Dr Katharine Welsh | University of Chester

Senior Lecturer in Physical Geography and University Innovation Fellow

Katharine Welsh is a Senior Lecturer in Physical Geography and University Innovation Fellow. Katharine teaches on the BSc Geography and Natural Hazard Management programme and is the Programme Leader for MSc/PgDip/PgCert Flood Risk Assessment, Modelling and Engineering and PgCert Flood Risk Management. As a University Innovation Fellow, she leads strategic educational change projects and supports the enhancement of academic practice across the University. Her research interests include technology enhanced learning, particularly in fieldwork environments. She is also interested in catchment scale flood modelling and community flood resilience. Since the COVID-19 pandemic she has had an interest in how households and individuals can ‘learn from’ their experiences to build resilience for future socio-economic crises and this has led to exploration of the potential of gamification to support more sustainable lifestyles.

GE5001 Hazard Processes and Human Vulnerability (Module Leader)

GE6003 Natural Hazard Assessment and Mitigation

GE7010 Engineering, Hydrology and Hydraulic Principles in Flood Risk (Module Leader)

GE7011 Flood Risk Modelling (Module Leader)

GE7017 Independent Dissertation

GE7018 Natural Flood Management and the Catchment Context

Katharine is particularly interested in the role of technology across her three areas of research: learning and teaching, flood risk, and sustainability.

Current research interests include (i) Enhancing Fieldwork Learning: focusing on a range of fieldwork related pedagogies. The team run an annual showcase event to support staff development around a whole range of fieldwork-related themes from employability to inclusivity to technology enhanced learning (ii) Flooding: originally engaged with the hydro-geomorphic model CAESAR-Lisflood, Katharine's research has involved using palaerecords to validate the model over long timescales, supporting MSc students to apply a range of approaches to modelling Natural Flood Management and more recently, I have moved into the field of contemporary flood risk management (ii) Sustainability: exploring how household behavioural changes during COVID-19 can be used to inform other socio-environmental crises and developing a smartphone app with gamified elements to explore the extent to which it maintain or reinvigorate some of these pro-environmental habits developed through the pandemic.

Collins, R., Welsh, K.E., Rushton, M., Cliffe, A.D., Bull, E. (2022) Nature, Nurture, (Neo-)Nostalgia? Back-casting for a more socially and environmentally sustainable post-COVID future. Social and Cultural Geography, 1-20.

Collins, R., & Welsh, K. (2022). The road to “local green recovery”: Signposts from COVID‐19 lockdown life in the UK. Area.

Hillier, J. K., Welsh, K.E., Stiller-Reeve, M., Priestley, R. K., Roop, H. A., Lanza, T., & Illingworth, S. (2021). Geoscience communication–Planning to make it publishable. Geoscience Communication Discussions, 1-25.

Whalley, B., France, D., Park, J., Mauchline, A., & Welsh, K. (2021). Towards flexible personalized learning and the future educational system in the fourth industrial revolution in the wake of Covid-19. Higher Education Pedagogies, 6(1), 79-99.

Clark, K. A., Welsh, K. E., Mauchline, A. L., France, D., Whalley, W. B., & Park, J. (2020). Do educators realise the value of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) in fieldwork learning? Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 1-24.

Schillereff, D. N., Chiverrell, R. C., Macdonald, N., Hooke, J. M., Welsh, K. E., Piliposian, G., & Croudace, I. W. (2019). Convergent human and climate forcing of late-Holocene flooding in Northwest England. Global and Planetary Change, 182, 102998.

Healey, R. L., Lerczak, A., Welsh, K., & France, D. (2019). By any other name? The impacts of differing assumptions, expectations, and misconceptions in bringing about resistance to student-staff partnership. International Journal for Students as Partners, 3(1), 106-122.

Welsh, K. E., Mauchline, A. L., France, D., Powell, V., Whalley, W. B., & Park, J. (2018). Would Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) be welcomed by undergraduate students to support their learning during fieldwork?. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 1-16.

Schillereff, D. N., Chiverrell, R. C., Macdonald, N., Hooke, J. M., & Welsh, K. E. (2016). Quantifying system disturbance and recovery from historical mining-derived metal contamination at Brotherswater, northwest England. Journal of Paleolimnology, 56(2-3), 205-221.

Welsh, K.E., Mauchline, A., Powell, V., France, D., Park, J.R., Whalley, W.B. (2015) Student perceptions of iPads as mobile learning devices for fieldwork. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 39(3), p.450-469.

France, D., Whalley, W.B., Welsh, K.E., Powell, V., Lerczak, A., Mauchline, A., Park, J.R. (2015) Enhancing Fieldwork Learning using Mobile Technologies. Springer Brief Series.

Welsh, K.E, Mauchline, A.L., France, D., Park, J., and Whalley B. (2013) Enhancing Fieldwork Learning with technology: practitioner’s perspectives, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 37 (3), 399-415.

Welsh, K., France, D., Park, J., and Whalley B. (2012) Geotagging Photographs in Student Fieldwork, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 36(3).

BSc (Liverpool), PhD (Liverpool)
Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (2016)
Senior Fellow of Advance HE (2022)

Awards

Advance HR Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence (2018)

Professional Affiliations

European Geoscience Union
Associate Editor Geoscience Communication