Advance HE Fellowships have significantly enhanced the quality of learning, teaching, and continuing professional development at ATU, one of Ireland’s newest universities. The launch of ATU ENGAGE, our in-house Fellowship attainment programme, has partly inspired this success and the benefits for students, staff and the institution have been immediate. We are committed to further embedding Fellowship in our learning and teaching culture and further strengthening our already robust support scheme.
A whole community approach
ATU ENGAGE provides the opportunity for all staff with a teaching and learning role to develop professionally by reflecting on and articulating the effectiveness of their practice in the context of ATU’s teaching and learning strategy and the Professional Standards Framework for Teaching and Supporting Learning in Higher Education 2023 (PSF). Because there may have been a perception that Fellowship was for academics exclusively, we are keen to make clear that Fellowship is for both academics with teaching responsibilities and also professional staff who support learning in a wide variety of different contexts. ENGAGE extends recognition to the everyday excellence of all those who help our students to learn. Our message to ATU staff is that if you support learning in the lab, the library, the lecture hall or elsewhere, ENGAGE is for you, Fellowship is for you, and we want you to join a community that celebrates teaching and learning support excellence in different roles and discipline areas across our nine campuses. The emphasis of the PSF on values and context helps a diverse range of staff to see the relevance of Fellowship to their practice. And while we have a history of celebrating our teachers, Fellowship remains a relatively new venture in ATU, and indeed in Higher Education in the Republic of Ireland generally. Nonetheless, already a vibrant community of Fellows has been established in our university.
Support
We face the same challenges confronted by teaching and learning centres in all universities – in between teaching, learning support, assessment, administration and leadership duties, how to entice hard-working academic and professional services staff to engage in a challenging Fellowship application that entails learning the language of the PSF, with its constituent dimensions and descriptors? ENGAGE is designed to be a practical process that supports reflection on learning, teaching, assessment and the student experience, and consolidates personal and professional development. It provides ATU educators with an opportunity to compile evidence of and articulate how (in a written document) they facilitate a high-quality, challenging and rewarding learning experience for students. And it promotes professional dialogue on teaching and learning, within communities of practice at ATU and beyond, in order to inform, develop and enhance practice.
Alignment
ENGAGE will help to reflect our sustained commitment to high-quality teaching and learning, based on a combination of innovative curricula, best-practice pedagogy and the use of contemporary digital/technology resources to promote equity of access and build an increasingly inclusive teaching and learning environment. The clear alignment here between the values informing the PSF and ATU’s strategic priorities in teaching and learning facilitate the embedding of the PSF in professional development and recognition pathways. To support, develop and recognise the practice of its educators from the earliest stages of their careers and throughout, ATU is embedding the PSF in a range of informal and formal learning, development and recognition opportunities. We are currently preparing to submit proposed development pathways for accreditation by Advance HE.
Mentoring
Mentoring of applicants by Fellowship holders is a key part of the support offered by ENGAGE. Members of ATU’s community of Fellows may well have enjoyed the support of ENGAGE in gaining their recognition, and the mentoring programme continues this cycle of investment in the abilities of our teaching and learning support personnel. Contributing to ENGAGE as a mentor serves to broaden and deepen the expertise of our Fellowship community. The role of the mentor is not to ‘supervise’ but rather to share their experience of the Fellowship application process, all in the context of the dimensions of the PSF and the relevant Fellowship category descriptor. The mandatory induction undergone by ENGAGE mentors and assessors will be supplemented by annual training so that they remain up-to-date in their knowledge and understanding of how Advance HE interprets the dimensions and descriptors of the PSF.
Institutional backing
Institutional support for Advance HE membership and the development of accredited pathways to Fellowship is strong. ENGAGE, and potential Advance HE accreditation of ENGAGE as a route to recognition and Fellowship, establishes multiple opportunities for ATU:
- To create a bespoke process aligned with ATU’s strategic priorities and to showcase the value ATU places on learning and teaching
- To best support ATU educators in developing their learning and teaching practices
- To take stock of the full range of learning and teaching practices of staff and, likewise, to facilitate recognition of a diverse range of applicants
- To disseminate evidence of innovation in learning and teaching to communities of practice across ATU and further afield
- To fulfil the transformational potential of the Fellowship process for students, as well as for individual staff and the institution.
Impact of Fellowship
How to substantiate the bold claims made at the outset of this blog about the positive impact of Fellowships on learning, teaching, and professional development in ATU? Our evaluative efforts are proving productive, but we are at such an early stage of our Fellowship journey that the personal testimony of our community of Fellows is still our best source of evidence. Engagement with the PSF and the building of a case for recognition prompts greater self-awareness and a transformation in teaching and learning support practice. Recognition boosts self-confidence and allows educators to question themselves more freely and to innovate more bravely. It is heartening to see results already filtering through to teaching and learning support settings; this is how long-term impact, sustained momentum and meaningful, lasting change will be generated. Ultimately, ATU, its staff and its students will all be the better for it.
Dr Niamh Plunkett, Head of Teaching & Learning at ATU Sligo, advanced the Fellowship programme in 2022. Dr John O’Callaghan, Academic Writing Instructor leads the ENGAGE Programme, which began in 2023.