The University of Western Australia - Faculty of Life and Physical Sciences

MINUTES OF THE MEETING OF THE FACULTY TEACHING AND LEARNING COMMITTEE

held in Room 1.58, First Floor, Physics Building on Monday 21 February 2011

Present:

Associate Professor Peter Whipp (Chair) Ms Jenny Gamble (Faculty Manager) Associate Professor Nancy Longnecker (Teaching and Learning Co-ordinator)

Representatives from Schools: Dr Jan Meyer (Anatomy and Human Biology) Professor Alice Vrielink (Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences) Professor Geoff Hammond (Psychology) Professor Robert Grove (Sport Science, Exercise and Health)

Other Representatives: Associate Professor Des Hill (Mathematics and Statistics) Associate Professor Thomas Martin (Faculty Offshore Programs Director) Ms Merrilee Albatis (Science Library) Ms Marjan Heibloem (Representative from FNAS)

Visitors: Ms Jennifer Stevenson (Manager, Future Framework) Dr Joanne Castelli

Apologies Professor Ian McArthur (Physics) Dr Jane Hallos (Student Advisor) Mr David Enright (Program Manager/Offshore Programs) Mt Tiago Tomaz (Postgraduate Student Representative) Mrs Kath Williams (Executive Officer)

1. MINUTES

RESOLVED – 1

that the minutes of the meeting of Teaching and Learning Committee held on Friday 12 November 2010 be confirmed.

2. DECLARATIONS OF POTENTIAL FOR CONFLICT OR PERCEIVED CONFLICTS OF INTEREST No conflicts were declared.

3. ITEMS/BUSINESS IN PROGRESS FOR NOTING SINCE PREVIOUS MEETING

Item/Business in Progress Progress Update Status Principles of assessment and amendment of Marks

Policies to be created To be revisited

1

2

4. NC2012 EMBEDDING SCIENCE COMMUNICATION AND RESEARCH SKILLS

Prior to the meeting the Chair had met with Heads of School or their representatives and some School Curriculum Coordinators to discuss proposed strategies relating to the embedding of science communication and research skills within majors. At the meeting the Chair provided an update of NC2012 Curriculum Reform – FLPS February 2011 (Attachment A) and members were informed that Table 1. Proposed percentage of mark allocation for a Major had been revised. In principle agreement had been reached on the development of an online module which would not be assessed as such at level one. It was envisaged that a first draft of this would be available in June 2011. At levels one, two and three there would be the need for continual explicit evidence of what science communication and research skills had been taught and assessed. In addition to the online work each major would need to be mapped and there would be a need to engage with assessable source content in class. The Teaching and Learning Chair offered to provide generic rubric material to help this exercise and members agreed that this would be extremely useful. Members noted that no explicit time allocation had been defined; however some indication had been given of it being equivalent to a unit spread across the major. In essence this would be the equivalent of one unit for communication and one for research. One member felt this that would be difficult to gauge. Members expressed concern over the proposed percentage of mark allocation for a major and requested clarification. During discussion the following points were made:

Could assessment be common to both communication and research? Some units don’t teach research skills. Further clarification was requested; Significant content would be lost and the importance of curriculum was being undermined.

Members agreed in principle to the concept and timeline of the online module, but sought further clarification on the content required. The Chair expressed his gratitude to Marjan Heibloem, the representative from FNAS, for their willingness to collaborate on this issue and Dr Joanne Castelli was thanked for the information that she had collated from the Go8.

Members were also provided with documentation relating to the proposed new unit that was to replace Science IRIS (Attachment B). The new unit would give students a generic understanding of communication and research skills whereas the online module mentioned above, would provide both depth and content. Members were reminded of an all staff email that had been circulated that day relating to the new Learning Management system that was to replace WebCT. Both systems would run in parallel for twelve months and it was envisaged that data would be transferable. The Manager, Future Framework informed members that two new postgraduate programs had been submitted.