linking research and teaching · 2017. 11. 23. · andrea rayner, ilthe production editor sarah...

Ideas, practices, news and support for decisionmakers active in learning and teaching

LINKING RESEARCH AND TEACHINGThe focus of this issue

WHAT DO STUDENTS THINKABOUT RESEARCH?Barbara Zamorski explores how learners can developa more sophisticated understanding

RESEARCH AND TEACHING–

REPARING THE DAMAGE Roger Brown suggests how the links can be restored

DOES RESEARCH BENEFITTEACHING?and how can we know? asks Dai Hounsell

Issue 3 Autumn 2002

ExchangeIssue 3 Autumn 2002

Exchange exists to stimulate the sharing ofideas, practices and news about learningand teaching in higher education. It aims toencourage positive change by supportingits readers in developing and enhancinglearning and teaching in their communities.

Exchange is a collaborative publication.The partners involved are:The TQEF National Co-ordination Team(TQEF NCT)The Learning and Teaching SupportNetwork (LTSN)The Institute for Learning and Teaching inHigher Education (ILTHE)The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC)

Editors in ChiefVaneeta D’Andrea, Co-Director, TQEF NCTCliff Allan, Programme Director, LTSN

Editorial BoardRepresentatives from the partnerorganisations

Joint Commissioning Editors for Focusand OpinionsMick Healey, University of GloucestershireAlan Jenkins, Oxford Brookes University

Editor for General InterestAndrea Rayner, ILTHE

Production EditorSarah Claridge, NCT

Design and productionAutumn Design Consultants

Exchange is a tri-annual publication. Each issue includes an examination of a different themealong with a look at news and items of interest onlearning and teaching generally.

The views expressed in this publication are notnecessarily those of the Editors nor of the partnerorganisations. The Editors reserve the right toedit, amend or abbreviate copy without notice.

The TQEF NCTCentre for Higher Education PracticeThe Open UniversityWalton HallMilton Keynes MK7 6AA

Tel: 01908 858434Fax: 01908 858438Email: [email protected]

Exchange website: www.exchange.ac.uk

An electronic version of Exchange is available onthe Exchange website along with full referencesfor all articles, where supplied.

Exchange is available free of charge. If you do notcurrently receive a copy and wish to do so in thefuture please contact [email protected]. Yourdetails will be used solely for the purpose ofkeeping you informed about Exchange and willnot be made available to outside organisations.

Cliff Allan

Mick Healey

Alan Jenkins

Vaneeta D’Andrea

Ideas, practices, news and support for decisionmakers active in learning and teaching

3Contents

Focus: Linking Research and Teaching

6 Does research benefit teaching? And how can weknow? by Dai Hounsell

8 Institutional strategies for linking research andteaching by Graham Gibbs

12 Making the departmental link between research andteaching by Roger Zetter

15 Constructing the teaching-research link in the builtenvironment disciplines by Chris Webster

17 Of mutual benefit? Research projects in theundergraduate science course by Jim Ryder

19 Evidence-based practice in health sciencesby Anne McKee

21 What do students think about research?by Barbara Zamorski

23 Turning the light on ourselves: researching pedagogicpractice and policy by Liz Beaty and Glynis Cousin

25 Towards research-led educational developmentby Angela Brew

Opinions: Linking Research and Teaching

27 Let’s stop trying to separate the inseparableby Peter Scott

29 Research and teaching – repairing the damageby Roger Brown

General Interest

31 Moving forwards in partnershipby Andrea Rayner

Regulars

3 Editorial

4 News

33 Feature on a Fellow Anthony Rosie describes hisexperience

35 Events A selection of forthcoming events examiningissues surrounding learning and teaching

Comment from the Editors

This issue of Exchange brings a focus to the on-going debate inhigher education which centres on the teaching-research nexus.This challenging, and sometimes contentious, debate is

addressed by a wide range of authors well-known to the highereducation sector. As noted in the first issue of this magazine, theintention in spotlighting this debate is to inform and stimulate thinking bydecision-makers on matters central to the work of higher education.

As our guest editors Mick Healey and Alan Jenkins note:

“This publication is particularly timely for it goes to the centre ofcurrent practice and policy debates in UK higher education. Whetherquality teaching is based, dependent, or linked to (staff) research is amajor research issue. Perhaps more significantly, it goes to the centreof individual academic’s views of their role and practices, and to definingdepartmental and institutional policies.

Teaching/research relations are also now at the centre of policydebates as to the future of UK higher education. The challenge is tomeet the needs of a ‘mass’ higher education, while at the same timeholding on to high academic standards and supporting ‘quality’research. As research is now seen as central to national economic andsocial goals, there are evident pressures to concentrate research inselected HE institutions and departments. Such arguments for researchselectivity, place under question the ‘traditional’ view of theinterdependence between ‘research active’ staff and student learning.

Some of the contributors to this issue of Exchange present researchand policy perspectives on these national policy issues. Others focus onthe immediate experience and examples of staff and studentsattempting (and succeeding!) in forging effective links between researchand teaching. Whatever the national policy, individual academics andinstitutions will rightfully seek to shape their own agendas. This issuegives you ideas to take into your own academic practices and policieson linking research and teaching”.

Also in this issue is an evaluation card. We hope you take a fewminutes to respond to the questions on it so that we can continue toshape a publication that is responsive to our readers’ needs. Our nextissue will focus on assessment practices in higher education. Weanticipate that the discussion will have wide-spread practical applicationin teaching and learning. Please let us have your views on whether youfind Exchange interesting and useful.

Cliff Allan

Vaneeta Marie D’Andrea

4 News

Professor Vaneeta D’Andrea and Dr DavidGosling have been appointed as Co-Directors of the Teaching QualityEnhancement Fund (TQEF) National Co-ordination Team. The TQEF was launchedin 1999 to deliver the HEFCE’s learningand teaching strategy. Vaneeta and Davidare sharing the post left by the move offormer Director, Carole Baume, to theposition of Regional Director for the OpenUniversity in the North West.

David has been Head of EducationalDevelopment Services at the University ofEast London. He also founded thenational Heads of EducationalDevelopment Group. Vaneeta hasestablished educational developmentunits at the University of SurreyRoehampton and City University, London,where she currently holds a Chair.

Dr Caroline Bucklow has beenappointed as Acting Chief ExecutiveOfficer at the Institute for Learning andTeaching in Higher Education (ILTHE). DrBucklow will hold the post for an interimperiod of six months following thedeparture of founding Chief Executive, DrPaul Clark, who has taken up the post ofPro-Vice-Chancellor (Learning andTeaching) at the Open University.

Caroline Bucklow was the ILTHE’sDirector of Accreditation, a post she hadheld since March 1999. She waspreviously Head of Education at theBritish Computer Society, withresponsibility for the Society’s accredit-ation programme and professionalexaminations. She established an honoursdegree in Technical Communication atCoventry University, the first of its kind inthe UK.

New Heads forthe NCT andILTHE

Learning and Teaching Strategies

The Engineering Council and theInstitute of Mathematics and itsApplications have both publishedreports expressing concern aboutthe growing deficiency inmathematical skills amongstscience and engineering students.Four LTSN Subject Centresresponded to the report by formingthe LTSN MathsTEAM. The centresinvolved are Maths, Stats & OR,Physical Sciences, Materials andEngineering. The MathsTEAM hasbeen conducting an in-depth surveyof current resources and teachingmethods in order to identify suitablematerial for inclusion in threeinformation packs.

The packs will be available in print

and from the four LTSN Centres’websites by early 2003 when theproject is due to finish. Survey results,relevant generic information,annotated references and links touseful resources will also be available.

The MathsTEAM is now ready tostart commissioning further casestudies. If you are teachingmathematics to students within anengineering or scientific context, theMathsTEAM would like to hear fromyou.

Further information is availablefrom Christine Hirst, LTSN Maths,Stats & OR Network, tel 0121 4143945, email: [email protected],or see http://ltsn.mathstore.ac.uk/mathsteam

All English Higher EducationInstitutions have now submitted theirrevised learning and teachingstrategies to the HEFCE. Once againthe TQEF NCT will be undertaking ananalysis of the strategies to identifyemerging trends, building onProfessor Graham Gibbs’ earlieranalyses (HEFCE 99/55 and01/37A). In particular the analysiswill look at the extent to which theHEFCE’s policy priorities arereflected in the strategies.

The TQEF NCT will also bepublishing another Good PracticeGuide following the success of thetwo recent publications, Recognisingand Rewarding Excellent Teachingand Funding Innovation and

Disseminating New TeachingPractices. The next Good PracticeGuide will focus on monitoring andevaluating learning and teachingstrategies.

Over the next six months a seriesof regional meetings will be held,jointly organised by the TQEF NCTand the HEFCE’s RegionalConsultants, on implementinglearning and teaching strategies.These will be informal workshops toenable colleagues to compare theirexperience of developing andputting into practice their strategies.For further information on theseevents please contact the NCT on01908 858434 or [email protected]

The LTSN MathsTEAM

5Focus 5News

New service to assist in dealingwith plagiarism

New publication on students with disabilitiesFrom September 2002 new anti-discrimination legislation will requireeducation institutions to ensure thatdisabled students can access all theservices they offer. The JISC-fundedTechDis has teamed up with theAssociation for Learning Technology topublish Access All Areas: disability,technology and learning to assistinstitutions with the new legislation. Thepublication addresses two key areas:• how students can access institutional

services using technology, forinstance with software that readsaloud to a blind student

• how technology can be madeaccessible for disabled students,for instance how Virtual LearningEnvironments and computer-basedassessment can be modified toensure disabled students can usethem.

As the legislation covers all subjectareas the book is of use to anyoneworking within an academicdiscipline as well as to overarchingservices (learning technologists,librarians etc). A pdf version isavailable on the TechDis website(www.techdis.ac.uk).

e-Learning StarterGuidesThe Association for Learning Technologyand the LTSN Generic Centre haveproduced a series of eight starter guidesto inform colleagues on current learningtechnology topics. Titles are: Using theWWW in Learning and Teaching; VirtualLearning Environments; Computer-mediated Conferencing; Using CAA tosupport student learning; Streaming audioand video for course design; Evaluating LTresources and their uses; Integrating onlinelearning into your course; and, Models forevaluating the effect of ICT on studentlearning. The guides can be downloadedfrom the ALT website at www.alt.ac.uk orthe LTSN Generic Centre website atwww.ltsn.ac.uk/genericcentre.

