Valuing excellence in education
The value we place on the education of our students is equal to the value we place on research, and it is essential that we give staff the support they need to provide students with an exceptional learning experience. This will require us to innovate our systems, practices, and process to ensure academic staff are supported to work more closely with students inside and outside the classroom, to develop their teaching and learning practices, and to grow their expertise. Equally, our professional staff make a vital contribution to our students’ experiences, and to teaching and learning activities. We will support and recognise the expertise of these staff, celebrate their achievements and ensure career paths and job security are part of what they can expect from the University. We will also renew our mechanisms of recognition and reward for teaching, care, and student support to ensure those who focus on our students are encouraged and rewarded.
Our ambition
- A culture of excellence in teaching and learning and student support that parallels our culture of excellence in research
- Significant uplift in support for all staff to fully embrace their roles in providing outstanding teaching, learning and student experiences
- Academic and professional staff who are known for their approachability and availability to students inside and outside of the classroom and warmly embrace this as part of their role.
Advancements
The People Strategy, among other initiatives, will identify our ambition in our twin aims of research and education. Working with the academy we will support new and adapt existing academic roles at the University, enabling all our staff to participate fully in teaching and learning and the support of our students.
We will:
- Expect all University of Melbourne academic staff will contribute in meaningful ways to teaching, supporting and inspiring students
- Define academic roles on a spectrum from teaching-focussed to research-focussed so that no roles are exclusively one or the other
- Establish new early-career academic roles for teaching- and research-focussed positions that enable and explicitly chart career progression within and across these roles
- Provide exceptional support for all our staff, and develop additional support for staff in our teaching-focussed positions to ensure they excel, are recognised and have opportunities to advance in their careers.
We will enable teachers to focus on students and their learning through providing coordinated, specialist technical and administrative support for teaching delivery in both physical and virtual spaces.
We will:
- Review the ways in which support for teaching delivery is currently provided locally and centrally in areas including LMS support, IT support and room-based infrastructure support
- Consider developing new specialist response teams to support teaching delivery, based around faculty and school needs and spaces.
Develop a new whole-of-University Educational Excellence framework to assist staff to identify and develop excellent teaching practice. This will be accompanied by agreed standards of service, student support and engagement excellence suitable for use by all staff.
We will:
- Establish a program to support academic staff to reflect on their teaching and learning and build a portfolio that showcases the impact and value of their work in education
- Extend existing University measures beyond student evaluations to provide staff with a broader suite of evidence to demonstrate the quality and value of their teaching
- Establish a common frame of reference for teaching quality and impact that can support confirmation and promotion processes
- Expand investment in teacher development to new early-career academic roles.
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