How should we recognise and How should we recognise and reward teaching in higher reward teaching in higher

education?education?

Paul Ramsden

“If the modern economy is built on specialisms, it is also built on a raft of soft skills such as intellectual confidence, logical thinking, communication and working and collaborating in teams.

“I believe that these things come above all not from particular disciplines, but from the discipline of good teaching. And for me, that raises an important challenge for universities. We have become very good at developing criteria for assessing research excellence in universities, and for incentivising research excellence. We also need to look in my view for ways of incentivising excellence in academic teaching – which which is not quite the same thing”

Peter Mandelson, July 2009

Overview

• What’s the evidence base?

• An important distinction

• 1995 - an Australian investigation

• 2008 - a UK study

• Standards and criteria

• An uncertain conclusion

What is the evidence base?

How to improve teaching and the student How to improve teaching and the student experience?experience?

• Name and shame poor departments?

• Provide more ‘informed choice’?

• Design of learning environments?

• Students’ experiences of the designs?

Perception of context:

teaching & assessment inappropriate

Perception of context:

teaching & assessment

enabling

Surfaceapproach

Deepapproach

Outcome–

Outcome+

Students’ approaches to learning

“nothing”

“imaginative acquisition of knowledge”

40200-20-40-10

0

10

20

30

40

Good Teaching

De

ep

Ap

pro

ach

y = 18.960 + 0.35307x R^2 = 0.401

806040200-20-40-40

-30

-20

-10

0

10

20

30

Appropriate Assessment

Su

rface

Ap

pro

ach y = 12.819 - 0.38979x R^2 = 0.472

THEORY 1THEORY 1TEACHING ASTEACHING AS

TELLINGTELLING

THEORY 2THEORY 2TEACHING ASTEACHING ASORGANISINGORGANISING

THEORY 3THEORY 3TEACHING ASTEACHING AS

MAKING LEARNING MAKING LEARNING POSSIBLEPOSSIBLE

FOCUSFOCUS Teacher and contentTeacher and content Teaching techniques Teaching techniques that will result inthat will result inlearninglearning

Relation betweenRelation betweenstudents and students and subject mattersubject matter

STRATEGYSTRATEGY TransmitTransmitinformationinformation

Manage teachingManage teachingProcess; transmitProcess; transmitconceptsconcepts

Engage; challenge; Engage; challenge; imagine oneself as imagine oneself as the studentthe student

ACTIONSACTIONS Chiefly presentationChiefly presentation ‘‘Active learning’; Active learning’; organising activityorganising activity

Systematically Systematically adapted to suit adapted to suit student student understandingunderstanding

REFLECTIONREFLECTION Unreflective;Unreflective;taken for grantedtaken for granted

Apply skills to Apply skills to improve teachingimprove teaching

Teaching as a Teaching as a scholarly, research-scholarly, research-like activitylike activity

Theory 3relationstudent-content

Theory 1teacher &

content

Perception of context:

teaching & assessment inappropriate

Perception of context:

teaching & assessment

enabling

Surfaceapproach

Deepapproach

Outcome–

Outcome+

Lecturers Students

An important distinction An important distinction

An important, though imperfect, distinction

Raise status & importance of teaching

NTFS, CETLs, LTPF (Australia), performance funding in universties, Sweden Centres of Excellence, Academy Fellowships, accredited programmes … publication of wastage and earnings rates …

Recognise & reward academics

Teaching awards, specific changes in promotions/ appointment criteria

Australia 1995Australia 1995

Committee for the Advancement of University TeachingCommittee for the Advancement of University Teaching

Teaching Research

0

20

40

60

80

100

Is valued

Should be valued

Australia 1995

100 80 60 40 20 0

Quantity of research

Teaching undergraduates

Teaching postgraduates

Quality of students' learning

Quality of research

Is Should be Percentage agreement

The 1995 investigation

The Recognising and Rewarding recommendations

A1 Articulate more explicit criteria and standards of good teaching A2 Establish minimum standards of teaching performanceA4 Broaden the base of evidence used to assess teaching A5 Prepare committee members for their role as assessors of teachingA6 Help candidates learn how to describe teaching achievementsA7 Expect all newly-appointed academic staff to become qualified as teachersA8 Link internal quality assurance processes to progress in changing the reward system

