Academic speed dating

1
Academic speed dating

• Please get into groups of about 4 and arrange
  yourselves so you can talk and listen to each
  other and if possible are away from other groups
• Appoint Chair - person with most hair on their
  head
• Reporter person with the most
  interesting notebook
• Timekeeper - person with the biggest watch
• Ensure you know each others names and roles in
  you institutions And be ready QUICKLY for the
  next task!

2
Research Teaching Linkages International
Perspectives  and Institutional  Policies

• Alan Jenkins, Consultant HE Academy, and
  Reinvention Centre for Undergraduate Research

3
Confirming the Focus

• Our focus today is on (staff )research in the
  disciplines (eg philosophy or interdisciplinary
  areas such as womens studies) and student
  learning
• not on
• (pedagogic) research on higher education. (Except
  of course if your discipline is education!)

4
Aims

• Explore your views on teaching/research
  relations
• Set these issues in international perspective
• Summarise key aspects of the research evidence
• Suggest a language /conceptual framework
• Consider teaching /research relations in your
  institution
• Suggest strategies for strengthening T/R links
  in institutions
• Provide an advance organiser for the workshop
  sessions focussed on course design and
  department strategies

5
Discuss in your groups and agree one statement
worth making ..

• To be an effective teacher one needs to be
  centrally involved in discipline based research
• Strongly Agree Strongly
  Disagree

6

Discuss in your groups and agree one statement
worth making ..

• Undergraduate Research where students learn as
  researchers- is for
• All students Selected
  Students

7
International Perspectives

• ..The research universities have often failed,
  and continue to fail their undergraduate
  populations, thousands of students graduate
  without seeing the world - famous professors or
  tasting genuine research. US Boyer Commission
• In Scholarship Reconsidered, Ernest Boyer (1990,
  X11) challenged US higher education to break
  away out of the tired old teaching versus
  research debate
• The New Zealand Education Amendment Act (1990)
  defines a university as where teaching and
  research are closely interdependent and most of
  their teaching is done by people who are active
  in advancing knowledge. That policy is now under
  review
• I believe that the main hope for realising a
  genuinely student centred undergraduate education
  lies in re re-engineering the teachingresearch
  nexus. Paul Ramsden (2001). Then Pro VC
  University of Sydney, now Chief Executive, HE
  Academy

8
UK Perspectives

• The (UK) Government is not seeking an artificial
  divide between teaching and research. Lecturers
  need to keep up to date with their field through
  engagement in some form of advanced scholarly
  activity. But this need not necessarily be
  through participation in leading-edge
  research. DFES , The Future of Higher Education,
  2003
• We believe an understanding of the research
  process asking the right questions in the right
  way conducting experiments and collating and
  evaluating information must be a key part of
  any undergraduate curriculum whether those
  involved in delivering it are actively engaged in
  research activity themselves Bill Rammell,
  Minister for HE ,Oct 2006

9
My Perspectives

• Student understanding of the complexity of
  knowledge lies at the centre of higher education.
  
• From the perspectives of the academic, the
  student, the institution, and the national
  systems there are tensions between teaching and
  research
• The link at undergraduate level is both most
  problematic and most important ?
• We need to maximise the (potential) synergies and
  minimise the conflicts
• This requires actions at a variety of levels
  national , institutional , department ,course
  team and the individual and from many areas of
  the university including learning resources etc
• There are important disciplinary / professional
  variations in teaching /research / professional
  knowledge relations

10
International Interventions

• Handout, pp 34-36
• US National Science Foundation (NSF) grant
  applicants have to demonstrate their experience
  of engagement with pedagogy and service
• www.nsf.gov/pubs/2003/nsf032/start.htm
• Australia The Academic's and Policy-Maker's
  Guides to the Teaching-Research Nexus A suite of
  resources for enhancing reflective practice. 
  Carrick Institute for Learning and Teaching in
  Higher Education Competitive Grant (2006 - 2008)
  www.cshe.unimelb.edu.au/pdfs/TRnexus.pdf
• Scotland Funded Research-Teaching Linkages as a
  Quality Enhancement Theme
• www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/themes/ResearchTeachi
  ng/default.asp

11
(No Transcript)
12
Key Research Evidence

• Based on this review we concluded that the
  common belief that teaching and research were
  inextricably intertwined is an enduring myth. At
  best teaching and research are very loosely
  coupled
• The aim is to increase the circumstances in
  which teaching and research have occasion to
  meet.
• Increase the skills of staff to teach
  emphasising the construction of knowledge by
  students rather than the imparting of knowledge
  by instructors......
• Ensure that students experience the process of
  artistic and scientific productivity. (Hattie
  and Marsh , 1996, emphasis added)
• Students at arms length from staff research
  Angela Brew 2006

13
A Language to Help Us Examine What We Do

• Handout, pp 2
• Learning about others research
• Learning to do research research methods
• Learning in research mode enquiry based
• Pedagogic research enquiring and reflecting on
  learning

14
(No Transcript)
15
T/R Relationships in Your Institution

• Discuss teaching /research relationships in your
  institution perhaps using as prompts these
  analogies
• Like love and marriage a horse and carriage
  or strangers in the night (Sinatra F..) or
  perhaps Mills and McCartney ?

16
(No Transcript)
17
Consider Institution case studies

• Handout Section 4, pp 21-9
• Discuss any 2? of the case studies that look
  relevant to your context
• How could you adapt them to your needs?
• This discussion remains private

18
Institutional Strategies

• Annex 3, pp 45
• Developing institutional awareness and
  institutional mission
• Developing pedagogy and curricula to support the
  nexus
• Developing research policies and strategies to
  support the nexus
• Developing staff and university structures to
  support the nexus
• Other strategies you consider appropriate

19
Task A Conclusion

• A Round each person speaks briefly in turn
• Then if time, group discussion
• ONE idea or strategy I am taking away from this
  session is

20
Workshop Course Design in our Disciplines to
Enhance Research/Teaching Linkages

• In this workshop we will reflect back on the
  plenary on research teaching linkages and then
  focus on what we can do as individuals and course
  teams and disciplinary communities to bring
  teaching and discipline based research together
  for the benefit of students and staff morale and
  academic identity. If time we will also consider
  the role that department policies can play but
  the focus will be practical and on areas where we
  have some control.

21
Some Web Resources

• Discipline-based practices for linking teaching
  and research www.heacademy.ac.uk/850.htm
• Jenkins A (2003) Designing a Curriculum that
  values a research-based approach to student
  learning www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources.asp?id163
  processfull_recordsectiongeneric
• Jenkins A and Zetter R (2003) Linking Research
  and Teaching in Departments
• www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources.asp?processfull_re
  cordsectiongenericid257
• Jenkins A (2004) A Guide to the Research Evidence
  on Teaching Research Relations, York, Higher
  Education Academy www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources.as
  p?processfull_recordsectiongenericid383
• Jenkins A and Healey M (2005 ) Institutional
  Strategies to Link Teaching and Research . York
  .Higher Education Academy www.heacademy.ac.uk/res
  ources.asp?processfull_recordsectiongenericid
  585

22
Forthcoming

• April 2007
• Linking Teaching and Research in Disciplines and
  Departments. Alan Jenkins, Mick Healey, and Roger
  Zetter
• Higher Education Academy (paper and web
  publication)