Fostering the Quality of Teaching and Learning by Developing the “Neglected Half ” of University Teachers’ Competencies

Barica Marentič Požarnik,Andreja Lavrič

doi:10.26529/cepsj.143

Barica Marentič Požarnik, Andreja Lavrič

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.26529/cepsj.143

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Abstract

For too long, the quality of teaching and learning in universities has been undervalued in comparison to research. Current social, economic, ecological and other challenges require that more attention be given to measures to improve the situation. Academic staff should receive incentives, policy support and high-quality pedagogical training to develop key competencies for excellence in teaching. Examples of key competencies in this area in different countries are presented as well as some schemes of policy support and pedagogical training. The casestudy from the University of Ljubljana is based on experiences gathered from four groups of participants during a course on Improving University Teaching in 2013 and 2014. They gave their opinion on the relative importance of different competencies in teaching, to what extent have they developed them during the course and, finally, which activities and methods used have most contributed to their development. At the end, some measures to foster excellence in teaching at the level of policy are proposed, as well as areas for further research.

Highlights

Increasing importance of quality in teaching in higher educationUniversities have three main functions: to conduct research, to offer education, and to serve society
University teachers’ career development is usually dependent heavily on the first function, i.e. the quality of research, while the quality of teaching remains undervalued and overshadowed by research achievements; teachers enjoy a thorough training in research methodology and have numerous opportunities to perform and report research results, while competencies linked to quality teaching mostly remain “the neglected half ”
The research results alone count in official rankings of universities, such as the popular Shanghai ranking, because of the underlying, but unproven assumption that a good researcher is necessarily a good teacher (Marentič Požarnik, 2007)

Summary

Introduction

Increasing importance of quality in teaching in higher educationUniversities have three main functions: to conduct research, to offer education, and to serve society. Increasing importance of quality in teaching in higher education. The massification of studies, the increasing heterogeneity of students, rapid developments in different fields of science and technology, economic, ecological and social problems on one side and new research findings about human learning from psychology, cognitive and neuroscience on the other, as well as the globalization and internationalization of higher education: all these require that much more attention be paid to the quality of teaching and learning in universities. As stated in the recent Report to the European Commission on Improving the Quality of Teaching and Learning in Europe’s Higher Education Institutions (Report, 2014), the 19th century model of teaching relying mainly on lecturing is no longer compatible with new developments in universities and with societal challenges While “the quality of teaching and learning should be at the core of the higher education reform agenda in Europe” (Report, 2014, p. 13), the commitment to this mission at present remains “sporadic and frequently reliant on a few individuals who give practical support for upskilling teachers” (Report, 2014, p. 14) with little or no institutional support or incentives

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