The Joint Information Systems Committee(JISC) is launching a new national service tohelp universities and colleges prevent anddetect plagiarism. Based at NorthumbriaUniversity, the new service will seek topromote good practice by providing online

access to a variety of information aimed atsenior managers, academic staff andstudents. This will include guidance onassignments, policies, procedures andstudent learning. The service will provideworkshops and training, as well as on-lineaccess to a central detection facility,located in the UK and supported byiParadigms, the leading US supplier ofplagiarism detection products.

Although electronic detection cannotsolve the problem of plagiarism, it willassist staff in identifying it, thus allowingthem to concentrate on the issue ofprevention. The national facility will alsoallow the checking of student work forcollusion within and between institutions,something not currently available.

For further information contact GillChester, [email protected], tel: 01235822291

FDTL 4 getsunderwayOver 35 projects have secured fundingfrom the HEFCE’s fourth round of theFund for the Development of Teachingand Learning (FDTL) and are now gettingunderway. The new projects havereceived £8 million of funding.Mathematics support for theschool/university interface;incorporating disability equality in clinicalpractice and improving the cost-effectiveness of formative assessmentin science are just some of the variedtopics that will be examined over thenext three years.

A two-day ‘start up’ seminar was runby the TQEF NCT in early September forrepresentatives from the new projectteams. A full list of the successfulprojects can be found on the NCTwebsite at: www.ncteam.ac.uk/projects/fdtl/fdtl4/index.htm

6

Does research benefit teaching?

AND HOW CAN WE KNOW?

Focus

In higher education, as in education generally,research evidence rarely resolves long-standing issues. More often than not, itleaves us with new and more compellingquestions rather than decisive answers. The

protracted debate over the relationship betweenresearch and teaching - an often heated but not alwaysilluminating one - follows this pattern.

On the face of it, the research findings on howresearch may affect teaching look clear-cut. One surveyin the United States by Feldman, found that thelikelihood that research productivity actually benefits

teaching was “extremely small”. For all practicalpurposes, the two were “essentially unrelated”. Another,by Ramsden and Moses in Australia, saw “little or nofoundation for a belief in the existence of a positivecausal relationship between effective undergraduateteaching and high levels of research activity”. And athird, a meticulous review of a large number of empiricalstudies by Hattie and Marsh, concluded that “thecommon belief that research and teaching areinextricably entwined is an enduring myth. At best,research and teaching are very loosely coupled”.

Such findings seem to undermine the integrationistcamp, those staunch believers in a positive symbiosisbetween teaching and research, and to strengthen the

cause of the separatists, who hold that the relationshipis costly and dysfunctional. But doubts arise over pastresearch methods and assumptions. A truer outcomewould be a goalless draw, or that distinctively Scottishverdict, “not proven”.

Better or different?Past research has mostly looked for evidence thatteaching in ‘research-led’ universities was rated ofhigher quality than teaching in institutions whereresearch had a lower priority. In other words, theassumption being tested was that research-led

teaching would be better, in some universal senserather than different in kind. But it can plausibly beargued that, while the teaching which takes place inresearch-led departments may well be in certainrespects distinctive, it is not necessarily ‘better’, more‘effective’ or of ‘higher quality’ than is teaching gearedto other legitimate concerns such as the needs of theprofessions or social inclusion.

Subject differencesAnother source of difficulty has been that a search forcommonality of impact of research on teaching hasunderplayed differences in how research isconceptualised, organised and communicated in

The relationship between research and teaching is more complex, interesting andimportant than it may first appear. To advance our understanding, and hence ourpractice, we need to do more, believes Dai Hounsell, than take positions.

“… while the teaching which takes place in research-led departments may wellbe in certain respects distinctive, it is not necessarily ‘better’, more ‘effective’ orof ‘higher quality’ than is teaching geared to other legitimate concerns”

Linking Research and Teaching

DAI HOUNSELL, Professor of Higher Education, Department of Higher and Community Education, University of Edinburgh

7Focus

different disciplines. These subject differences have astrong influence in opening up (or closing down)opportunities in how undergraduate students canengage with the leading edges of a discipline, and thuson how research might enrich teaching. What may befeasible, appropriate, or worthwhile in one subject areamay be difficult or impossible in another. Similarly,subject differences may also determine the potentialfor sound scholarship by lecturers to be a validalternative to active involvement in research. As RonBarnett has argued in The Idea of Higher Education:

“The relationship of the (university) teacher toresearch is analogous to the relationship of themusical soloist to the score. There is no demand onthe soloist that he or she be a composer... But it isparamount that the soloist be so directly acquaintedwith the score that he or she is able to offer us apersonal interpretation of it”.

Mixed blessings?A third shortcoming is that past studies have been noless polarised than the debate itself, and have tended toask simply whether research benefits teaching ratherthan deeper questions. To anyone with at least somefirst-hand experience of research universities, it seemsperfectly plausible to view the nexus not as whollydesirable or wholly undesirable, but as having bothadvantages and drawbacks in any given institutionalsetting. For example, the research-led university mayhave an outstanding infrastructure - up-to-date labs,abundant library holdings, a very sophisticatedcomputing network - but find it necessary to restrictaccess by undergraduates to some parts of thatinfrastructure to protect access by researchers. Equally,although curricula may offer students the chance to betaught by eminent researchers, pressures to maintain aresearch profile may well limit student access to theseresearchers, and much first-year teaching may be sub-

contracted to doctoral teaching assistants. And coursesmarinated in research-derived ideas and findings mayenthral a student who envisages going on topostgraduate study, but put off others whose careeraspirations lie elsewhere.

Next stepsSo where does this leave the debate? A well-foundedbody of research evidence may be lacking, for thepresent at least. But we can do more than simply waituntil it arrives. Universities, which believe in thepotential contribution of research to teaching, couldwork to close the evidence gap. A first step would bea readiness to document the negative contributionsthat research can make to teaching. A second wouldbe to try to map the many ways in which research andscholarship actually inform and nourish teaching. Asmy colleague Charles Anderson, Lecturer in theDepartment of Higher and Community Education, hassuggested, we could explore how research-mindedteaching influences:• the perspectives (insights, concepts or developing

approaches to enquiry) that are shared with students• the processes which are inculcated — a sense of

what counts as evidence within the subject, forexample, or of how new knowledge is generatedwithin it

• the products, in the form of the written and otherassigned work, through which students display theirdeveloping grasp of the subject or discipline.

And lastly, taking stock would mean teasing out theimpact of research on students’ understanding andskills in particular courses and subject areas. Themost telling evidence is likely to be gathered from thebottom up, not top-down.

A list of references relating to this article can be found atwww.exchange.ac.uk

“What may be feasible, or appropriate, orworthwhile in one subject area may bedifficult or impossible in another”

“… although curricula may offerstudents the chance to be taughtby eminent researchers, pressuresto maintain a research profilemay well limit student access tothese researchers”.


“The most telling evidence is likely tobe gathered from the bottom up, nottop-down”.

Most institutions have had aresearch strategy for sometime. Quite a few mention intheir learning and teachingstrategy the importance of

research strengths to their teaching. It is still unusual,however, for these learning and teaching strategies tothen mention any activity designed to maximise thebenefit to undergraduates of research strengths. And Ihave yet to see a research strategy which took itsimplications for teaching seriously. While some of theother articles in this issue of Exchange are addressedat teachers who are also researchers, this article isintended to prompt discussion about how the linkbetween research and teaching might be addressed ininstitutional strategies.

Limiting the negative impacts on teaching of researchMost people, including myself, believe that researchcan benefit teaching. In practice, the empiricalevidence is pretty clear that, on average, it does not.We need to examine why not.

Institutions have strategies forresearch and for learning andteaching. Rarely do these strategiesjoin up. They can, and they should,argues Graham Gibbs.

8 Focus

Institutional strategies for

LINKING RESEARCH AND TEACHING


GRAHAM GIBBS, Director of the Centre for Higher Education Practice, The Open University

One likely explanation is that, in somecircumstances, allocating effort to research simplydetracts from the time and energy available forteaching. As time and resource pressures haveintensified, the likelihood that this will happen hasincreased. Studies of the extent of emphasis placedon research and on teaching, at the level of adepartment, show strong negative correlations. It israrely possible to give high priority to both.

Both of my daughters have this year studied atleading universities. Both have experienced latefeedback on assignments, very little feedback when itdoes finally arrive and, sometimes, no feedback at all.On the basis of their personal experience, I calculatedthat Open University students will receive, on average,fifty times as much feedback during theirundergraduate careers as will my daughters. The factthat my daughters’ lecturers are at the cutting edge oftheir subject when off undertaking their research doesnot help my daughters much in relation to thefeedback that they don’t receive. Departments thatemphasise research commonly have policiesdeliberately to withdraw lecturers from teaching dutiesso as to preserve their time for research. I haveencountered examples of:• modules where all coursework has been dropped

and now there is only an exam• limiting students’ access to their project and

dissertation supervisors - in one case to just twomeetings for a final year project

• halving the number of seminars, or doubling theirsize

• stopping all marking of lab reports and of ‘problemsheets’

• replacing experienced research-active lecturers withpostgraduates who have limited research andteaching experience.

I assume that if departments did not make such policydecisions, and instead placed an equal emphasis onresearch and teaching, then there might well be amuch clearer positive correlation between researchexcellence and teaching excellence. Much the mosteffective strategy for strengthening the teaching-research nexus is to stop neglecting teaching, and toprovide more opportunities for lecturers’ researchstrengths to have an impact on teaching by themactually interacting with their students.

9

Some of the neglect of teaching is a matter not ofpolicy but of culture and of lack of recognition andreward for teaching. The Teaching QualityEnhancement Fund National Co-ordination Team (TQEFNCT) has recently published a collection of casestudies of how institutions are building recognition andreward mechanisms into their learning and teachingstrategies to try to redress this balance. More thantwo thirds of institutions have already overhauled their

“… it might be more effective to re-orientthe research so that it informed whatwas actually taught”.

A US perspective In 1998 The Boyer Commission published ablueprint for America’s research universities inwhich it noted that, “Thousands of studentsgraduate without ever seeing the world-famousprofessors or tasting genuine research”.