B1 Build an academic environment in which it is pleasant to teach wellB2 Acknowledge the crucial role of leadership in recognising and rewarding good teachingB3 Enhance the effectiveness of academic development units and personnelB4 Think more creatively about ways of recognising and rewarding good teaching

C1 Accelerate progress towards a profession of university teachingC2 Extend research-based approaches to teaching improvementC3 Make senior leadership appointments in teachingC4 Allocate a specific component of operating grant to improving and supporting teachingC5 Form networks of people and resources beyond the university who can help improve teachingC6 Honour teaching and teaching achievements publicly, as part of a coherent systemC7 Monitor the effect of schemes for recognising and rewarding good teaching

Standards and criteria• Articulate more explicit criteria and standards of good teaching • Establish minimum standards of teaching performance• Expect all newly-appointed academic staff to become qualified as teachers• Accelerate progress towards a profession of university teaching

Resources and QA• Link internal QA processes to progress in changing the reward system• Allocate a specific component of funding to improving and supporting teaching

Leadership and environment• Build an academic environment in which it is pleasant to teach well• Acknowledge the crucial role of leadership in recognising and rewarding good teaching

Celebrating achievement• Form networks beyond the university to improve teaching• Honour teaching and teaching achievements publicly, as part of a coherent system

UK 2008

Higher Education AcademyGENIE CETL, University of Leicester

UK 2008UK 2008

• Survey of promotion policies & criteria (data from 104 HEIs)

• Analysis of impact (e.g. numbers promoted)

• Online survey of academics’ perceptions

• Series of interviews

UK 2008 – research and promotion

-9%

-5%

0%

88%

89%

74%

96%

94%

74%

Russell Group

1994 Group

Other

Research is Research should be Difference

In your department or faculty, to what extent are the following regarded as important for promotion? How important do you think they should be? (% somewhat important+important+very important)

UK 2008 – teaching and promotion

57%

51%

46%

89%

90%

90%

32%

39%

44%

Russell Group

1994 Group

Other

Teaching is Teaching should be Difference

In your department or faculty, to what extent are the following regarded as important for promotion? How important do you think they should be? (% somewhat important+important+very important)

UK 2008: Survey of university policies and criteria

Out of 104 institutions –

• 104 had research criteria in their promotion policies

• 73 had teaching criteria in their promotion policies

• Only 46 could provide data about which

promotions had incorporated teaching as a

component

• Very few promotions to senior posts in the more

research-intensive universities included teaching as

a component

In principle you can achieve promotion on the basis of teaching but it rarely happens. So I think that we need to implement the policy [of promoting people for teaching excellence] with an eye on numbers of promotions that are actually made this way.

There are cases where promotional criteria have not been consistently applied or followed through. There are more members of the research community on the promotions panel than lecturers so there is already an imbalance there. It gives the message that research is more important than teaching.

We now have a career structure on our website for “university teachers”, but it is seen as a second-class thing. One of the things that can happen is that if someone is not as research active as a lecturer or senior lecturer, they’ll get moved sideways to university teacher.

I think that management style is the key to recognising good teaching. If you have a manager who is interested in pushing teaching then it will be recognised. If you haven’t then you really are up against it, aren’t you?

The recognition for my teaching activities is due, in no small part, to our PVC who is really outstanding in this area. And to my own head of department who has been very supportive.

The need for change –our recommendations

• Incentivise excellence in academic teaching to the same degree as excellence in research

• Record data on grounds for academic promotion • National effort to develop rigorous criteria for recognising

teaching performance• Apply the criteria and methods to all academic

promotions• Review and monitor progress - QAA, UUK, HEFCE • Review leadership and management for teaching in

higher education

Standards and criteria – an example

Research output assessment (RAE 2008)Research output assessment (RAE 2008)

Criteria

• Originality (engages with new problems or old problems in new ways)

• Significance (provides new knowledge; influential, challenging)

• Rigour (systematic; robust theory and method)

Quality levels (aka standards)

4* World leading ‘At the forefront of research of international quality’

3* International excellence

2* International recognition

1* National recognition

( ) Unclassified

Fundamental things have got to be simple… we must look for simplicity in the system first.

