The Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence (CATE) celebrates and recognizes outstanding collaborative work that has made a transformative impact on teaching and learning. Since its inception in 2016, the award has proudly highlighted the vital role of teamwork in shaping the future of higher education.
Entry to CATE is included as part of Advance HE membership in the UK.
Institutional nominations are made by a designated contact at each institution (the TEAL – Teaching Excellence Award Lead) and are submitted via Advance HE’s Survey Monkey Apply (SMA) platform. If you are a UK Advance HE member institution (Full or Affiliate member) and have not received details of the nomination process, please contact the Awards team for further information (ntfs@advance-he.ac.uk).
2026 CATE Winners
Meet the 2026 CATE winners.
Insight into the Award Criteria video series
We have created a set of videos to guide you through the award criteria for the Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence (CATE).
Introduction to CATE
Dr Holly Earl provides an overview of the application process for the Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence to help potential nominees develop their claims
CATE Criterion One
Overview of CATE Criterion One: tips and advice for potential nominees on how to evidence excellence in their collaborative approach when completing their claim.
CATE Criterion Two
Overview of CATE Criterion Two: tips and advice for nominees on how to effectively provide evidence of the impact of the team’s collaborative approach on teaching and learning when completing their claim.
The CATE Collection: Together in Collaborative Educational Leadership
With rich contributions from past CATE winners, this 2021 publication examines the what, why, how and who of the CATE in order to inspire aspiring CATE Teams planning their nominations as well as everyone interested in collaborative ways of working in higher education.
Benefits of winning a Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence
Gaining a CATE has a number of benefits for both individuals and their institutions.
| Benefits to teams | Benefits to institutions |
|---|---|
| Provides teams with national recognition and profile of their collaborative work in learning and teaching within higher education. | Offers an extension to university wide team-based recognition schemes, as a means to raise the status of learning and teaching. |
| The award can help ‘open doors’ to new collaborative or career opportunities. | Showcases the institution’s support of collaborative approaches to developing teaching excellence and the impact on learning and teaching. |
| Join a national community of like-minded professionals who are passionate about collaborative approaches to teaching excellence. | Enables staff to collaborate and network with colleagues across disciplines, themes, institutions, nations and countries. |
Past winners
Each team has demonstrated evidence that their collaborative work has had a demonstrable impact upon teaching and learning.
This could be impact on colleagues and/or students at an institutional or discipline level.
If you would like to gain some inspiration and find out more about past winners review the full directory below.
CATE Award Success
Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence award winner Pete Bridge discusses his award, and offers some advice for those thinking of applying.
For further resources, please contact the Teaching Excellence Awards Lead (TEAL) at your Institute or contact (cate@advance-he.ac.uk).
