Teaching and Learning Review 2020
Flexible Futures conference 2020
It had become a tradition that every year one of the keynote speakers presented online. For 2020, the whole conference was virtual. The theme was ‘Teaching innovations in higher education: COVID-19 and beyond’. Using the UCDP enabled the University to sponsor attendance for UP staff, giving them the opportunity to address critical issues as well as learn and share innovative teaching, learning and assessment methods, student success interventions, and the effective use of educational technology in higher education. The sponsors for this conference included Blackboard, Cengage and Amazon Web Services (AWS). The opening addresses by the Vice-Chancellor and Principal, Professor Tawana Kupe, and the Vice-Principal: Academic, Professor Norman Duncan, challenged the participants to reflect on the successes and limitations of remote teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic and to discuss the future of teaching and learning.
PROFESSOR TAWANA KUPE: ‘The future of higher education is digital and online. Being innovative and creative is a continuum. I’m not saying it will be purely online—there will be a spectrum of hybrid/blended learning to fully online learning. Spaces for teaching and learning will change while there needs to be major capital outlay for IT infrastructure.’
The plenary was delivered by Dr Tony Bates, President and CEO of Tony Bates Associates Ltd, a private company in Canada specialising in consultancy and training in the planning and management of e-learning and distance education. He is the author of Teaching in a Digital Age: Guidelines for Teaching and Learning and one of the foremost thinkers internationally on online pedagogy. In his paper, ‘Why get on the bus to come to campus? Maximising the benefits of hybrid learning’, he reflected on what can best be done online and face-to-face, which students different modes suit, and how learning online could develop the knowledge and skills needed in a digital age.
Ensure that Academics Are Recognised and Rewarded for the Work that they Do as University Teachers Teaching awards are given at various levels within the institution. Some are departmental but all faculties receive funding from the UCDP to provide awards relevant to their faculties. The University also awards Teaching Laureates and a Chancellor’s Award for Teaching. Education consultants worked with deputy deans to define criteria for teaching awards within faculties and with lecturers to design portfolios when applying for awards, thus contributing to the valuing and rewarding of teaching within the University. They also contributed to portfolio development for lecturers applying for promotion. The institutional Teaching Laureates went to Ms Heather Thuynsma and Mr Roland Henwood of the Department of Political Sciences in the Faculty of Humanities, and Dr Rory Biggs in the Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics in the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, at a virtual achievers’ event held in November 2020.
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