Ernest Rutherford

FundamentalsFundamentals

FundamentalsFundamentals

• Positive attitude towards students?

• Ability to communicate well?

• Lively interest in improving teaching?

And And even more fundamentaleven more fundamental......

The aim of teaching is simple: The aim of teaching is simple: it is to make student learning possible.it is to make student learning possible.

PerformancePerformance

A lecturer should appear easy and collected, undaunted and unconcerned, his thoughts about him and his mind clear for the contemplation and description of his subject.

Michael Faraday

PerformancePerformance

• Planning (e.g. effective subject design, clear objectives)

• Process (e.g. presentation technique, VLE design)

• Assessment (e.g. use of variety of appropriate methods)

• Outcomes (some evidence of link to learning)

• Evaluation (some evidence of use of evaluation to improve)

Research-led teachingResearch-led teaching

This atmosphere of excitement, arising from imaginative consideration of knowledge, transforms knowledge.

A. N. Whitehead

Research-led teachingResearch-led teaching

• Imagination and enthusiasm: a shared journey to understanding rather than delivery of content (top students expect to find themselves in a community of learners)

• Effective design of curricula to engage students in inquiry

• Materials make use of primary sources, recent discoveries, progress in field

• Clarity of communication (‘If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough’ –

Albert Einstein)

Student-focused teachingStudent-focused teaching

The two secrets of lecturing from which everything else follows: first, to believe that you have something worth telling your audience; second, to imagine yourself as one of that audience.

R.V. Jones

Student-focused teachingStudent-focused teaching

• Focus on relation between students and subject matter

• Use of evaluation evidence to redesign curriculum

• Use of assessment data to modify teaching strategies

• Choice of technique reflects level of student knowledge

• From “Did I make the goals clear?” to “Are the goals clear to the students?”

Scholarship in teachingScholarship in teaching

What is needed is for teachers in higher education to bring to their teaching activities the same critical, doubting and creative attitude which they bring habitually to their research activities.

Lewis Elton

Scholarship in teachingScholarship in teaching

• Critical, doubting, creative?

• Systematic use of best available evidence to select and deploy teaching and assessment strategies

• Publication of refereed journal articles on university teaching in field

• Esteem: invitations to address international conferences on university teaching in field

• Esteem: awards, qualifications, recognition as an expert

Leadership in teachingLeadership in teaching

She successfully inspired us to transform the course and to re-focus on our students. She melded a diverse group of academics into a team of great teachers.

A lecturer

Leadership in teachingLeadership in teaching

• Successful re-design and coordination of courses; team leadership in teaching; inspiration to change

• Policy development and implementation

• Mentoring of junior academics as teachers

• External recognition (e.g. application of teaching strategies, QA processes and curriculum design in other institutions)

• Coordination of benchmarking activities with other universities

In this example, the criteria are hierarchically ordered, implying the standards (c.f. RAE)

Non-negotiable basis: PerformanceSecond level: Research-ledThird level: Student focusFourth level: ScholarshipFifth level: Leadership

… leading to a structure that can be mapped on to promotion at different levels.

And the evidence?And the evidence?

• Are the basics in place?

• Use multiple sources and estimate consistency

• ‘Evaluate teaching like research’

• Use peer review if possible

• Use hard data when available

• Consider environment and esteem

• Do the claims made match the evidence?

• How well does the candidate link activities to learning outcomes?

An uncertain conclusion

“A place of teaching universal knowledge... Its object is the diffusion and extension of knowledge rather than its advancement. If its object were scientific and philosophical discovery, I do not see why a University should have students”

Newman

“Institutions of higher learning…always treat learning as an incompletely-solved problem. They are engaged in a process of continual inquiry… The teacher is not there for the sake of the student; both teacher and student are there for the sake of learning”

Humboldt