Dr Chrisina Jayne

National Teaching Fellow 2009 Institute at the time of award: University of East London Dr Chrisina Draganova is Head of Computing and Reader in Applied Computing at Coventry University. At the time of her award, she was  a Senior Lecturer in the School of Computing, Information Technology and Engineering at the University of East London. Her professional practice is recognised at many different levels: by her students, by her academic colleagues and her colleagues in industry. Chrisina is passionate about learning and teaching in general, and computing in particular.  She draws on wide experience from her teaching career and her practical expertise within the computing industry. Her innovation and creativity in leading the design and development of computing programmes has been commended for its integration of academic study with the latest technological development, and its high degree of industrial relevance. The application of her consultancy experience within the industry to her case studies ensures a high level of currency and fascination for her learners. She actively seeks to offer her students opportunities to communicate with industry professionals and leads the initiative at UEL for adopting mobile technologies in learning and teaching. Chrisina says: "The primary goal in my teaching is to help all of my students to become independent learners and to take responsibility for their own studies, which is particularly important in the constantly changing area of computing, where students need to be prepared to meet the challenges of future developments." Chrisina supports her academic practice with a range of scholarship and research activities.  Previously, she managed a knowledge transfer partnership project which received funding of over £110,000. For the last twelve years she has coordinated an international mathematics competition, the largest world-wide event of its kind, attracting student applications from over 170 universities in 53 countries. Her research related to Approximation Theory and Neural Networks has resulted in numerous national and international publications and conference presentations.