can also be padded out by repetitive and uninformative graphics which make you feel good about your IT skills but do not add to

the reader’s understanding. Check that each such item really does improve the impact of your report. Graphics should be numbered and have a caption. Each such illustration should then be referred to in the text so the reader

knows when to look at it. Small illustrations can be inserted at the point where they are relevant, but if they occupy a full page they may be better

in an appendix It is important that your referencing is done correctly; we recommend the

Harvard system and further advice on this is available from the Leeds Beckett library. If you use a different system you must know how to do so

correctly.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

23

One reason for getting the referencing right is to avoid not just

plagiarism but also the suspicion of plagiarism. Once again, further advice is available on this. A sample of the CD versions submitted

will be checked for originality using anti-plagiarism software. We reserve the right in addition to ask you to submit, with your dissertation, a plagiarism report from the Leeds Met approved

plagiarism checking software.

7.2. How your Honours Project is marked Your supervisor and a second marker will independently read the two copies

you hand in and award an initial mark. If they have awarded similar marks, the average will become your mark for the Project. If they disagree, a third

opinion may be required. This mark is reported for confirmation to the Board of Examiners which has the power to decide on module results.

The courses’ external examiners may well read your report too, but this is part of a process to ensure that the course team is applying an appropriate

standard overall rather than being yet another person you have to satisfy. Normally agreement is reached very quickly. If your dissertation goes to a

third marker this is probably not a reflection on its quality; more often it just means that the two markers have different perspectives and different

expectations. In the unlikely event that a pass mark cannot be awarded your supervisor will be able to explain what the problems were and, in most cases, suggest some improvements that will result in the probability that it

can be resubmitted with more success.

Failures are much more common among students who have not maintained regular contact with their supervisors and have never shown him/her drafts of key sections for comment. Even if this has been done, and however much

guidance and advice has been given, your supervisor will have stopped short of telling you what data to collect or what to write in your report. The

final version really is your responsibility. In the very rare event that your report fails because of an issue such as

plagiarism or because of major flaws in what you have done, you may need to start again from scratch or accept the award of a non-honours degree.

You should ask your course leader for advice in this case.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

24

7.3. Taking it further

Many final year students do excellent work for their Honours Project. Although mainly focused on gaining the qualification, it deserves to be more widely known and to influence professional practice outside the small circle

of your friends and colleagues.

There are various reasons why this often doesn’t happen. With a freshly acquired degree you may be starting work with a new employer or moving into a more responsible role in your existing employer. You may have

neglected your family and friends shamelessly while you worked on the course and feel you owe them some catch-up time. There is no particular

hurry, but if your Project was a good one it will help your career as well as the profession to make sure everyone knows about it.

If your Project is of the standard referred to, your supervisor will probably suggest taking it further and will be able to offer advice and help.

Unfortunately he or she will also be busy and may not follow this up. If you think your Project is good, or if your colleagues have read it and thought

so, then you should ask for guidance from your supervisor or another academic who seems to be interested. The main possibilities are to;

 Present your findings at a professional or academic conference

 Write a paper for an refereed academic journal  Write a contribution for a professional or trade publication

 Register for a Masters degree or even a PhD so you can take the work, or a related topic, further either full- or part-time.

Please bear in mind that the copyright of all work submitted for assessment as part of Leeds Beckett qualification belongs to the University, so do not

publish it elsewhere without getting permission.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

25

8. Further advice This booklet is intended as a guide to successfully completing a dissertation,

rather than as a set of detailed instructions. We have assumed that your Level 2 research methods module will have equipped you with an

understanding of the basic methods and approaches used in research. You may of course need to consult your notes from that module and you will undoubtedly want to look in detail into how these issues are normally dealt

with in your topic area. Some relevant advice will come from your supervisor and other tutors, but the Leeds Met library is the first port of call

when designing a research project. Here are a few suggestions for using the library effectively;

1. Study research journals in your broad area of interest (“Environmental Protection”, “Health and Safety”) rather than just

looking for papers about your specific topic. This will help you to see the range of research approaches and styles available before it is too late to incorporate good ideas into your work.

