Three Good Reasons
To get a Learning and Teaching Qualification

Warren Sellers (From the September 2006 issue of Spectrum)

Are you interested in gaining "context, confidence [and] commitment. for your teaching and learning?" The first cohort of participants in the UTDC's Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education Learning and Teaching (PHELT) indicate that these and other benefits make the PHELT Cert worth enrolling in. Participants welcomed the opportunity to dedicate time and space to their teaching and learning reflection and practice: "[PHELT] provided a structured context for exploring my teaching philosophy, for understanding diverse learning styles, and for identifying key issues about curriculum design, assessment, and feedback across a range of disciplines."

Participants in the 2006 cohort valued the opportunity to discuss and debate teaching, learning and research in a collegial, focussed, and well-facilitated environment, with colleagues from diverse backgrounds. When asked what they most valued about the course, the following three themes emerged.

Collegiality

Participants commented on the collegial and supportive atmosphere in the face-to-face meetings, and the ongoing professional relationships that have emerged as a result of the course:

I valued the time...to think about [teaching and learning] issues, discuss them...with colleagues from similar or very different fields within the university, and get a number of different perspectives to look at different teaching and learning challenges.

The diverse wealth of knowledge that teachers and colleagues brought to the learning experience...well-structured content... the cumulative wisdom of the class as a system.

Teaching Effectiveness

Beyond the reflective and collegial aspects of the course, participants also mentioned the effects on their professional practice: I turned from teaching and learning practice based on gut instinct, to professionally informed understandings of practice.

I'm now re-thinking practices and gradually introducing new approaches that bring theory and practice together. I'm absolutely committed to what I've learned; there's no going back!

We were asked to offer an analogy for how we saw our professional practice role. Mine was as a Museum Curator gathering and presenting content in a way that made it enticing compelling and easy to understand. Now, I see myself more as a sports coach; involved and engaged with motivating my students to participate fully in performing learning in our subject.

How to be more critically constructive about professional practice... to connect teaching with day-to-day realities that are familiar to students.

Productivity and Research Output

In addition to the impact on participants' teaching, the course has had a positive impact on their research outputs and focus. A significant component of the PHELT course involves the design of a research project aimed at improving student learning outcomes and at generating PBRFeligible publications. Participants are now working on a variety of research projects, covering such diverse topics as:

• examining the educational role of the critique in architectural studio teaching;
• the role of prerequisite knowledge in the achievement of teaching goals;
• investigating the use of participant video documentation as a data collection tool and blogging as a reflective process;
• the value of laboratory education from the student's point of view and
• developing integrated curricula.

One participant has already been invited to present on their research project and to give a seminar at an overseas partner institution. Others are looking at publishing their research before the end of the year.

The UTDC congratulates the nine academics, representing three Faculties and six Schools, who have successfully completed the first course in the new qualifi cation.s pilot phase in the fi rst trimester, and encourages staff to consider registering for the 2007 PHELT cohort. Interested academic staff are encouraged to contact Tom Angelo on ext. 7482 or Tom. Angelo@vuw.ac.nz or Kathryn Sutherland on ext. 5795 or Kathryn.Sutherland@vuw.ac.nz with questions and expressions of interest.

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