Navigating the Complexities of Sandbox Courses: Insights and Strategies for Success

As an academic specialising in Data, and AI Tech in Insurance, I deliver courses in Risk and Actuarial studies at The University of NSW (UNSW) Business School. This includes ACTL4305: Accurate Data Science Application and its prerequisite, ACTL3142: Statistical Machine Learning for Risk and After Applications.

My aim in these courses is to accredit my students for their future actuarial careers. To reach this objective, I must teach them the actuarial methods that they will need, with a syllabus that is created in collaboration with the relevant industry professional body.

There are always certain obstacles in teaching these advanced data science courses. For example, there is a limited bandwidth for students to learn complex and highly technical concepts. This means students can struggle with learning the material and need a lot of guidance to be accredited.

I wanted to teach something that would be useful to the students in terms of further industry engagement, as well as this accreditation aspect.

I believe the UNSW Sandbox Program, an initiative of the UNSW Business School, can benefit both industry and my students in this way. My students and I would solve a Sandbox challenge provided by the industry, and the industry would give us feedback while gaining the opportunity to connect with our talent.

As a researcher, access to real data sets from industry also helps my empirical work. I wished to engage more meaningfully with industry partners and get a better understanding of what they are doing.  

With the UNSW Sandbox Program, there is more engagement with the industry partner – where I could demonstrate my expertise and they could observe my work ethic – meaning I could achieve these goals. 

For these reasons, I transformed ACTL4305/5305: Accurate Data Science Application three times (2021-2023) and ACTL3142/5110: Statistical Machine Learning for Risk and After Applications once (Term 2, 2022) into Sandbox Courses. These are both accredited courses.

While there were wins in running a Sandbox Course for myself and my students, I did face several blockers. Through various trials, I have developed some interventions to navigate these challenges.

Firstly, gaining access to real data from industry partners is a process that is always challenging for an academic. From a legal perspective, academics are often not familiar with the process of getting the data sets, and it can take a lot of time to do so.

The UNSW Sandbox Program currently provides helpful processes and documents to manage industry partnerships. I see opportunities for this support to be extended to managing data access for research use. This would be extremely helpful for combined track academics to develop their empirical work, while supporting students in their learning.

Secondly, managing industry engagement within UNSW Sandbox Courses can sometimes be a challenge, particularly due to the context-specific nature of the Sandbox projects. Each industry partner brings a unique set of expectations and operates within a specific organisational context, which often generates questions and issues that are deeply rooted in that specific environment.

This can make it difficult for an academic like myself, whose expertise might not align closely with the nuances of each partner's specific context. When industry partners were unavailable during crucial periods of the Sandbox challenge, at times I found myself unable to provide meaningful responses to student inquiries that delved into these organisation-specific details.

While the increased industry involvement offered by the UNSW Sandbox Program undeniably enriches the student experience, it also presents challenges in balancing the curriculum within my course. 

The structure of my course culminates in a heavily weighted final exam that is crucial for actuarial accreditation, where mastery of specific mathematical concepts is essential for success. 

This rigorous academic requirement means that my students have less time and energy to devote to their Sandbox challenges compared to peers in other courses. This constraint necessitates careful consideration of how to effectively integrate practical industry experience without compromising the essential academic preparation needed for their professional qualifications.

As a result of these two challenges I mentioned, I have implemented several adjustments that have been successful, as well as considering other, future adjustments.

I now integrate the Sandbox challenge into the course comprehensively for a more seamless combination across the term. This design saves students’ time and helps them focus on solving one real-world problem during the term.

For example, some of my in-session discussion questions (which are assessed) are now placed in the context of the Sandbox challenge. Around half of the final exam questions are also written directly based on the Sandbox challenge. This helps “exaggerate” the nominal 30% max of group assignment requirement and allowed for integrating authentic assessment within the two-hour time constraint of final exam. It also reduces the exam preparation pressure and "free ride" motives, resolving the conflicts between working on Sandbox challenge and preparing for final exam. Since I have adopted this outlined method, student satisfaction has been greatly improved.

I also am careful to set the perspective to all parties – myself as the academic, the students and the industry partner – from the very beginning. That the three groups are all in it together to solve the Sandbox challenge. I have found that doing so encourages students to be more open and collaborative, to discuss their problems, stimulates innovative problem-solving, and strengthens their communication skills. This shared buy-in in solving this open-ended problem is increased by my scheduling of ‘trouble shooting’ time for students working on their Sandbox solutions at the end of each workshop throughout the UNSW Sandbox Course.

Inspired by my Sandbox experience, I also now actively negotiate with industry partners to align the Sandbox challenges whose scope aligns both with their needs and my areas of expertise – for example, this year I will propose a research project that I am working on to be the subject of a Sandbox project. When projects I oversee are in my knowledge domain, I can have greater autonomy to guide students consistently. I can provide a learning journey that is continuous and robust, regardless of external availability. This is particularly helpful when industry partners have less time to commit at certain points in the term.

Overall, when evaluating whether a course is suited to be transformed into a UNSW Sandbox Course, there are several critical factors to consider. I recommend that academics reflect on the following points:

Consider how the Sandbox projects align with your core learning outcomes. The UNSW Sandbox Program can significantly enrich courses with strong ties to industry applications.  

Careful planning is needed in courses where accreditation and examinations are predominant to ensure a beneficial balance between practical engagement and theoretical requirements.  

Reflect on your course structure and assess how Sandbox Courses can enhance rather than overshadow the essential academic components. Drawing on the experiences of peers within the Sandbox community who have navigated similar challenges can help you make more informed decisions before committing to transforming a course into a Sandbox Course.

Lastly, I would say to academics considering doing a Sandbox Course: know that no one size fits all for you to get the best result. If the existing design does not quite fit the learning objectives of your course, innovative adjustments can always be made to help you achieve them - and more.