They went on to argue that, “Universities need totake advantage of the immense resources of theirgraduate and research programs to strengthen thequality of undergraduate education..... There needsto be a symbiotic relationship between all theparticipants in university learning that will provide anew kind of undergraduate experience availableonly at research institutions”.

FocusLinking Research and Teaching

scope for such flexibility. Instead it might be moreeffective to re-orient the research so that it informedwhat was actually taught. This re-orientation would notbe easy for, or welcomed by, lecturers in mid-career;but it could form the basis of a long-term approach torecruitment of lecturers in the future.

The type of research undertaken could also usefullybe re-oriented. Using as categories the forms ofscholarship Boyer described in ScholarshipReconsidered helps to identify where benefit to

undergraduates is likely to beeasiest to nurture. It suggests:• The scholarship of discovery

– the type of scholarship mostvalued in the RAE – is the leastlikely of all types of scholarshipto benefit undergraduatelearning, especially in thestudents’ crucial first year. It isextremely unlikely to relate tomuch or any of what is taught –it is simply too specialised oradvanced. Sensible hypothesescan be developed about howstudents might benefit indirectlyfrom their teachers beingengaged in discovery research,even where the research is on anunrelated topic. For example,students might absorb aresearch approach and readmore widely, or might developmore sophisticatedargumentation. All such sensiblehypotheses have beendemonstrated to have littleempirical foundation.

• The scholarship of applicationseems much more likely to leadto benefits to students – through

10 Institutional strategies for linking research and teaching

recognition and reward systems. However, very fewmechanisms include any element which recognisesteachers who link research to teaching. Usuallyrewards for teaching are simply in competition withrewards for research, and the two elements are dealtwith entirely separately. It would be possible to rewardresearch which benefited teaching and to rewardteaching which made the best use of research.

Re-orienting researchMuch of what is written about the teaching-researchnexus seems to assume that the research componentis inviolate, and that what might change if the nexus isto be strengthened, is the teaching. In some areas itmay be possible to re-orient the curriculum so thatresearchers could teach what they research. But inmany subjects, particularly where there areconstraining professional requirements, there is little

“If one were being strategic in the wayresearch was supported and oriented, so as tobenefit undergraduate teaching, one wouldprobably not do very well in the RAE”.

Focus Linking Research and Teaching

their history or context seem just as doomed to failureas central learning and teaching strategies that seteducational goals independently of the kinds ofpedagogy used in different disciplines. If it is intendedthat research should benefit teaching, then it is essentialto allow and encourage departments to work out howthis benefit might best operate in their own uniquecontext, and to develop and support locally variedstrategies accordingly. Getting departments to engagein the debate necessary to develop locally relevantstrategies to achieve this link is the first and mostimportant step.


generation of examples, case materials, the basisfor student projects or even supervised internshipsor consultancies. The RAE often does not value suchscholarship, and income generated through appliedresearch may well not count in the RAE.

• The scholarship of integration is essential toteaching. In the form of the production of textbooksor reviews of fields it seems highly likely to benefitstudents, either through the provision of learningresource material or through lectures or otherorganising frameworks that help students toconceptualise complex fields of study. Scholarshipof integration is often not valued by the RAE.

• The scholarship of teaching is essential to goodteaching, and is also rarely valued by the RAE.

The disjunction here is very clear and sharp. If onewere being strategic in the way research wassupported and oriented, so as to benefitundergraduate teaching, one would probably not dovery well in the RAE. If one’s research strategyconsisted of little more than trying to do well in theRAE, this would seem unlikely to be the best way tobenefit teaching.

Disciplinary differences and departmental strategiesWithin all but the research elite institutions, there arevaried standards of research, and varied proportionsof staff entered into the RAE across departments. Inaddition, the type of scholarship undertaken indepartments usually varies widely, with, for example,an emphasis on consultancy and practice in someapplied areas and plenty of scholarship of integrationin others. In practice, the way research is most likelyto benefit undergraduates is likely to vary widelybetween departments within an institution. Centrallydetermined research strategies that set the same kindof research goals for all departments regardless of

What is employability and how can it be achieved through the curriculum? 11

“ To help meet the crucial ‘accessand retention’ Governmentagenda for higher education,linking research to teachingmeans supporting the scholarshipof teachers”.

Some examples of good practiceOxford Brookes University, in the context of themove to semesters, required all courses to identifyexplicitly how they ‘deliver’ teaching-research links.

At Earlham College (USA), applications forresearch grants have to identify how the proposedresearch will benefit students through producing a‘pedagogic impact statement’.

McMaster University (Canada) has established anInquiry Project, to develop inquiry based coursesacross the University, starting in year one.

Individual academics applying for promotion atthe University of Auckland (New Zealand) need toshow how their research and teaching are linked.


The link between research and teachinghappens, or not, within departmentsand faculties. This is where teachingand research are organised, resourced,staffed and delivered. This is where

research agendas are set, and where teachingprogrammes are designed and delivered. This is alsowhere the relationship between teaching and researchis most susceptible to disciplinary developments andvalues. Departmentsprovide the critical interfacebetween institutionalpolicies and strategies,whose impact on theteaching-research nexus isno more than formative, andthe programme level, wherethe students’ teaching andlearning experience isimplemented.

How can departmentalpolicies and strategies bedesigned to plan, promoteand enhance therelationship betweenteaching and research? Ofcourse, differentdepartments and subjectgroupings will respond tothese challenges in different

ways. But, Project LINK (Linking Teaching withResearch and Consultancy in the Built Environment) anFDTL Project has developed some answers (see box).

The core idea of this article is that enhancing therelationship between research and teaching has to becreated, planned and structured in a systematic wayby departments. Two helpful early activities consist ofthe following:• a Departmental Focus Group is especially valuable in

bringing together researchand teaching staff where‘two camps’ exist. It is aneffective way of exploringstaff perceptions, sharingcurrent experience,identifying constraints andopportunities, andgenerating momentum forfurther development • a Departmental SWOT

analysis can be used toexamine such things ascurricula dealing withresearch-based andresearch-led learning;management,organisation structure andstaffing; and cultures ofinclusiveness orexclusiveness.

12

Making the departmental link between

RESEARCH AND TEACHING

Departments can and should play a central role in enhancing research-teachingrelationships. There are many ways to achieve this, as this article explores.


Project LINK Linking Teaching with Research andConsultancy in the disciplines of Planning,Land and Property Management and Buildingis an FDTL project being undertaken byOxford Brookes University, The University ofthe West of England, University ofWestminster and Sheffield Hallam University,into the what, where and how of “LinkingTeaching with Research and Consultancy inthe disciplines of Planning, Land and PropertyManagement and Building”. As well asproducing a portfolio of effective practiceregarding course design it is also shapingdepartmental and institutional policies thatsupport productive relationships betweenresearch and teaching. Further informationcan be found at:www.brookes.ac.uk/schools/planning/LTRC/

ROGER ZETTER, Deputy Head School of Planning, Oxford Brookes University

StrategiesBuilding on the SWOT analysis, a valuable next stageis to carry out a detailed audit of teachingprogrammes and research. This should provide asystematic review of how and where departmentalresearch feeds into teaching programmes and howeffectively it is integrated. It should also reviewprogramme design and structure and curriculumcontent and programme delivery, to identify how thestudent experience of teaching and learning is linkedto research.

Departments should also review their learning andteaching and research strategies and committeestructures, ensuring that these are complementary andtogether address and strengthen the teaching-researchlinks. These strategies should set objectives to: • enhance the curriculum to make more explicit

research-led and research-based elements• integrate research-based/led learning • develop the profile of pedagogic research. The critical question here is - ‘How does yourdepartment’s learning and teaching strategy articulatelinks between teaching and learning and research?’

Staff resourcesThe relationship between teaching and research willonly be developed if academic staff are committed tothis relationship, and are supported by enablingstructures and resources.

Division between research and lecturing staff isfrequently asserted to be the biggest barrier toenhancing teaching-research links – a division whichthe RAE is thought to compound. Another frequentassertion is that good researchers are not necessarilygood lecturers, and vice versa. We might all recognisethese stereotypical beliefs; some of us may sharethem. However, there is little systematic evidence toconfirm them.

Departments can be proactive in challenging theseassumptions and myths, and in developing coherentstrategies to enhance the nexus. Better cohesion canbe achieved by harmonizing teaching teams andresearch clusters, for example by:

• enabling and encouraging all staff to join researchclusters

• requiring clusters and teams to develop coherentstrategies for both research and teaching activities,and the links between them

• ensuring that research clusters and teaching teamsuse programme development and review to enhancethe synergies.

Equally important will be to review staff developmentpolicies, for example by:• ensuring that research-teaching links are nurtured

through staff development policies• using workload planning to encourage more

integrated management of teaching and research • encouraging staff to use sabbaticals to develop

research-based or research-led teaching• encouraging contract research staff to participate in

teaching • ensuring that senior researchers teach across

programme levels, helping to embed a research-ledteaching culture for students.

Curriculum and programmesIn the end, how effectively teaching and research arerelated can only be tested by the quality of theoutcomes. What is the student learning and teachingexperience? What are the longer-term benefits, interms of employability and of the critical awarenessand research skills demanded in a knowledge-basedsociety? Similar questions incidentally might be askedabout the ways teaching can enhance your research.

Beneficial outcomes are not automatic.Programmes need careful design and evaluation ifthey are to achieve these beneficial outcomes.

You could start with a ‘route map’ of the programmecontent, showing where and how research supportscontent and delivery. This will point up opportunities torevise or develop new programmes – or more likelymodules – which better incorporate staff research (i.e.research-led teaching), or ensure that

13

“ enhancing the relationship betweenresearch and teaching has to be created,planned and structured in a systematicway by departments”.


“ The link between research andteaching happens, or not, withindepartments and faculties”.

programmes/modules are more directly research-based.

Similarly, course teams can carry out a pedagogicaudit of their programmes. Here the focus might be ondelivery and assessment which involve research-process and problem-based methods of learning.Students can learn by investigating issues, framingquestions, solving problems, testing and interpretingevidence, by critical engagement with, and applicationof, research literature and reports. This simulates thestudent research process, and can be delivered ingroup and project work.

A specific part of the audit should focus on howresearch skills development takes place inprogrammes. This involves reviewing studentprogression in developing research skills, acquiringknowledge of research methods and demonstratingindependent research capacity. Much of this learningmight be incorporated directly into substantive modules.

