Leading educational development in higher
education
The Bologna Reform in Iceland Project (BORE) er verkefni sem stýrt er af Maríu Kristínu
Gylfadóttur (Rannís). Verkefnið felst m.a. í því að auka gæði náms og kennslu og vinna
marksvisst að nemendamiðaðari kennsluháttum. Meðal verkþátta er vinnustofa/námskeið fyrir
þá sem leiða kennsluþróun innan háskóla.
Vinnustofa um kennsluþróun er skipulögð sem eins árs verkefni þar sem þátttakendur velja
sér þróunarverkefni að vinna að, senda inn lýsingu á viðfagsefni og aðstæðum, taka þátt í
tveggja daga vinnustofu í lok ágúst, kynningarfundi í lok september og hittast svo að vori
2017 til að bera saman bækur sínar.
Vinnustofunni stýra Dr. Torgny Roxå og Dr. Katarina Mårtenson sem eru þekktir fræðimenn
á sviði kennsluþróunar í háskólum og leiða slík verkefni við Háskólann í Lundi.
Umsjónarmaður verkefnis er Guðrún Geirsdóttir ([email protected]), Kennslumiðstöð Háskóla
Íslands og verkefnastjóri er Elva Björg Einarsdóttir ([email protected]) og veita þær allar frekari
upplýsingar um vinnustofuna.
Þátttakendur á vinnustofunni eru beðnir um að skrá sig á vef Kennslumiðstöðvar Háskóla
Íslands (kennslumidstod.hi.is)
Hér er að finna frekari lýsingu á tilhögun vinnustofunnar:
Introduction
This course is about how leaders on local level in higher education can influence their
respective working context towards developed teaching and student learning.
The course is divided in three phases
1. Draft project : Submitted to Katarina and Torgny
Participants Submit a project draft, describing an idea for a project at the beginning May
2016. In the project draft, participants include some information about the context and the aim
for the project. “What do I want to achieve? Who am I working with and where? The draft
should be 1 to 1,5 pages long and describe the context and what the project intends to do.
Preferably the draft also outlines an analysis of the difficulties and opportunities foreseen by
the project owner.
Once the draft is submitted, Torgny & Katarina will host an online meeting in Mid May and
to explain the process ahead and how participants should prepare for the August training. The
teachers will then further suggest reading in relation to respective project draft by end of May.
Besides the reading in relation to projects, all participants read:
Gibbs, G., Knapper, C., & Piccinin, S. (2008). Disciplinary and Contextually Appropriate
Approaches to Leadership of Teaching in Research-Intensive Academic Departments
in Higher Education. Higher Education Quarterly, 62(4), 416 - 436.
Mårtensson, K., Roxå, T., & Olsson, T. (2011). Developing a Quality Culture through the
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Higher Education Research & Development,
30(1), 51 - 62.
2) Workshop – August 29 & 30 in Iceland (Háskóli Íslands).
August 29th (9 am–5 pm)
 INTRODUCTION
- participants, projects, and workshop leaders
 QUALITY TEACHING
- key concepts (brainstorm, group discussion, lecture)
- the role of the context (group discussion + lecture)
 ORGANISATIONAL CULTURES
- priorities, networks (individual mapping exercise)
- similarities, differences between disciplines/units (group-exercise)
- Organisational culture, and academic microcultures (lecture)
 PROJECTS
- Discussion about relevance of the day’s content to participants’ projects
August 30th (9am-4pm)
 REVIEW MIRROR
- Reflections upon yesterday’s content and processes
 LEADERSHIP IN EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
- What can educational leaders do? (4 cases, group-discussion + plenary)
- External/internal mandates; leadership in relation to microcultures (lecture)
 EVIDENCE-BASED PLANNING
- How to plan for ed dev; and need of evidence (small-group discussions)
- Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (lecture)
 WHAT NOW?
- Looking ahead; returning to participants’ project (small-group discussions + plenary)
3) Finalizing project reports and feedback
Participants finalize their project reports and receive both peer-feedback and feedback from Katarina
and Torgny by end of September 2016.
PROJECTS
A fair question to ask in this context is, what is a project?
A project is a change-attempt made by a participant. The range of this change can vary. It can
be aiming at a planned change as well as something actually happening.
Background
Demands on universities to enhance teaching has in many forms increased the demands on
individual teachers in higher education (see for example Tight, 2010). Teachers work more
hours, use more time for administration and reporting, and they are urged to provide more and
more timely feedback to an increasingly more diverse student body.
One way to meet these challenges would be better coordination among the teachers. If teacher
would collaborate more and support each other to a greater extent the demands placed on
them could be distributed more efficiently than today. This, in turn, raises demands for
leadership – especially leadership as it is conducted close to the teachers.
A specific challenge in higher education is that teaching is a highly contextual practice. It is
performed inside disciplinary communities or in workgroups constructed around courses and
programs. Therefore, leadership aimed at supporting these activities must be context-sensitive
and aimed at supporting the teachers in their job to further develop teaching as an academic
practice. Simultaneously, local leaders must respond to and mitigate pressure channelled
through higher levels of the organisation or from students. It places local leaders in the nexus
of competing forces and challenge them in their work to support the development of teaching
and student learning.
The course
The current course for local leaders in Icelandic higher education is organised as a community
of practice (Wenger, 1999; Mårtensson & Roxå, 2014). The aim is to invite local leaders to
work on specific development projects in the context of a collegial culture. Through the
sharing of literature, experiences, and support from course leaders each participant develops a
project aimed at enhancing teaching.
Timetable
Beg. May
Submit a project draft, describing an idea for a project. Include some
information about the context and the aim for the project. “What do I want to
achieve? Who am I working with and where?
Mid May
Meet online on Skype. Participants share their drafts and discuss collaboratively
how to proceed.
End May
Submit developed drafts to Katarina and Mårtensson.
June/July
Receive feedback from Katarina and Torgny and suggested reading for the
summer.
August
Meet in Reykjavik for a two-day workshop where the drafts are supported
further. The discussions are fuelled by material from the literature and from
examples offered by Katarina and Torgny.
September
Submit a plan for a development project as a leader. The plan should include a
description of the context, the aims, and a suggestion for how the projects
should be evaluated.
Summer 2017 A follow-up meeting, alternatively Skype-tutorials with Katarina and Torgny
Katarina and Torgny
Katarina Mårtensson and Torgny Roxå have offered leadership courses for local leaders at
Lund University for more than a decade and have published on the topic. They are academic
developers with a special interest for leadership and strategic educational development. They
have three times organised a national professional development course for Swedish academic
developers.