Academic Mentoring

Anyone at the start of their career needs to be shown the ropes. But why is mentoring so important in HE?

Teaching Exchange

Uclan  PRF and LDU  is hosting a Teaching Exchange, on Wed 13th June 12-3pm
The teaching exchange is open to anyone who teaches at Uclan or partner colleges and who is interested in developing their teaching skills...

Sharing Practice conference 2012

The call is out for posters around sharing practice around teaching and learning.  Deadline for abstracts 20th April 2012

Digital Literacy in Higher Education

What is digital literacy?  Do we need to expand our definitions to include new social media interactions? What are we talking about?.. What does digital literacy mean to you?

Challenges facing Higher Education

The HE Guardian has come up with this great infographic detailing the research they did on the challenges facing HE today. The changes in the sector section indicated that most people think things are getting worse and that the coalition government has no coherent set of policies to see HE through this turbulent time.... but

University funding for 2012-13

Here is the letter  from BIS. There is going to be a cut in teaching funding but research is mostly ok, with Willets saying "Our universities play a vital role building the skills and knowledge Britain needs to grow. That is why we have protected HEFCE funding for research " 
but it looks like he does not think teaching plays a role in the knowledge economy? We knew the teaching cuts were coming but the £830M drop is still staggering!

Figshare, a new tool for sharing data or a revolution in academic publishing?

What is figshare? well it seems to be a faster way of sharing your data, away from the ponderous route of normal journal publishing.

"figshare allows researchers to publish their data in a citable, searchable and sharable manner. The data can come in the form of individual figures, datasets or video files and users are encouraged to share their negative data and unpublished results too. All data is persistently stored online under the most liberal Creative Commons licence, waiving copyright where possible. This allows scientists to access and share the information from anywhere in the world with minimal friction."

It already boasts usage by prestigious universities, and uses the creative commons licence.  Could it be a useful way to share openly data including negative results, as it claims, we shall see, it seems to be mainly science based data at the moment but there are no restrictions on what you can upload so it has the potential to upload qualitative data and for performing arts staff to upload videos as well. So we shall see if it will be the ground breaking invention it claims to be. It could certainly come in useful!

Vice Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching and Learning

Today we held the first Vice Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching and Learning presented by Malcolm (Vice Chancellor) and Rod. (Pro VC)  There were 28  Award winners in a total  5 categories:

Individual Awards
• Excellence in teaching delivery and intellectual stimulation of students
Cliff Olsson, School of Sport Tourism and the Outdoors
Amanda Taylor, School of Social Work

• Innovation in teaching and assessment
Andy Bainbridge, School of Art, Design and Performance
Martin Salisbury, Lancashire Law School

• Best practice to improve the student progression and performance
Matt Horn, School Of Journalism, Media and Communication
Sarla Ghandi, School of Health

• Excellence in research informed learning and teaching
Pam Qualter, School of Psychology
Darren Tunstall, School of Art, Design and Performance

Team Awards

• Creation of a superlative student experience overall

Graduate Diploma in Law team - Lancashire Law School

The Media Technology team -School Of Journalism, Media and Communication

Congratulations all! Its nice to see your hard work being rewarded and valued. Also congrats to the LDU (Learning Development Unit) for all your hard work setting up and organising the event.

Universities UK launches guide to quality and standards

As mentioned in their media release, UUK have launched  a new publication which outlines how quality and standards are assessed and assured within UK universities. The are 6 key features in the UK system for safeguarding standards :

1.       National tools that are used by all universities (the ‘Academic Infrastructure’) including Frameworks for higher education qualifications, Subject Benchmark Statements and a  sector-wide Code of practice for the assurance  of academic quality and standards in higher education;

2.       Universities’ own systems for ensuring their standards are right and quality is maintained, such as procedures for the design and review of courses and the use of external examiners;

3.       Independent external review of each university by the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA), resulting in published reports;

4.       Effective engagement with students and employers, including professional, statutory and regulatory bodies, which helps to shape what universities do;

5.       Mechanisms to support improvements in quality, for example by learning from the experience of others, sharing good practice and ways of supporting professionalism in teaching;

6.       Measures to address complaints.

These features provide the backbone of the quality standards assessment. This document helps clarify the way this system works.  http://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/Publications/Documents/44806UniUK_guide_lores.pdf

or for the summary see: http://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/Publications/Documents/44835UniUK_Summary_lores.pdf

  There is an increasing request for transparency of the HE system and provisions. This seems to be another way of demonstrating the value of UK universities.

And the award for best lecturer goes to....

"Its about time good teaching was recognised in HE as a valuable commodity. there are enough student surveys and websites criticising lecturers, so I'm very glad to see the Student Led Teaching Awards  making the news. 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/oct/17/lecturers-win-student-awards


This idea has been implemented by the Higher Education Academy http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/student-led-awards  and is a very worthwhile activity to help recognise good teaching when and where its happens. we want lecturers to feel recognised for their good work, because its not an easy job that just seems to get harder every year. The criteria mentioned is quite interesting as an example of what good teachers do.


  "the criteria for which an award was made – enthusiasm, feedback and the ability to prompt questions and critical thinking."


not only is the recognition a encouraging boost for the really good lecturers, who can feel disheartened in todays economic climate but it also has;

"unexpected benefits, strengthening a sense of community on campus, empowering students and making them reflect on their learning."


I am now looking forward to this being implemented in my university as we already have a cadre of dedicated teachers who work with the pedagogic research forum to improve their teaching, but don't get enough credit from their colleagues or management.  