Aim for inclusivity by seeking ways to engage studentsmore directly in the department’s research culture by: • making more information available to students on staff

research activities and output• focusing dissertation topics on staff research interests• encouraging student involvement in staff research and

consultancy.

Validation and annual programme review are useful toolsto assess the scale and effectiveness of research-teaching links. Departments can ensure that programmessatisfy generic outcomes, which enable students tounderstand, learn and benefit from research-basedinquiry, to acquire research skills, and to undertakeindependent research. Such reviews can clarify whereresearch skills are taught, practiced and assessed, and amore integrated delivery of research and scholarshipwithin all modules or units can be achieved, rather thanexclusively in those devoted to ‘research methods’.

It is the individual’s scholarly engagement with her or hissubject, and how this engagement is brought to thelecture room and research setting, that, above all,mediates the relationship between teaching and research.In seeking to enhance the relationship between teaching

and research, it is vital toallow for, indeed toencourage, diversity ofpractice. But therelationship will not developautomatically - it needsstrategies, resources andwell designed teachingprogrammes.

A list of references relating to thisarticle can be found atwww.exchange.ac.uk

14 Making the departmental link between research and teaching

“… encourage staff to usesabbaticals to develop research-based or research-led teaching”.


“A specific part of theaudit should focus onhow research skillsdevelopment takes placein programmes”.

Knowledge creation is no longer the preserveof the universities. In the applied subjects ofarchitecture, construction and urban

planning - as with medicine, education and social work- useful knowledge is created on the job as much as itis in the research lab, lecturer’s office or classroom.This has always been the case, albeit not alwaysrecognised. What is new is the fast-growing complexityof knowledge and its applications, and the widespreadavailability of advanced infrastructure to support homeand industry-based learning. In this kind ofenvironment, teaching and research need to beinextricably linked. Students, teachers andprofessionals in the workplace are all learners andresearchers as well as teachers.

The world of practiceTeachers of construction law, property management,materials, urban design, transport systems andhousing policy have to research the world of practiceeach year to keep up-to-date. Most course work in thebuilt environment disciplines uses ‘real-world’ cases and students learn to use the quick and dirtyresearch methods that they will apply when working asprofessionals. Students and teachers research andlearn together through live projects, study visits,simulations, design studios, consultancy and visitingspeakers. Practising architects, planners, surveyors

and project managers discover knowledgehaphazardly on the job, and reflect systematicallythrough continuing professional development. Theyexchange knowledge with students and teachers viawork placements, project supervision and the reportsthey write.

Academic research is mostly applied, offeringreflection, critical analysis and experimentation. Theoutcomes of this academic research are rarely toocomplicated for undergraduates to understand, andtend to find their way into curricula as illustrations anddiscussion material.

In these vocational subjects there is, then, a naturalfluidity at the boundaries between teaching andresearch; between doing, discovering, learning anddisseminating. Fluidity can be messy. The messiness

gets greater as knowledge expands and fragmentsinto multiple specialisms. This messiness poseschallenges for both research and teaching. Forresearch, the challenge is, first, how to bring disciplineto a research field that is highly topic-oriented andinformed by diverse theoretical perspectives, and,

: a fresh approach 15

Disciplines shape the relationships betweenteaching and research. The following series of threearticles explore some of the variety of practice. First we examine the perspective of the builtenvironment disciplines.

“ Students, teachers and professionals inthe workplace are all learners andresearchers as well as teachers”


Constructing the teaching-research link in the

Built Environment disciplines

CHRIS WEBSTER, Professor of Urban Planning, Cardiff University

1

secondly, how to do this in a way that keeps thebigger picture - in the end, an applied picture - in mind.For teaching, on the other hand, the challenge is howto sample from an ever-expanding knowledge base -including the fruits of academic research - to create acoherent curriculum and learning experience that botheducates and trains.

Creating synergiesThe danger for a vocational subject is that teachingand research interests tackle the challenges ofcomplexity and messiness in incongruent ways, andlose the synergy that gives their subject coherence.Professional accreditation bodies, of which there aremany in the Built Environment, tend to address theknowledge problem by prescribing content. This caneasily lead to curriculum ‘creep’; that is animpoverishment of the educational experience and adistancing of teaching and research.

On non-accredited courses, and where professionsare less prescriptive, there is greater scope foracademics to align research and teaching interestsand for curricula to evolve more naturally. If academicshave no incentive to correct this alignment to the

needs of industry, however, then academyand industry move further apart. Industryand the professions hit back by calling theacademy to the negotiating table (as iscurrently the case in the constructionindustry, architecture and planning).Academics plead that they are captives ofthe RAE and, perhaps, of their university’smission.

Getting an incentive structure right for ahealthy teaching-research balance isdifficult enough. Designing one to rescuethe naturally creative partnership betweenthe academy and industry withoutcompromising teaching and researchexcellence is more difficult still. Outcomesfrom well-intentioned incentive schemesare famously perverse. Those BuiltEnvironment professions currently talkingabout relinquishing control over thecurriculum may have it right. A universitydepartment with a commitment to avocational mission will need its owninternal incentives to align teaching and

research with its mission, and its own mechanisms foradjusting its mission to the changing needs ofstudents, industry and academic staff.

16 Constructing the teaching-research link in the built environment disciplines

An example of integration - student teams andSunderland City Council Part of the spine of the Environmental Studies Degree at theUniversity of Sunderland is a set of integrative ‘EnvironmentalIssues’ modules. The second semester delivery of thesemodules brings together students from levels one, two andthree for a ‘local sustainability’ project. The students work insmall research groups looking at various aspects ofsustainable development, in collaboration with Sunderland CityCouncil. In 2000 each group was set the task of producing asustainability profile for one of Sunderland’s wards.

There was a differentiation of roles and learning outcomesbetween levels:• level three students were directed to take a lead in the

project management and research design• level two students led in data analysis and shaping data

collection strategies• level one students led in fieldwork and basic research.

Each student team was required to submit a 5000 wordjoint report on their particular ward and to present their findingsat a public conference attended by City councillors, externalpartners and invited members of their local communities.


17

Placing student research projects within theundergraduate course creates a direct linkbetween staff research interests and students’

learning experiences. What are the benefits andchallenges of such projects for students and staff?With colleagues, I carried out an investigation into theimpact of final year undergraduate research projectswithin several science departments, based at my owninstitution, to find some answers. The departmentsinvolved provided all their final year students with aresearch project experience, for example empiricalwork in the laboratory, analysis of a computerdatabase, fieldwork or a theoretical analysis project.

Contributing to departmental research Several features of student research projectssupported departmental research efforts. For thoselecturers working within large research groups, thepresence of undergraduates provided an opportunityfor PhD students to gain valuable professionaldevelopment skills through their involvement in theday-to-day supervision of students. Havingundergraduates come through research groups alsoprovided a stream of potential PhD students for thegroup. Furthermore, we found several instances wherestudent research projects resulted in co-authoredacademic publications.

Of course, these benefits come at a price. Theinvolvement of students in research generatessignificant challenges. Many lecturers reportedspending considerable time in guiding students,

particularly when PhD students were not available tosupport supervision. Student laboratory projects alsodrained limited financial resources, with costscompensated only partially by income from theteaching budget. A few students required considerablesupport, and were disruptive, rather than supportive,of the lecturer’s research effort.

The student experienceMany students said that their research project hadgiven them a fascinating insight into cutting edgeresearch. “It’s your little baby (…) you do get reallyinterested in one particular branch, little aspect ofscience. Whereas if you’re working on differentexperiments every week, every session, it’s justanother experiment isn’t it? (…) [With project work] youdo get into what you’re doing. We all did, I think,” saidone final year science undergraduate.

Analysis of student learning over the project periodshowed that many students had transformed theirview of how science research works. In particular,there was much more recognition that scienceadvances through research programmes involvingglobal networks of scientists often working on

“Analysis of student learning over theproject period showed that many studentshad transformed their view of how scienceresearch works”.


JIM RYDER, Lecturer in Centre for Studies in Science and Mathematics Education, School of Education, University of Leeds

The second article in our seriesexamines teaching and research fromthe viewpoint of the science subjects.

OF MUTUAL BENEFIT? Research projects in the undergraduate science course

2

18 Of mutual benefit? Research projects in the undergraduate science course

competing ideas. Project work also gave students a

sense of ownership and responsibility thatmotivated them. Significantly, manystudents stated that their project work hadinformed career decisions about whetheror not to pursue postgraduate researchopportunities.

The open-ended and long-term nature ofproject work presented all students withconsiderable challenges. Many becamedisillusioned at some point during theirproject with what they perceived to be alack of progress. In particular, the difficultyof getting reliable results in scienceresearch was a shock for students used tocarefully designed practical activities withinlaboratory courses.

Worth the effort?Research projects provided the majority ofstudents in our study with a learningexperience that synthesised, and showedthe relevance of, much of their previousundergraduate study. Despite, or perhapsbecause of, the challenges they faced,many students found research work thehighlight of their undergraduateexperience. Of course, departments mustconsider the resource and workloadimplications of such projects. I havehighlighted from our study some of theunique benefits for students and staff thatprojects can provide. Can alternativeactivities provide these benefits? If not, arewe prepared for these learningopportunities to be lost from theundergraduate course?


Examples from elsewhere:A student research Journal at ChesterBiological Science staff at Chester College have developed Origin – AJournal of Undergraduate Research in the Biological Sciences, which: • annually publishes representative examples of research by students in

the department • gives “motivated students the opportunity to publish their findings by

providing a rigorous but supportive review and editorial process”• is supported by the LTSN Bioscience.More information is available at www.chester.ac.uk/origin/Many US universities have similar web-based student journals.

Developing disciplinary understanding at University College LondonIn term one, year one all students in the geography course at UniversityCollege London do a project which aims to develop understanding ofdoing geographical research. The basic procedures are:• each first year tutorial group is allocated a member of staff who is not

their tutor • that member of staff gives to their tutorial groups three pieces of writing

which are representative of their work and their CV, and arranges a datefor the interview

• before the interview, students read these materials and develop aninterview schedule.On the basis of their reading and the interview, each student individually

writes a 1500 word report on a) the objectives of the interviewee’sresearch; b) how the interviewee’s research relates to his or her earlierstudies and c) how the interviewee’s research relates to his or herteaching, other interests and geography as a whole.