2. There is a good collection of

books about research methods. They are pitched at

different levels, written in different styles and biased towards a variety of different

subject areas; even books claiming to cover all types of

research are often biased towards a particular set of subjects. The box gives further

details on some of the course team’s favourite research

guides.

3. http://skillsforlearning.leedsmet.ac.uk/ is the URL for the Skills for

Learning website. It contains a mass of useful material including a whole section on research skills. Other particularly relevant sections

are those on writing “Academic Communication” and – depending on your topic – maths. You should make a point of browsing the site to identify which sections will be useful for you.

4. A wide range of research publications are freely available on-line via

various licensing arrangement. Ask at the enquiry desk if you have difficulty finding out from the website exactly what is available. Many of the services will require you to log on via Athens, so make sure

you know how to do this. It would be well to ensure early on that in your chosen topic area the relevant publications are easy to obtain,

either in the library, on-line, or somewhere else that you can access without too much difficulty.

Denscombe M (2007) The Good

Research Guide, third edition. Open

University Press

Bell, J. (2005). Doing Your Research

Project: A Guide for First-Time

Researchers in Education, Health

and Social Science (4th Edition).

Open University Press. Buckingham.

Peat, Jennifer (2001) Health Science

Research. A Handbook of

Quantitative Methods. Allen & Unwin.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

26

9. References

Quality Assurance Agency (2008). The framework for higher education qualifications in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. QAA 264 08/08

Denscombe, M (2007) The Good Research Guide, third edition. Open University Press

Bell, J. (2005). Doing Your Research Project: A Guide for First-Time

Researchers in Education, Health and Social Science (4th Edition). Open University Press

Peat, Jennifer (2001) Health Science Research. A Handbook of Quantitative Methods. Allen & Unwin.

BSc Environmental Health

BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management Honours Project Guide

27

Appendices

Key dates for 2017-2018

Date: Activity Submit to:

October 2017 If your protocol has not already

been approved as part of the Level 5 UTRP module, this is the last date to submit it along with

the ethics and risk assessment forms.

If you are carrying out a protocol

which has already been approved you will need to clear with your supervisor any changes to your plans.

Turnitin

Mid-February 2018 By now you should have shown

your results and findings to your supervisor

Project Supervisor

Mid-March 2018 By now you should have

discussed your Conclusions and

Recommendations with your supervisor

Project Supervisor

April 2018 HAND IN FINAL VERSION Faculty reception

Course team contact details Jane Arnaud [email protected] 0113 81 25450

Tim Briggs [email protected] 0113 81 23333

Mark Hodgson [email protected] 0113 81 23851

Stephen Mole [email protected] 0113 81 23072

Hayley Robinson-Mitchell [email protected] 0113 81 23847

Tim South (Module co-ordinator) [email protected] 0113 81 23125

Duncan Webb [email protected] 0113 81 25584

BSc Environmental Health BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management

Honours Project Guide

28

Protocol Marking Scheme First Marker  Second Marker  Student……………………….. Category Mark

Awarded

Comment

Aims, objectives and rationale

Identification of the reasons for carrying out this

research

/20

Initial literature review

Awareness of recent relevant research. Location of

proposal in the context of current knowledge

/20

Research question and research design

Clear articulation of the research question

Justification of appropriate research approach

/20

Data collection strategy and programme

Critical discussion of alternative strategies. Realistic

assessment of time and resources required.

/20

Ethics and health and safety

Clear and appropriate strategies for the management

of these risks. Correctly completed ethics and risk

assessment forms.

