Challenges of Professional Development and Potential Solutions: Policy Reforms of Higher Education Institutions in Mongolia

Abstract

The Mongolian higher education sector has experienced a massive expansion in the past two decades, with changes in the student body as well as academic staff. There are increased pressures of teaching loads and administrative requirements for a relatively young community of academic staff in Mongolian Higher Education Institutions. Academic staff is also required to increase their research profile while delivering excellent teaching. The effect of faculty professional development on student learning is seen as one of the solutions to improve the quality of teaching and research which would have an overall impact on student learning and employability of graduates. Consequently, the faculty professional development in Mongolian higher education is high on the agenda of the Ministry of Education and Science of Mongolia. To develop a national policy for the professional development of higher education teaching staff, the Mongolian Institute of Educational Research conducted the baseline survey which focuses on identifying faculty professional development needs of Mongolian HEIs and finding out challenges and solutions to the issues around faculty professional development. The survey was conducted in January 2018 and was designed to elicit information about how academic staff conceives their professional development needs, what challenges they encounter in their professional development, and what they suggest to address the issues.