Women writers on the web at the University of ManchesterThe Corvey Women Writers on the Web Project based at Sheffield HallamUniversity supports students doing and publishing research.• Largely funded through the UK Arts and Humanities Research Board, the

Corvey Project is developing a database of Romantic era women writersand selected texts.

• This research resource is specially designed to support students inresearching and publishing using this material. An electronic journalCorinne (Undergraduate Research on Romantic-Era Literature) supportsstudents and staff publishing their research.

• Dissertation students adopt a text or author and produce an individuallynegotiated portfolio of work which contains source documents indigitised form, a literary historical survey and a critical analysis.

More information is available at www.shu.ac.uk/corvey

“… many students foundresearch work the highlight oftheir undergraduate experience”.


19

In health care, there is generalprofessional consensus that evidence-based practice is good practice. The

idea is not new. Professional bodiesrequire their members to remain up-to-date. This implies knowing currentresearch, developing new skills andmodifying practice to take account ofadvancing technological and scientificpossibilities. What is new, however, is thatevidence-based practice strengthens thelink between research and practice, andchallenges practitioners to be clear aboutthe basis for their professional judgementsand actions. Evidence-based care,moreover, promises to discipline theroutinisation and habituation of practice,the trap of continuing to do what hasalways been done because it has alwaysbeen done that way.

What are the implications of the rise ofevidence-based practice for medical andhealth sciences curricula at undergraduate,pre and post-registration levels?

Learning how to learn The rate of scientific advances requireshealth practitioners to be self-directedlearners who know how to learn. In health

care, so much changes, so quickly, thateducators must ‘future–proof’ training. Thismeans building, at pre and post-registration levels, students’ capacity todefine their individual learning needs andsearch out appropriate training. Thisreview of the vision of the practitioner as aself-directed learner is very relevant to theemphasis on evidence-based practice.Both challenge traditional approaches inmedical and health sciences education,which have valued committing ‘facts’ tomemory, and instead assert theimportance of critical thinking.

Linking research, teaching andpracticeCardiology provides an illuminatingexample of how health practitionersexperience the challenge of changing theirpractice over time. Fifty-year-old consultantcardiologists, and their seniors now

“Evidence-based care cannotresolve, and may onlyinform, how dilemmasmight be managed”.


ANNE MCKEE, Research Fellow, LTSN Health Sciences and Practice Subject Centre, Kings University London

EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE IN

HEALTH SCIENCES

The final article in our series examines theteaching and research issue from the point ofview of the health sciences.3

20 Evidence-based practice in health sciences

practice quite differently from how they didwhen they trained. Research has extendedthe possible range of interventions, andhas developed understanding about howbest to manage heart disease.Cardiologists have had to develop newskills, change their practice and continueto learn. A key part of the change processhas been their ability to make professionaljudgements. Research sometimes pointsin opposite directions. The benefits andside effects of new treatments take time toestablish. Familiar health care approachesare not easily or quickly replaced, often forgood reasons. Practitioners must operatewithin resource constraints and, at times,with competing views about what shouldbe done for the patient. Evidence-basedcare cannot always resolve, and may onlyinform, how dilemmas might be managed.Health practitioners must learn to copewith clinical uncertainty and make theprofessional judgements for which they areaccountable.

Linking teaching with research supportsprofessional judgement by allowingpractitioners to develop critical thinking,review research and also its applicability topatients. Research requires that a problembe framed as a question, that aninvestigation be appropriately designed,evidence analysed and recommendationsfor future action made. These processesand abilities support life-long learning, andenable practitioners to judge, rather thanjust comply with, the results of research.

What counts as evidence or research? Evidence-based care, and how it is taught,together have the potential to enhanceprofessional judgement. However, they arenot the new panacea for the education ofhealth professionals. This is particularly trueif, as sometimes happens, evidence isdefined narrowly, to exclude the growingbody of qualitative educational literature onthe impact of informal learning on practiceand decision-making. Informal learning is

learning gained outside classroom andlecture situations. In health sciences,informal learning tends to be gained inworkplace settings through occupationalexperience. Educationalists have beeninterested for some time in defining thenature of non-formal or experiential learning,and in exploring its role in decision-makingprocesses. Professional decision-making isinformed by both formal and informalknowledge. We will better serve healthpractitioners by educating them about therole of both in shaping practice.

In summary, evidence-based care has avaluable contribution to make in educatinghealth professionals for the demands ofreal practice. If evidence is definednarrowly, it may exclude from review theimpact of workplace learning and culturesupon practice. Evidence-based carestrengthens the drive towards curriculathat emphasise the development of criticalthinking and learning how to learn.


“Professional decision-making is informed byboth formal and informalknowledge”.


Linking teaching and research in thedisciplinesThis national project for the Learning and Teaching Support NetworkGeneric Centre involves: • exploring how to embed teaching-research links in disciplinary

communities • the creation of generic support materials to help further embed

teaching-research links in disciplinary communities• support materials to include a web site with links to international

projects working on the teaching research nexus; a guide tosupport making strong linkages in departments and a range ofworkshop materials for others to adapt

• embedding teaching-research links in five LTSN Subject Centresdisciplinary communities initially: Bioscience; Geography, Earth andEnvironmental Sciences; Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism;and Law; and recently extended to include English and Medicine

• providing a framework, ideas and strategies that will also supportother LTSN Subject Centres in developing such links.

More information is available atwww.ltsn.ac.uk/genericcentre/projects.asp

21

Twelve third-year students at theUniversity of East Anglia (UEA)collaborated with academic staff(including myself) and the StudentsUnion on the ‘Research-Led Teaching

and Learning in Higher Education’ project based at thesame institution. The aim was to investigateundergraduates’ experience of the relationshipbetween teaching and research in their university.

Experience of research-rich environmentGenerally, we found that students valued highly theexperience of studying in a research-rich environment.Undergraduates reported many examples andillustrations of what they considered an essentialrelationship between research and teaching. Theseexamples also revealed a range of different views asto what constitutes research. It was clear that, formany new students, their initial views were often toassociate ‘research’ with laboratory research (‘men inwhite coats’). But this early assumption was graduallyoverlain with other images, and with a deeperunderstanding of research, as they progressedthrough their undergraduate careers.

Research-based teachingA key distinction was made between teaching whichsimply placed students as audiences of the researchcarried out by their teachers and teaching which

“A key distinction was madebetween teaching which simplyplaced students as audiences of theresearch carried out by theirteachers and that teaching whichengaged students directly inresearch activity …”


What do students think

ABOUT RESEARCH?Students can develop a more sophisticatedunderstanding of the role of research inuniversities - particularly if they are helped toproduce as well as consume research. Thisarticle explores the benefits to all.

BARBARA ZAMORSKI, Centre for Applied Research in Education (CARE), School of Education and Professional Development, University of East Anglia

22 What do students think about research?

engaged students directly in research activity, theformer being more common than the latter in somedisciplines. This distinction was critically important tomany students. If universities really want to build aninclusive research culture, and to develop the appetiteof today’s undergraduates to become tomorrow’sresearch students, then they should do more to initiatestudents into the processes of research in theirundergraduate years.

Intention and perceptionThere was evidence of a gap between university policyintention and student perceptions. In particular, therewere some ways in which, in practice, undergraduatesfelt excluded from the ‘research community’. While theneed to better understand the links between researchand teaching and learning was important to students,this was not something they were always explicitly‘taught’. Rather it emerged slowly as a personalrealisation. As one reported, research ‘does not jumpout and grab you. If you are looking for it however, youwill find it. Open your eyes to research and it will nolonger be at the background, but will be at theforeground of everything you see and do’.

The complete research process was often invisibleto undergraduates. The partial picture they had, fromits visual signs or traces, could be, and often were,misread and misunderstood by them. Most had a poorgrasp of the nature of academic work. Although theyclearly appreciated the idea of the university as astrong and active research community, in which theymight be included, few were aware of the full range ofsectors and activities of the university, or of therelationship between intellectual capital gained throughresearch and other resources (human and financial).

A better understandingThe student researchers in the project suggested thatfuller knowledge of these aspects of university lifemight help better understanding of the role ofresearch in the wider curriculum by undergraduates,and thus provide them with access to a morecomplete and valuable learning experience. As onestudent researcher finally commented, ‘Although thiswould not have bothered me before I came touniversity, studying at UEA has made me realise howstagnant and narrow-focused study would be withoutthe aid of research. Research keeps things alive andallows ideas and knowledge to progress and moveforward’.


‘Open your eyes to research and it willno longer be at the background butwill be at the foreground of everythingyou see and do’.

Another study of student awareness ofresearch in their universityIn a recent survey of almost 200 students at theUniversity of Gloucestershire, only just over halfwere aware of books, journal articles and otherforms of research and consultancy outputproduced by staff in the university. However, thepositive aspects of staff involvement in research -increasing understanding, or stimulating interestand enthusiasm - were identified by students almostfive times as frequently as possible negativeaspects, such as lack of availability of staff, orapparent lack of interest of staff in teaching andfacilitating learning.


23

Programme and the Higher Education Funding Councilfor England’s (HEFCE’s) Fund for the Development ofTeaching and Learning, most Learning and TeachingSubject Networks offer seed-corn funding for localprojects of research and development. Manyuniversities provide internal funding for academicswanting to research their teaching. And a significantnumber of educational development units areencouraging practitioner research within programmesof professional development.

There has been a long tradition ofteachers researching their practice inthe compulsory sector. By contrast,practitioner research into universityteaching and learning is relatively new.

Doubtless this is due in part to the kind of researchthat typically is rewarded in higher education. Thehitherto homogenous and educationally privilegednature of British student populations may also havediscouraged pedagogic research. However,accompanying the substantial changes in numbers,academic preparation, background and needs ofthose now entering our universities, we can trace aturn to higher educational research and developmentto support these changes. This turn includes thegrowing provision of funding for research partnershipswhich involve practitioner research.

FundingBesides major national research or developmentprojects, such as the Economic and Social ResearchCouncil (ESRC) Teaching and Learning Research

“… practitioner research intouniversity teaching and learning isrelatively new”.

