Readings and resources

This collection of journal articles can guide you through some topical academic development issues.

Academic development guided readings

If you're interested in academic development, this collection of readings will guide you through some topical themes. Use the questions at the end of each section to reflect and form opinions. These readings were collected by the Centre for Academic Development.

Accessing the articles

To use the links to these articles, you need to be registered with the websites where the articles are stored. Some will let you read an abstract without a registration.

The University provides staff with access to these websites. If you're logged on to the University network you can just use the links provided—you won't be asked to sign in to see the article. This should also be true of other institutions with registrations to these websites.

If you aren't registered, you can use the citations to source the article independently.

Academic identity

• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Billot, J. (2010). The imagined and the real: Identifying the tensions in academic identity. HERD, 29 (6), 709-721. Taylor and Francis Online
• Manchester University Press. Citation: Calvert, M. et al. (2011). Negotiating professional identities in higher education: Dilemmas and priorities of academic staff. Research in Education, 86, 25- 38.
• JSTOR. Citation: Day, C. et al (2006). The personal and professional selves of teachers: Stable and unstable identities. British Educational Research Journal, 32(4), 601-616.

Questions

1. What is academic identity?
2. How does academic identity relate to 'professional identity'?
3. What are your academic values?

Graduate attributes

• Springer Link. Citation: Barrie, S. C. (2006). Understanding what we mean by the generic attributes of graduates. Higher education, 51(2), 215-241.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Green, W., Hammer, S., Star, C. (2009). Facing up to the challenge: why is it so hard to develop graduate attributes? Higher Education Research & Development, 28(1), 17-29.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Fraser, K., & Thomas, T. (2013). Challenges of assuring the development of graduate attributes in a Bachelor of Arts. Higher Education Research & Development, (ahead-of-print), 1-16.

Questions

1. What is a graduate attribute? How many definitions can you find in these papers? What other similar terms are used?
2. What is the place of values?
3. Are graduate attributes automatically transferable?

Researching higher education and academic development

• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Clegg, S. (2012). Conceptualising higher education research and/or academic development as ‘fields’: a critical analysis. [doi: 10.1080/07294360.2012.690369]. Higher Education Research & Development, 31(5), 667-678
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Jones, A. (2010). Examining the public face of academic development. [doi: 10.1080/1360144X.2010.497689]. International Journal for Academic Development, 15(3), 241-251.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Trowler, P. (2013). Can approaches to research in Art and Design be beneficially adapted for research into higher education? [doi: 10.1080/07294360.2012.750276]. Higher Education Research & Development, 32(1), 56-69.

Questions

1. What is a research 'finding'?
2. Do you see teaching as a problem, a science or a moral good?
3. Is academic development a deficit activity?
4. Take a look at your programme's webpages. How is your work and the work of your teaching team seen by others?

Student evaluations of teaching (SETs)

• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Lyn Alderman, Stephen Towers & Sylvia Bannah (2012). Student feedback systems in higher education: a focused literature review and environmental scan. Quality in Higher Education, 18:3, 261-280.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Stephen L. Wright & Michael A. Jenkins-Guarnieri (2012). Student evaluations of teaching: combining the meta-analyses and demonstrating further evidence for effective use. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 37:6, 683-699, DOI: 10.1080/02602938.2011.563279.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Stephen L. Wright & Michael A. Jenkins-Guarnieri (2012). Student evaluations of teaching: combining the meta-analyses and demonstrating further evidence for effective use. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 37:6, 683-699, DOI: 10.1080/02602938.2011.563279.

Questions

1. One underlying assumption of SETs is that what they measure relates to student learning. Is that justified?
2. Berk (2005) suggests that student feedback is just one of 12 possible strategies for measuring the effectiveness of teachers. What are some other measures of teaching effectiveness?
3. As a result of reading all three articles, how would you evaluate Victoria’s policy and practice regarding student feedback?
4. How do you feed back (or feed forward) your SET results to your students?

Signature concepts

• Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA). Citation: Kandlbinder, P., 2011. Reading to change higher education teaching and learning. In Kandlbinder, P., and Peseta, T., 2011. Higher Education Research and Development Anthology. Milpera, NSW: HERDSA.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Kandlbinder, P., 2013. Signature concepts of women researchers in higher education teaching and learning. Studies in Higher Education.
• Taylor and Francis Online. Citation: Kandlbinder, P., 2013. Signature concepts of women researchers in higher education teaching and learning. Studies in Higher Education.

Question

What's your 'signature concept'?