Enhancing the Quality of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education
| Published date | 01 December 1994 |
| Date | 01 December 1994 |
| Pages | 13-18 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/09684889410071087 |
| Author | Gus Pennington,Mike O′Neil |
| Subject Matter | Education |
VOLUME 2 NUMBER 3
1994
13
Few observers of the contemporary higher
education scene can doubt that the system is in
transition and that higher education organizations
(HEOs) are experiencing considerable turbulence
as they grapple with the aggregated imperatives
of growth, less generous resourcing, widespread
curriculum change and demands for
demonstrable, relevant measures of “output”. In
this setting, the debate about the attributes and
indicators of quality in teaching and learning is
high on both political and professional agendas.
That debate has been given additional edge and
impetus by the activities of quality audit and
quality assessment such that, arguably, no UK
university can now avoid reviewing its own
mechanisms for ensuring quality in teaching and
learning both at a strategic policy level and at the
point of delivery.
This concern with the quality of students’
learning experience has been gaining momentum
in the UK and elsewhere for at least five years.
Ensuring competence (excellence even!) in
teaching and learning has also been at the centre
of a growing number of recent national
development programmes. The proliferation of
such programmes (e.g. Gibbs et al.’s (1992)
project for PCFC on Teaching More Students;
Otter’s (1992) work for UDACE on Learning
Outcomes; the RSA’s Higher Education for
Capability campaign (Stephenson and Weil,
1992); and the HEFCE’s recent Effective
Teaching and Assessment Programme) indicates a
pressing need for practitioners to make explicit
their philosophies, policies and practices about,
and for, teaching. At an organizational level, there
is a parallel need to articulate and adopt a
strategic view of professional practice which can
be translated into meaningful activities and which
takes account of current resourcing levels,
including the availability of suitable learning
environments. The synthesis of these external and
internal forces for change entails engagement
with three simple yet wide-ranging questions:
(1) What principles might (ought to) underpin
our teaching and learning strategies at both a
micro- and a macro-level?
(2) What might be the implications of adopting
these principles?
(3) What activities might secure them?
Towards a Strategy for Improving the
Quality of Teaching and Learning
While we do not attempt to describe a full-blown
strategy here, acknowledging that organizations
themselves are best placed to determine their own
strategic approach in the light of their own
history, and future priorities and plans, we do
advocate engagement with a menu of
considerations from which such strategies might
be derived. In assembling these ideas we are
mindful that progress only occurs when
organizational decision makers at a variety of
levels generate, endorse and disseminate the
specifics of policy. This ability to translate a broad
vision and “feel good” statements (often
developed for the consumption of external
audiences) into workable classroom activities lies
at the core of teaching quality; a major block to
progress in many organizations is how to
operationalize these vaguely expressed
aspirations.
An evaluation of a number of major national
initiatives (see the NFER, Tavistock and
individual university evaluations of EHE
(Sinclair, 1994; Slee, 1994)) confirms the view
Quality Assurance in Education, Vol. 2 No. 3, 1994, pp. 13-18
© MCB University Press, 0968-4883
Enhancing the Quality of
Teaching and Learning in
Higher Education
Gus Pennington and Mike O’Neil
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