Turning the light on ourselves:

researching pedagogic practice and policy


LIZ BEATY, Director, (Learning and Teaching), the HEFCEGLYNIS COUSIN, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Higher Education Development, Coventry University

One of a pair of articles which show how research andteaching can be linked by lecturers and educationaldevelopers researching pedagogic practice and policy.1

24 Turning the light on ourselves

Practitioner research and cultures of inquiryPractitioner research sometimes clashes withdiscipline-based cultures of inquiry which valueresearcher objectivity, which often means researcherdistance from the object of study. In our experience,many academic colleagues express an initial anxietythat intimacy with the research site must bringproblems of bias. However, this anxiety appears to bediminishing as colleagues begin to appreciate thatusing their own practice as a laboratory enables themto conduct what Schon in The Reflective Practitionercalls ‘frame analysis’. This involves them becomingaware of the frame within which they practice in orderto develop an awareness of other frames. Whatelevates this analysis to research is its subjection torigorous, public enquiry. This can be done fruitfully inpartnerships between subject specialists andeducational specialists.

Partnership researchHigher education research partnerships betweeneducationalists and subject specialists are very rich

because they createpowerful dialoguesbetween different fieldsof inquiry, allowing eachto learn from the other.Two examples withwhich we are involvedare the Geography,Earth and EnvironmentalSciences SubjectNetwork’s ‘Enhancingthe quality of fieldworkthrough pedagogicresearch’ project fundedby the LTSN and theESRC funded ‘EnhancingTeaching and Learningin UndergraduateEducation’ project. In

both these projects of co-inquiry, we are working withcolleagues who are interrogating their professionalpractice in a mutual quest to understand more aboutthe nature of their subjects from a pedagogicperspective. In our view, the prospects for an enrichedas well as expanded university sector depend on acultural shift that values practitioner research withinthese kind of interdisciplinary partnerships.


“Higher education researchpartnerships between educationalistsand subject specialists are very richbecause they create powerful dialoguesbetween different fields of inquiry,allowing each to learn from the other”.


25

Afew weeks ago I was investigatingwhat people understood by research-led teaching and what theirinstitutions were doing to bringresearch and teaching together. I

was astonished when the head of one educationaldevelopment centre said: “We’re not concerned withresearch. We’re just here to do teaching development!”

Taking research seriouslyIt’s true there was a time when educational developerscould focus on teaching and forget about research.Those days are now gone. Developers are having totake research seriously because universities, whetheror not they are ‘research-intensive,’ are seeking tobring research and teaching closer together.

In today’s accountability context, data-hungryacademic managers need to make decisions on thebasis of evidence. For example, what has focused theminds of deans in my own institution on the need for

TOWARDS RESEARCH-LED

Educational development

changes in teaching is the data on students’ experiencewhich we, the educational developers, have collected.Developers need to be ready to respond to managers’requests for data, which means taking research intoteaching and students’ learning experiences seriously.

Graduate certificates in higher education teaching, ILTmemberships, FDTL funded projects on teachingdevelopment and the like all mean that teaching isbecoming more scholarly. Academics are more andmore encouraged to use coherent theories of teachingand learning, and to make curricular decisions on thebasis of evidence. They are demonstrating their use ofscholarly processes in teaching award schemes andpromotion. Educational developers cannot just sit on thesidelines. Unless they, too, take research seriously, theywill not have credibility.

Evidence-based educational developmentThis means that educational development has itself tobe evidence-based. If teachers are going to engage inthe scholarship of teaching, educational developersmust exemplify this. This means doing research which isuseful in academic development work, and usingresearch, explicitly, in development activities.

One aspect of research-led teaching that is growingfast is inquiry-based learning. One variant of this,problem-based learning, has been around for some time


ANGELA BREW, Senior Lecturer, Institute for Teaching and Learning, University of Sydney

The second of a pair of articles which show how researchand teaching can be linked by lecturers and educationaldevelopers researching pedagogic practice and policy.2

26 Towards research-led educational development

in medical and professional fields. It is now spreadingthrough undergraduate education more generally. Inproblem-based learning, the curriculum is organisedaround the process of research. Unless educationaldevelopers take research seriously, they are unable tosupport academics as they implement theseapproaches.

Importantly, developers have a role in generatingdiscussions about the possibilities for research andwhat it might become. There are lots of thingsdevelopers know about good teaching which could beused to enhance research. For example, goodcommunication has long been considered important inteaching, and is now being recognised in scientificresearch. And reflective practice, which is arecognised part of professional higher educationteaching, is now becoming increasingly important inresearch.

Many developers are ill-prepared for thesechallenges. They feel distant from academic research,and are often sceptical about how it can dovetail withtheir practice. Many are not skilled in doing research.But they must now become credible researchers inorder to be credible as agents for change. They musttake research seriously. Universities are working tomake teaching research-led. Developers must work tomake educational development research-led, too.


“… educational development has itself to be evidence-based”.

Linking research and teaching:A GUIDE TO KEY READING

Boyer, E. L. (1990) Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of theProfessoriate. New Jersey: The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancementof Teaching. This seminal book argues that the emphasis in US universities on‘discovery research’ has been at the expense of more integrativescholarship and connecting research to student learning.

Brew, A. (2001) The Nature of Research: Inquiry in Academic Contexts.London: Routledge Falmer. A study of the nature of research, this book argues for a much widerperspective on what is research and discusses the implications forteaching-research links.

Jenkins, A., Breen, R., Lindsay, R. and Brew, A. (2002) ReshapingTeaching in Higher Education: Linking Teaching and Research. London:Kogan Page and the Staff and Educational Development Association A range of strategies, to strengthen teaching-research links is presented,strategies that individuals, course teams, departments / institutions andnational systems can adapt. International examples are included and theresearch evidence is reviewed.

Jenkins, A. and Zetter, R. (2002) Linking Teaching and Research inDepartments. York: Learning and Teaching Support Network GenericCentre.Suggestions are provided for those with department leadership roles forresearch and teaching.

The Boyer Commission on Educating Undergraduates in theResearch University (1998) Reinventing Undergraduate Education: ABlueprint for America’s Research Universities. New York:, Stony BrookState University of New York. (naples.cc.sunysb.edu/Pres/boyer.nsf)Suggestions are offered, particularly for research elite universities, onconnecting staff research to student learning.

Zubrick, A., Reid, I., & Rossiter, P. (2001) Strengthening the Nexusbetween Teaching and Research. Canberra: Department of Education,Training and Youth Affairs.(www.detya.gov.au/highered/eippubs/eip01_2/default.htm) Descriptions are given of how three contrasting institutions (research eliteUniversity of Western Australia, regional/access-led University of Ballarat,and professionally-led Curtin University) formulated strategies tostrengthen the nexus between research and teaching in the context oftheir particular institutional missions.


27OpinionLinking Research and Teaching

“ ”Let’s stop trying to

separatethe inseparable

The case for maintaining the linkbetween teaching and research canbe simply stated: you cannotcommunicate knowledge withoutadding to it, and you cannot add to

knowledge without communicating it. Every act ofexposition, every dialogue with a student, has thepotential for creating new insights; and all researchfindings must be communicated (the wider the better).

The conventional view holds that the separation ofteaching and research is inevitable, because it enablesboth activities to become more ‘professional’. Thisview must be challenged. The conventional view isonly true if professionalism is defined in reductionistterms which diminish the creative potential of bothteaching and research. The parallel view thatdifferentiation between teaching and researchuniversities (code-name: ‘Operation Diversity’) isequally inevitable must also be challenged; both typesof university, not simply those that concentrate onteaching, would be incomplete.

These views need to be challenged more stronglythan ever in the light of the Higher Education FundingCouncils’ recent decision to commission a ‘majorreview’ of the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE).The main purpose of this review, of course, is for the

funding councils to be seen to be responding to thecriticisms of the RAE 2001 – or, rather, of its fundingoutcomes. After all it is barely three years since thelast ‘fundamental review’ of the RAE. No change then;not much now? Certainly this latest review is no morelikely than the last to question the need to maintaintwo separate regimes, for research and for teaching.

Valuing the linkOn the contrary, the traditional arguments forassociating teaching and research are stronger thanever. High-quality teaching must be informed byresearch – in two different senses.

The first argument is that effective teachers mustcultivate habits of self-critical reflection, on what theyteach and how they teach it. This does not mean thatall higher education teachers must be engaged inresearch ‘of national/international significance’, toadopt the language of the RAE. However,condescending references to ‘scholarship’ (reading thebooks that other people write) or to ‘keeping up-to-

In our knowledge-intensive society, we are allboth teachers and researchers. The presentseparation between teaching and researchdamages both, argues Peter Scott.

“… the traditional arguments forassociating teaching and researchare stronger than ever”.

PETER SCOTT, Vice-Chancellor, Kingston University

28 Opinion Linking Research and Teaching

date’ are inadequate descriptions of this professionalresponsibility.

The second argument is that best practice inteaching (and assessment) is increasingly based onresearch techniques such as student projects andgroup assignments. Not only teachers but also theirstudents must be researchers.

The right of universities to award their own degreesand determine their own academic programmes (witha little ‘help’ from professional bodies and, now, QualityAssurance Agency benchmarks, frameworks andguide-lines) must be rooted in an intellectual authoritythat can only be derived from research and scholarlyactivity. The proliferation of new courses andqualifications, such as Foundation Degrees, and ofnew modes of delivery and learning environments,such as web-based learning management systems or

work-based learning, increases rather than diminishesthe need for such authority.

A knowledge-intensive societyThese now traditional arguments, suitablymodernised, have been reinforced by new argumentsderived from the changing constitutions of knowledgeand of society itself.

First, knowledge production is now much morewidely distributed. It takes place anywhere andeverywhere – in the community, or the company, aswell as the academy, or the laboratory; and certainlyin the classroom and lecture-hall. Just as it hasbecome difficult to disentangle knowledge producersfrom knowledge users, so it is now difficult to say whois ‘teacher’ and who is ‘researcher’.

Secondly, in a knowledge-intensive society we allhave to be ‘researchers’, just as in learning (orintelligent) organisations we all have to be ‘teachers’.The signs are everywhere – from the rise of ‘evidence-based’ public policy to instant access to ‘expert’information on the Internet. Universities have beenslow to adapt to this new, more flexible and reflexive,environment. There is a risk that, if higher educationcontinues to insist on ever-more rigid professional and

institutional demarcations (contrary to its own valuesand traditions), it will become part of an ‘old economy’of knowledge – and suffer the same fate as other ‘oldeconomies’.

