The Teaching and Learning Development Unit at Sussex has 7 staff members who accomplish amazing things for the University. They offer a Post Graduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education which is compulsory for new faculty who have less than 3 years of teaching experience. The second year of the program is a research project that is relevant to the participants’ teaching endeavors. TLDU also offers a series of workshops for Associate Tutors (these are like our Teaching Assistants), and when the whole series is taken, students gain accreditation from the both the Higher Education Academy (HEA) and the Staff and Educational Development Association (SEDA). The Centre also offers a selection of workshops as need arises on such topics as finding pedagogic resources, and plagiarism.
Sussex uses a Moodle based VLE, called StudyDirect, and interestingly it is the Information Technology Services department who delivers the workshops on how to use the system. Sussex used WebCT in a limited way until last year, but when they wanted to expand its use campus-wide, they found that the price was too great. They started to use the Moodle-based system last September, and now about 20% of courses use it. The feedback about Moodle has been positive, and the students have asked that more courses use the system.
Like many universities, Sussex has a Teaching and Learning Development Fund to support instructors and departments to innovate in a wide variety of teaching and learning contexts. An example of a funded project is the development of online labs for a neuroscience course with the aim of reducing the demand on tutors and allowing students to spend more time with the learning materials. The fund also supported a project to run student focus groups to gather course evaluation data – this method of data collection was seen as more accurate than using student surveys.
Finally, today I met with Pro-Vice-Chancellor Joanne Wright and we discussed how a research-intensive university can leverage its strength in research to improve the quality of the student learning experience. Any thoughts about that?
Leveraging? Hmm.
Provide some funding for educational research in discipline areas? Then value this as much as pure research??
Needs to help lecturers save time (so they have more time for their research) and do a better job (attract more fnding to pay for research).
“They offer a Post Graduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education which is compulsory for new faculty who have less than 3 years of teaching experience”
This is great – I think. Do they behave like conscripts: or do the participants enter in wholeheartedly?
I have to say that I love the idea of the Post Graduate Certificate. At first I thought that all new teachers in any university have to take it, but I think that individual universities can decide if it’s compulsory or not. I wonder how people go in as conscripts and come out with a new view on teaching?
HI Vivian, Stephen here (the e-learning developer at Sussex University). This is an interesting discussion you have going here, including your description of the process at Sussex. Programs such of these are not new, although Sussex University does a very good job.
As you know, I started out the same way at the University of New Brunswick 9 years ago, where the Province actively encourages teacher development at the College level(through UNB) as well as offering a similar program to the university faculty.
The big difference I have found at Sussex is that in the UK system there is no requirement to complete the program but it is strongly encouraged, and if the recipient completes the second year they are awarded a certificate in teaching. Sometimes these incentives encourage a genuine interest in the learner to go forward. While employed in the NB college system, I completed my required Instructor development program, then went on to a teaching certificate, a BEd and my masters in Education (if this is any indication to go by Amy).