A Multidisciplinary Approach to Promoting Scholarship of Teaching

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A Multidisciplinary Approach to Promoting
Scholarship of Teaching Learning Professor
Vaneeta DAndrea City University/Open
University Dr David Gosling Open
University HEFCE TQEF National Coordination Team
ICED Conference Perth, Australia2002
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Boyer Categories

• the scholarship of discovery
• the scholarship of integration
• the scholarship of service
• the scholarship of teaching

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What is scholarship?

• Communities of engagement
• Artefacts or products
• Evaluation of ideas
• Scholarly attributes
• Scholarly teaching or scholarship of teaching?
  (Richlin)

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Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)

• Multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary field of
  enquiry
• Multiple forms of enquiry- methodological
  pluralism
• Cumulative Literature and theory base
• Applied field influence on practice
• Inclusive, collaborative, contestable,
  conversational

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Group activity

• What is the value of SoTL - to staff? - to
  students? - to the subject?

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Capacity Building

• Ways of developing SoTL in higher education.
• Three levels
• individual
• subject
• institutional

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Individual Level

• isolation of staff undertaking pedagogic research
• subject specialists inexperience in educational
  methodologies

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Individual Level- strategies

• support networks
• pump priming funding for projects
• certificated awards in teaching and learning
• rewards and recognition

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Subject Level

• staff identify and teach within a
  subject/discipline
• disciplines have distinctive concepts,
  methodologies and concerns
• staff more motivated to research their subject
• separate bodies of literature
• interplay between discipline, research and
  teaching.

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Subject Level-strategies

• funding initiatives FDTL(UK)
• LTSN subject centres (UK)
• disciplinary associations (US)
• departmental learning and teaching groups

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Institutional Level

• importance of institutional ethos
• institutional commitment to teaching quality
• building an institutional mission and concerns

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Institutional Level- strategies

• Centre with cross institutional responsibility
• internal peer-reviewed publication
• SoTL conference
• recognition and reward - e.g. promotion criteria
• external support - visiting professorships

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Conclusions

• Valuing SoTL is important, but not easy
• requires institutional commitment to
• support pedagogic culture
• rewards for staff engaged in pedagogic research
• strategies at each level

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SoTL Conference

• 3nd Annual International Conference on
• Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
• June 19 20, 2003
• TUC Conference Centre, London

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Contact Details

• Copies of Papers related to this topic and the
  SoTL Conference are available from
• The Educational Development Centre
• City University, Northampton Square
• London EC1V 0HB
• 44 (0) 20 7040 0177
• edc_at_city.ac.uk