“Not only teachers but also theirstudents must be researchers”.

“…you cannot communicate knowledgewithout adding to it, and you cannot add toknowledge without communicating it”.

29OpinionLinking Research and Teaching

”“I

nstitutions have, for many years, beenfunded separately for research and teaching.Whilst this makes for a number ofartificialities, institutions have generally beenable to cope with these. But the position is

now more serious for those who want to see a closerrelationship between research and teaching. Why?Because neither of the assessment methods, forresearch or for teaching, looks at how institutionsdevelop and manage the relationship betweenresearch and teaching.

The arrangements for assessing teaching qualityare marginally better than those for research. One ortwo QAA continuation audit reports have commented(adversely as it happens) on institutions’ claims aboutthe benefits of staff research for student learning.Moreover, the new Framework for Higher EducationQualifications makes the explicit assumption thathonours level work will be taught by staff who arethemselves engaged in research and scholarship, andfurther that the extent to which this happens can bechecked through future institutional audits.

RAE impactsBy contrast, the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE)contains no provision for evaluating the impact of the

RESEARCH AND TEACHING –

repairing thedamage

National policies and fundingarrangements have variously weakenedand ignored links between research andteaching. This article explores what can bedone to restore these links.

Rejecting a link…HEFCE’s Review of Research (2000) notes that“Despite the evidence of a synergistic relationshipbetween teaching and research, we make norecommendation about this: it would be wrong toallow teaching issues to influence the allocation offunds for research”.

… and encouraging a linkStaff seeking individual entry to the ILT since 1August 2002 are required to demonstrate evidencethat “you … have actively sought opportunities tocreate links between your teaching or support forlearners and your research and scholarly activity orrelevant professional engagement”.

The Quality Assurance Agency’s degree-leveldescriptors state the “an Honours graduate willhave developed an understanding of a complexbody of knowledge, some of it at the currentboundaries of an academic discipline. Through this,the graduate will have developed analyticaltechniques and problem-solving skills …. (and) beable to evaluate evidence, arguments andassumptions, to reach sound judgements”.

ROGER BROWN, Principal, Southampton Institute

30

research being assessed on other activities. Moreimportantly, there is ample evidence that the exercisehas reinforced the conventional lack of parity ofesteem between research and teaching of which thereis such abundant, and continuing, evidence. The RAEhas also damaged curriculum innovation. If we are tobegin to encourage re-connections between researchand teaching, therefore, it is surely with the RAE, orany successor exercise, that we should start.

Options for linkingThere are various options here. It would be particularlyattractive to require institutions to show, as part oftheir bids for research funding:• how they manage research to ensure that teaching

at all levels benefits from staff involvement inresearch, including research into student learning

• how any possible negative consequences of staffresearch, such as staff absences on sabbaticals, areminimised

• how effective synergies are developed between theinstitution’s research and learning and teachingstrategies.

More generally, any future arrangements for fundingand assessing research should strive to strengthen

the link between research and teaching rather thanweaken it. In particular, if research funds are to berestricted to elite units, departments or institutions,consideration should be given to establishing specialfunding streams for scholarships, for staff orinstitutions outside these flows. This would help ensurethat scholarship functions effectively as the vital linkbetween research and teaching as suggested in theHEFCE’s Fundamental Review of Research Policy andFunding in 2000.

The relationship between research and teaching is aserious matter. We should be serious about it.


Opinion Linking Research and Teaching

“If we are to begin to encourage re-connectionsbetween research and teaching, therefore, it issurely with the RAE, or any successor exercise,that we should start”.

” …any future arrangements forfunding and assessing researchshould serve to strengthen the linkbetween research and teachingrather than weaken it…”

Meanwhile, in other countries:In the USA, The National Science Foundationprovides competitive awards to institutions,departments and individuals for developingteaching-research links.

The 1996 Hong Kong RAE explicitly valued theproduction of textbooks and e-learning.

In 2000, New Zealand’s Academic Audit Unitaudited all universities for how they linked researchand teaching, and studied the effects of this link.

Hopefully the further review of the RAE can lookat these and other ideas.

31General Interest

Q uality enhancement and collaboration inlearning and teaching are both currentlyhigh on higher education’s national

agenda. During the spring and summer of this year,the Teaching Quality Enhancement Committee(TQEC), chaired by Sir Ron Cooke, has beenconsidering the roles and relationships of the threemain agencies concerned with teaching qualityenhancement in higher education. The TQEC wasestablished by the Higher Education Funding Councilfor England (HEFCE), Universities UK and theStanding Conference of Principals (SCOP). Its briefis to make recommendations on ways to promoterelationships between the various qualityenhancement agencies and avoid unnecessaryoverlap in their areas of work. The three mainagencies included in the review are the HigherEducation Staff Development Agency (HESDA), theInstitute for Learning and Teaching in HigherEducation (ILTHE) and the Learning and TeachingSupport Network (LTSN).

The review is designed to dispel any confusion inthe HE community about what exactly theseagencies - working with other bodies concernedwith teaching and learning such as the TQEFNational Co-ordination Team (TQEF NCT) and theJISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) -actually do. The review will clarify the areas ofresponsibility of each agency and makerecommendations on how to support students, staffand institutions in achieving high quality education.But behind the plethora of acronyms there is alreadya great deal of synergy and positive collaborationbetween the agencies. Two of these (the ILTHE andLTSN) are among the partners in Exchange. Herewe report on three activities in which two or moreExchange partner organisations are co-operating.

Andrea Rayner describes moves to introduce more coherence into nationalteaching quality enhancement and examines some successful work beingundertaken through current collaborations.

MOVING FORWARDS in partnership

A RAPID track to collaboration in engineeringRAPID 2000 is a Fund for the Development of Teaching and Learning(FDTL) Phase 3 project co-ordinated by the NCT. It aims to promote skilldevelopment on undergraduate programmes in Civil & BuildingEngineering.

The success of such a project often requires the involvement ofacademics from other institutions. Dissemination is key, not only inengendering involvement but also in raising the profile of the project’s work.

RAPID 2000, of which I am Project Manager, has a particularadvantage - I share office accommodation with the LTSN Subject Centrefor Engineering. Having the support and advice of the relevant LTSNSubject Centre in your discipline is critical. When you are in the sameoffice as the source of that support and advice, so much the better!

How has RAPID 2000 benefited from working so closely with theSubject Centre? Here is one example. Recently, the Engineering SubjectCentre held a seminar for the Engineering Professors’ Council. At thisevent, the requirement to offer students a means of personaldevelopment planning (PDP) by the academic year 2005-06 wasdiscussed. Many present were totally unaware of this requirement. It wasagreed that I shall demonstrate the web-based PDP tool developedthrough RAPID 2000 at the next seminar for senior engineers.

The RAPID 2000 Project Director, John Dickens, is also the Director ofLTSN Engineering. John comments:

“LTSN Engineering has developed good working relationships withmost FDTL engineering projects. Our activities range from support onsteering groups to organising specific workshops. This collaborationbenefits both parties. Project Managers are helped by the provision ofeasy access to the academic community for dissemination. LTSNEngineering benefits by being able to incorporate the expertisedeveloped in the projects into our activities. This helps us at LTSNEngineering to deliver one of our main aims: enhancing the quality oflearning and teaching across engineering. Our relationship with the RAPID2000 project is an excellent example of this”.

ALAN MADDOCKS, RAPID 2000 Project Manager, Department ofCivil & Building Engineering, Loughborough University

32 Moving Forwards in PartnershipGeneral Interest

Learning to Work in the Built EnvironmentThe FDTL 3 project Learning to Work: Working to Learn is based in the Schools of Surveying, Architecture and Landscape atKingston University. The project has worked closely with the LTSN Subject Centre for Education in the Built Environment (CEBE),based at Cardiff University, since the project began in September 2000. Support for the project at all stages has come from boththe TQEF National Co-ordination Team (NCT) and CEBE.

The Learning to Work: Working to Learn project team is undertaking a number of pilot learning and teaching initiatives alldesigned to prepare architecture, landscape, planning and surveying students for their placements into professional practice.

The team has also delivered workshops to surveying practitioners who are responsible for supporting graduates already in theworkplace towards the attainment of professional qualifications. Andy Roberts of CEBE comments:

”We are increasingly facing demands, from the Government and from the built environment professions, for graduates whopossess the necessary skills for professional life. It is often inappropriate for these skills to be taught within the narrow confines ofacademia. Developing work-based partnerships between educators and practitioners can be more beneficial to the students. TheLearning to Work: Working to Learn projectprovides valuable resources in how thesepartnerships might be developed, which CEBEcan disseminate further”.

CEBE has assisted Learning to Work: Workingto Learn on a number of levels. These include:• disseminating research outputs through inviting

the project to deliver workshops at CEBEconferences. These workshops andconferences have provided excellent networkingopportunities

• disseminating pilot learning and teachinginitiatives, through articles in the CEBEnewsletter and through publicity for projectevents in the electronic newsletter

• providing information and contact details forinstitutions conducting related research work.This has helped the project team to avoidrepeating work already completed by others

• using the CEBE website as a dissemination toolfor project information and details of outputsand events.CEBE’s work in collating information on

learning, teaching and research from all BuiltEnvironment Schools has provided an invaluableresource for Learning to Work: Working to Learn,where a large amount of research, developmentand dissemination has been required in a shorttwo-year period.

PAUL SWANN, Project Manager, Learning toWork: Working to Learn, School of Architectureand Landscape, Kingston University

The UK Centre for Legal Education and the ILTHECollaborating with other agencies is a vital part of the work of the UKCentre for Legal Education (UKCLE), the LTSN’s Subject Centre forLaw. Collaboration enables the centre to draw widely on currentpractice, and to provide expertise and resources on aspects oflearning and teaching to the legal education community.

The UKCLE and the ILTHE have collaborated on several activities.In 2000 we were invited to submit an outline for a law-based book aspart of an ILTHE/Times Higher Education Supplement series entitled‘Effective Learning and Teaching’. The book was published by KoganPage in May this year and has been very well received. The chaptersaddress generic themes of professional practice, reflection,assessment and the use of information technology in teaching as wellas more specific aspects of teaching in law. Sally Brown at the ILTHEand Jonathan Simpson at Kogan Page helped us to strike a balancebetween theory and practice. The result is a genuine collaboration ofeffort and a development and sharing of ideas about what legaleducation can be.