See our impact guides for examples of inspirational teaching 
www.uclan.ac.uk/impact 

Putting student engagement at the heart of HE

Student engagement is a popular topic at the moment, especially with the increased fees. but what is it and how do you know you are doing it right?  What with the HEA and QAA putting their two pennyworth in, at least you have a place to start.
http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/retention-and-success
http://www.qaa.ac.uk/Partners/students/Pages/Our-student-engagement-work.aspx

The guardian has a live chat scheduled for  Friday October 14 "we will bring together a panel composed of some of the people trying to answer these questions and others. Join us from 12pm to 2pm to identify the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead as well as to share what student engagement looks like at your own institution."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/2011/oct/11/student-engagement-live-chat

Join the debate and voice your views!

New learners of the 21st century!

A good blog and short video on new learners of the 21st century.
Key points are embracing change, learning to join (there is usually already a community of practice to join.) and the power of play. 


http://learnstreaming.com/tinkering-with-john-seely-brown/
http://video.pbs.org/video/1767466213

The current impact agenda could consider the impact of inspirational teaching, not just research

"Some academics are unhappy with the focus of the research impact agenda and have questioned the new framework and criteria. John Parkinson writes that it could benefit from looking also at the potential of teaching to connect with and inspire students, rather than focusing solely on the impact of research."
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2011/07/27/the-current-impact-agenda-should-consider-the-impact-of-inspirational-teaching-not-just-research/


It is strange that in measuring the impact of universities, that teaching is not considered, since it is our primary activity!

The social value of universities

How do universities contribute to the wider community?  Well Uclan is one of the biggest employers in Preston, as well as being involved in community engagement projects! 
 Interesting article by Faiza Shaheen in the Impact of Social Sciences blog, 
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2011/09/05/billions-of-pounds-in-social-value/

Liverpool's free university

With the fee hike and general anger at the government, Plans are currently in motion for the establishment of a Free University of Liverpool (FUL). "This is explicitly framed as a protest against the government's tuition fees rise, but also evidences a longer-standing dissatisfaction with the current structure of higher education."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/31/liverpool-free-university-angry-government

what do you think? will it work? I am all for free access to education and learning to enrich your life rather than just for work. But you would need to get all sorts of courses running for it to work as a place of learning. If they offer courses part time so you can go around your job then it could work for people who are just interested in learning without the need for formalised qualifications, and I for one would welcome the opportunity. Education should not be for profit, it should be for the betterment of mankind. But with qualifications and training courses which need accreditation it is more understandable to charge for or subsidise these. I would rather my taxes were spent on education and training than war and obscene salaries/perks for government ministers and managers.

national curriculum for universities

A report by the 'liberal' think tank CentreForum, claims that Russell Group universities should focus on research whilst the ‘regular’ universities should focus on teaching at an affordable price. The report, Degrees of quality: how to deliver the courses we need at prices we can afford, argues that to maintain quality ‘a set of standardised courses and exams would be designed by ‘research’ institutions and other expert bodies – to be delivered through a ‘collegiate’ type arrangement in teaching based institutions’

'It warns that government plans to introduce a market in higher education may have undesirable consequences, with more providers making quality and value less easy to determine. It is suggested that moving to common standards and independent marking will be an effective quality control measure, similar to A-levels.'

http://www.centreforum.org/index.php/mainpublications/232-degrees-of-quality

What do you think about an national curriculum for universities?Are the Russell group the best people to design this or should teaching universities have a say also? What makes a research intensive group qualified to design a teaching curriculum? I think it would be more fair to have representatives from all the university groups in a common steering group that led change in this area. As is frequently pointed out the non research intensive universities may not be top in research but are very good at teaching so they should have input into a university curriculum.

Do we even need a national curriculum for universities? How does this help ensure quality? and would this mean that it doesn't matter which university you go to as they will all be exactly the same or will there still be a prevalent elitist attitude? The current national curriculum for schools is under review as has been called 'substandard' by the current government and has created increasing amounts of paperwork for teachers who can spare little time to really enable students to learn. Do we want such a broken system in our universities or will we be able to come up with something better?

the pressures of student satisfaction

The guardian has posed the question below, with a survey yes or no?

"Are pressures on HE professionals to deliver student satisfaction too high?"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/poll/2011/aug/17/national-student-survey-pressures

With the new fees regime and NSS results just out (student satifaction up overall to 83%) is student satisfaction putting too much pressure on academics to conform or perform to what the students feel is a good experience?
Do students know what to expect when they come to univesity or will they be expecting too much with the massive hike in fees?
Is Student satisfaction a fair assessment of the quality of a university experience? or should we find a different way that takes onboard the quality not quantity of contact hours and support? Are students the right people to be measuring the quality of an educational establishment or are they just part of the overall picture? Do the staff views of the quality of provison count? or should there be a 'mystery shopper' who looks at many different establishments who provide the same course?
Student and staff expectations can be very different and there is no easy way to measure the overall student satisfaction as students are individuals and will expect and need different things from their university education, and some subjects will outperform others and some courses will have more dedicated staff. If the lecturing staff care about their subject and about their teaching it shows. We have produced short books in a series called Impact which details how much the staff care about their work and the innovations in their teaching. Hopefully this will help students make an infomed decison and show who in their subject is dedicated enough to make a real difference to the student experience.
http://www.uclan.ac.uk/information/services/ldu/research/impact.php

Plagiarism, what can we do about it?

Top tips to tackle plagiarism from Prof Rob Jenkins

http://chronicle.com/article/Toward-a-Rational-Response-to/128611/