About us

Launched in 2018, the Academy for the Transformation of Teaching recognises the power of higher education to transform thinking, transform lives, and transform the world.

The Academy for the Transformation of Teaching aims to:

• Provide an active intellectual forum to develop and disseminate innovative teaching practices within the University and the wider external academic community;
• Transforms students’ ability to think, learn, and transfer knowledge in order to transform their own lives and the world around them;
• Develop transdisciplinary, diverse and inclusive teaching and learning environments across all academic programmes within the University;
• Enable and support university teachers with the ability to inspire, innovate and engage with students so that learning is enriched and students reach their full potential;     

The Academy comprises an inspiring and innovative community that seeks to transform teaching and learning through providing an intellectual forum for all academics to engage in discourse and knowledge about teaching scholarship and practice and contribute to national and international conversations on pedagogy and optimal student learning.

The Academy enables high quality teaching by aligning teaching more closely with knowledge production and dissemination so that teaching practices are embedded in knowledge but similarly productive of new pedagogical knowledge.  This will enable academic colleagues to make informed pedagogical decisions about their teaching and to reflect on how students best learn based on pedagogical knowledge and research.

The Academy aims to shift teaching from a focus on knowledge delivery to transactive, engaged, and participatory student learning.  As the Academy is a University-wide initiative, it aims to develop transdisciplinary, diverse, and more inclusive teaching and learning environments and practices collaboratively across all academic programmes, whether in the classroom, in placements and internships off campus, or in our study abroad programmes.  The Fellows of the Academy, selected because of their interest, expertise, and leadership in particular areas of teaching and learning, provide enriched contexts for active deliberation, debate, and engagement through their projects around the development of student-centred pedagogies, the recognition of the diverse literacies students bring to the learning situation, the construction of assessment practices that provide the best opportunities for students to demonstrate what they have learned, the purposeful use of technology to enrich student learning,  the development of teaching mentorship programmes to support university teachers at all levels, the engagement of diversity and difference across the curriculum, and the role of higher education in public life.  Our Fellows also disseminate knowledge on their projects within the University through podcasts, blogs, and lunchtime seminars as well as connecting more broadly to the HE sector nationally and internationally through delivering papers at conferences, creating partnerships with schools, giving invited lectures, publishing their pedagogical research, and through other interventions in the public sphere.

Prof Mariann Rand-Weaver

Co-Convener of the Academy

Prof William Spurlin

Co-Convener of the Academy