In addition, UKCLE has enjoyed taking part in the annual ILTHEConference (ILTAC). ILTAC enables the Centre to disseminateinformation, meet new people, share ideas and make links withprojects. Over the last three years, the Centre has presented sessionsat ILTAC, together with other LTSN Subject Centres and staff fromother HE institutions. Topics have included personal developmentplanning and challenges for professional training. The diversity andinternational make-up of the participants at ILTAC means that we gainfeedback from a number of disciplines as well as an insight into globalperspectives.

KAREN HINETT, Education Developer, UK Centre for LegalEducation, University of Warwick

33Feature on a Fellow

fellowship holderthis issue: anthony rosie

Living the life of a

Anthony Rosie, who won a National TeachingFellowship in 2001, writes on how theFellowship has had an impact on his teaching.

When I won my National TeachingFellowship in 2001, my initial euphoria atwinning was quickly tempered by

questions and concerns. How would my project fare? Would students and

colleagues expect me to be different because I wasnow a National Teaching Fellowship winner?

Just over a year later, I can reflect on twelve monthsthat did not go quite according to plan but a time inwhich I learned a great deal of benefit to me in mywork with students.

Starting a projectMy project is on peer tutoring and the use of on-lineenvironments in students support. By late September2001, ten second-year Social Science students hadvolunteered and been trained to act as peer mentorsto new first-year Social Science students on a face-to-face basis. A good, fast start, I felt. Yet the first trial in2001-02 did not work out quite as we planned.

Very few first-year students came to the peermentoring sessions. Why? We had publicised peermentoring in different ways, while academic tutors hadalso encouraged first-years to take part in the project.

On reflection, the student mentors and I agreed thatwe had offered too much, too soon to the first-yearstudents. Given this early experience, the greater partof my work at the beginning of the project has beenconcerned with trying to understand what forms ofsupport students feel they need, what forms of

support they feel are less helpful, and how studentsapproach their learning.

Much research has been published on studentlearning, student motivation and factors that encouragesuccess. I have contributed to this research and my ownwork with students is premised on bringing aboutchange in student experience. Yet there is a real sense inwhich we as academics do not fully understand some ofthe ways in which students work and learn. By listeningto students on an informal basis, as well as throughconducting a small-scale research project, I have nowbecome clearer about how to take the project forward.The main outcome of this reflection is the realisation thatI need to shift the direction of my NTFS project.

Tutorials and self-tutoringWhether coming straight from school into highereducation or starting an HE course as a maturestudent, many new arrivals bring with them negativeexperiences of being taught. They also bring a seriesof personal ‘recipes’ for handling learning situations.Whether or not we feel that they are appropriate forlearning in higher education, we must start byaccepting that students bring these recipes with them.For instance, when explaining ideas in classes and totutors, students tend to use a discourse of idealism.However, in other, less formal, situations, they use arather different discourse of ‘debunking’ and rebuttal.Students are often surprised when they find I wantthem to write privately and informally for each other,

ANTHONY ROSIE, Professor of Social Science Education, Sheffield Hallam University

34 Feature on a Fellow

using their real and informal thoughts on a topic as wellas producing formal writing for me. Peer mentoring ispotentially problematic because it addresses issuesthat are often expressed in the idealist discourse, butthe setting and approach may be more appropriate forthe ‘debunking’ discourses of uncertainty.

A second issue that emerged was the strong desirefor effective tutorials. Students give many reasons foravoiding taking up fortnightly individual or small grouptutorials to discuss issues arising from their work withtheir tutors, while at the same time welcomingtutorials as a means of learning. Not all approacheswill suit everyone.

By summer 2002, I became convinced that it wouldbe helpful to work with students to help them becomeself-tutors. To be able to tutor oneself might seembizarre. I believe that, when students have acquiredthe skills to question themselves and others, they arebetter placed to take part in effective tutorials withtheir teachers.

My NTFS project is now moving on to develop atutorial approach for a group of second-year studentstaking one of my modules, on which they can build intheir final year. By the end of 2002-03 they will, I hope,be effective self-tutors and also be able to work withother students. The intention is that the students willthen act as peer mentors using their tutorial skills inthe final year of my project.

Self-tutoring and its place in my teachingI work in a School of Social Science and Law. Myuniversity and my school have supported all aspectsof my work in learning and teaching, and also myNTFS award. They have made it possible for me toteach fewer courses and to concentrate on developingresources with students – a collaborative activity. Forme, the field of historical-comparative sociology isrelatively unfamiliar, but I am looking forward toteaching a course in this field. I have enjoyed readingmy way into this as a key vehicle for my NTFS work.

Working with students on the historical emergenceof the state, revolution and the contemporary worldpromises a great deal. As I have studied anddeveloped learning materials, two questions havestruck me. Firstly, what do I do when I come acrossideas and approaches with which I am unfamiliar?

Secondly, how can I encourage students to engage inideas and materials from a remote past in order toexplore current experiences?

Of course, I too use shortcuts and recipes for myown learning, based on repertoires I have built up overthe years. I may be more adept than my students infinding and interpreting sources, but our positions aslearners of new materials are very much the same.How will I develop this idea and this practice further?

The module I am using for this particular work iscalled ‘Comparative Social Structures’. I teach it with acolleague and this coming year I will provide most ofthe lectures and all the seminars and workshops. Ihave planned a tutorial workbook for the students –hardly a novelty, but this workbook draws on bothonline and hard-copy resources. I am developingelectronic resources that include models of events andsituations that will be new to many students. Theresources are being constructed in ways that studentscan use while working in small groups, engaging indialogue and debate.

For instance, I am currently constructing a series ofmaps of Europe and Latin America at differenthistorical moments. These enable students to see thespread of empires, such as Muslim Africa and Europein the 11th century and the 16th-century Iberianconquest of Latin America. Students can then followparticular events and personages through a series ofinformation and question points for discussion.

I have also changed the assessment and the focusof my courses - I now include far more formativecomputer-based assessment, and also requirereflection on personal learning. What l hope will be ofparticular value in the coming academic year is thecombination of elements to help students developtheir personal tutoring skills. Through the University’sstudent mentoring projects, run by Student Servicesand the Students’ Union, these second-year studentsshould gain credit or an award through acting asaccomplished tutors themselves in their final year. Theresulting peer mentoring will be the richer because wewill then have a profile of personal learning, as well asrecords of how problems were surmounted and,above all, how enjoyment and satisfaction weregained. We will also have an honest portrayal of thedifferent discourses students use in their learning.

Events 35

LILI 2003: Complexity, Creativity andthe Curriculum10 January 2003, University of WarwickDetails: http://www.ukcle.ac.uk/lili/2003.htmlThe 2003 LILI conference seeks toaddress the implications for the lawcurriculum of changes in higher education,whether arising from factors such asglobalisation and the use of informationtechnology, or key policy initiatives such aswidening participation, employability andquality assurance.

Reusable learning objects in healthprofessional education: from theoryinto practice15 January 2003, ManchesterFee: £30.00Details: http://www.medgraphics.cam.ac.uk/ucel/workshops/The aim of this workshop from ALT and theUCEL is to introduce participants to theconcept of reusable learning objects with astep-by-step series of presentations anddiscussions that will show all the stagesand processes required to create theresources.

The Creative Planning Curriculum 16 -17 January 2003, Woburn HouseConference Centre, London Fee: £40.00Details: http://cebe.cf.ac.uk/news/events/creative/index.htmlA workshop for senior decision-makers inthe planning academy. Changes in thehigher education market are forcingplanning schools to rethink planningeducation. It is a propitious time thereforefor the academy to do some creativethinking.

The National Conference for StudentProgression and Transfer16 – 17 January 2003, University ofPlymouthDetails: http://www.spat.ac.uk/national.htmlA national conference exploring currentissues relating the transfer of top-up ordirect entry students into higher education,with a specific focus on the experience ofHND students moving into stages 2 or 3 ofa degree programme.

Personal Development Planning -Physical Sciences29 January 2003, GlasgowDetails: www.physsci.ltsn.ac.ukThe aim of this workshop is to helpacademics in the physical sciences toexplore the most effective ways ofimplementing PDPs with their ownstudents.

Assessment of Competence using OSCEs19 February 2003, St Bartholemewsand the LondonDetails: http://www.ltsn-01.ac.uk/resources/meetings/workshops/LTSN01–workshops This is a workshop for medical school staffwho want to learn about the principles andpracticalities of Objective StructuredClinical Examinations (OSCEs).

Teaching with the Web: does it work? 19 February 2003, University CollegeLondon Details: www.physsci.ltsn.ac.uk Looks at ways to use the web in teachingphysical science subjects.

JISC Conference4 March 2003, InternationalConvention Centre, BirminghamDetails of the JISC Conference and the newICT Strategic Workshop and Seminar seriesfor 2003 will be available on the JISCwebsite http://www.jisc.ac.uk/events/.

EventsA selection of forthcomingevents examining issuessurrounding learning and teaching

Engineering Education 2003, Access,Retention and Standards: IEE6 – 7 January 2003, SouthamptonInstitute Conference CentreDetails: http://conferences.iee.org/ee03/home.htmAttracting people to the Engineeringprofession and the entry standards of bothstudent and newly employed engineers areissues that have been much debated in themedia over recent months, and the widerimplications form the basis of EngineeringEducation 2003.

36 HeadingFocus

The TQEF National Co-ordination Team Centre for Higher Education PracticeThe Open UniversityWalton HallMilton Keynes MK7 6AATel: 01908 858434 Fax: 01908 858438Email: [email protected]

The Learning and Teaching Support NetworkThe Network CentreInnovation WayYork Science ParkHeslingtonYork YO10 5ZFTel: 01904 754500 Fax: 01904 754599Email: [email protected]

Joint Information Systems CommitteeJISC Executive Northavon HouseColdharbour LaneBristol BS16 1QDTel: 0117 931 7403 Fax: 0117 931 7255Email: [email protected]

The Institute for Learning and Teaching inHigher EducationGenesis 3Innovation WayYork Science ParkHeslingtonYork YO10 5DQTel: 01904 434222 Fax: 01904 434241Email: [email protected]

Exchange is also available at www.exchange.ac.uk

The Exchange Partners

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