/20

/100 = /10

Additional comments;

BSc Environmental Health BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management

Honours Project Guide

29

Honours Project Marking Scheme Marker………………………………… (Supervisor/2nd marker) Student………………………………………………

Category Mark Awarded Comment

The research question and research design Clear aims and objectives An appropriate research strategy to address them Pitched at a sufficient academic level

/20

Literature review Identifying and describing key documents, including some recent research Evaluation of the quality of sources Show their relevance to the research

/20

Data collection Data collection procedures discussed and justified Detailed description of the procedures used Clearly presented results

/20

Analysing and drawing conclusions Data analysis to be justified and explained A good flow of argument Conclusions which follow from the data presented Evaluation of limitations and uncertainties

/20

Following the conventions for academic writing A well-structured report Accurate referencing Use of graphics where they are helpful Clear, correct and appropriate use of language

/20

Overall

/100 = % Additional comments;

BSc Public Health-Environmental Health BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management

Honours Project Guide 2017

30

Tutorial Log

Use the log on the following pages to record your meetings with your supervisor. Not all the meetings need to be face to face; it may be that guidance at a critical

point can be given via a telephone conversation or an exchange of emails. You may consult someone other than your supervisor if a technical issue arises which

someone else is better at; include these meetings too. The log should show that you have completed the key stages in your dissertation

at the appropriate times.

BSc Public Health-Environmental Health BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management

Honours Project Guide 2017

31

Project Contact Log

STUDENT.................................................. TUTOR......................................

DATE PROGRESS QUESTION & ISSUES ACTION & COMMENTS TUTOR ’S

SIGNA TURE

BSc Public Health-Environmental Health BSc Safety Health and Environmental Management

Honours Project Guide 2017

32

Project Contact Log

DATE PROGRESS QUESTION & ISSUES ACTION & COMMENTS TUTOR’S SIGNATU

RE

33

Leeds Beckett University - School of Health and Well-being

Risk Assessment Form

Student’s name Project supervisor

1. In the table below, list all the tasks which may involve risks to you or others; expand the table as necessary 2. In each case, describe the risks eg personal safety, trip hazards, RSI 3. Say how that risk will be controlled eg arrange to be accompanied, wear protective equipment, adjust workstation correctly 4. Put the risk into one of the four categories A-D. In most cases it will fall into category C.

Category Description

A Direct supervision required (name the person supervising)

B Work may not be started without Supervisor's advice and approval

C Extra care must be observed, but it is considered that you are adequately trained and competent in the procedures involved

D The risks are insignificant and carry no special supervision considerations

1. Nature and Method of Work 2. What are the hazards and risks? 3. How will they be controlled? 4. Category

A, B, C or D

Student’s signature Supervisor’s signature

* Indicates delete as necessary XXX means put relevant information in

34

Leeds Beckett University

Information for participants My name is XXX and I am a student on the *BSc Environmental Health /Safety Health and

Environmental Management Course at Leeds Beckett University. My email address is XXX This

should be your Leeds Met email address.

*I can also be contacted on the following telephone number; XXX

*My postal address is: XXX

Do not include your home address or personal phone number. If you are being supported by an

employer or other organisation, you can use work contact details. Otherwise, if phone contact is

essential, you may need to get a phone or SIM card specifically for use on the project.

*As part of my course I am studying XXX and it would be helpful if you would agree to take part

by filling in a short questionnaire.

*As part of my course I am studying XXX and it would be helpful if you would agree to take part

by answering a few questions.

Delete one of the above, and amend as necessary

*I will be recording our discussion to ensure I have an accurate record of your replies, after which

the recording will be deleted.

Delete if not relevant

If you agree to take part, your answers will be kept confidential;

 I will store them in a secure place

 I will destroy them once my study is complete

 I will not pass the information on to any third party

 You will not be identified in my report, and no answers will be used in a way that would enable anyone to identify

you

Always include this section, amending if necessary

Participation is entirely voluntary. If you change your mind after answering the questions, you

can email me at the address above within XXX days, in which case I will remove your replies and

destroy them.

You may need to amend slightly the procedure for withdrawing from the study

If you have any concerns about this research please raise them with me. You can also discuss any

issues with the following person; XXX

This could be a manager at work, but normally it is your project supervisor or another course

team member. A name and either email address or phone number is sufficient.

If you agree to take part, please sign and return one copy of this form. Keep the other copy for

your records.

The purpose of this student project has been explained to me and I agree to take part.

Name………………………………………………………………………………

Signature…………………………………………………………………………

Date………………………………………………….