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FOREWORD At University College Cork we provide a high quality, research-based learning experience to all of our students, and support every individual to fulfil their academic potential and to contribute effectively to the wider community. Learning and teaching are central to the core mission at UCC to create, understand and share knowledge and apply it for the good of all. We have been at the forefront of the development of a strong learning and teaching environment in Irish Higher Education Institutions, with a well-established parity of esteem between research and teaching. The Office of the Vice-President for Teaching and Learning at UCC was established in 2008 and has enhanced the learning experience through exciting developments in teaching practice, technology enhanced learning, internationalisation, student-centred learning, learning space innovation and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. We will build on this firm foundation to transform and evolve learning, teaching and assessment at UCC for future generations. We do this at a time of considerable change in the higher education sector as it reacts to the changing needs and expectations of students and employers. This learning and teaching strategy sets out UCC’s priorities for learning and teaching for the next five years and incorporates the learning and teaching objectives of UCC’s Strategic Plan 2017-2022.

PROFESSOR JOHN O’HALLORAN Vice-President for Teaching and Learning

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OUR MISSION: Deliver an inspiring, student-centred, research-based learning and teaching experience

to ensure that all our students achieve their full potential. STRATEGY FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING 2017 - 2022 Background and context This strategy presents our approach to the enhancement of learning and teaching at University College Cork, based on a continuous improvement plan. It has been created in partnership with students and other stakeholders from across and beyond the University community. It sets out the University-wide priorities in Teaching and Learning to inform actions and decision-making regarding the learning, teaching and assessment of all students. It recognises the significant advances that have been made to enhance the learning and teaching experience to date and the parity of esteem of teaching and research at University College Cork. This Learning and Teaching Strategy 2017-2022 underpins the values and goals of the University College Cork Strategic Plan 2017-2022, and in particular the ambition to ‘deliver an outstanding, student-centred teachihng and learning experience with a renewed, responsive and research-led curriculum at its core’ and to ‘ensure a diverse staff who are enabled to reach their full potential’.

The strategy was developed in the context of the following principles: 1. Learning and Teaching is core to academic practice and is central to the mission of UCC. 2. Learning, teaching and research are interconnected and mutually enriching. 3. Learning and teaching are informed by research and all students engage in research as part of their

learning journey. 4. Higher education must respond to the needs of an increasingly diverse student community and

recognise new student demographics and age profiles including and beyond Generation Z. 5. Sustainable resources and supports are required to enable the enhancement of learning and

teaching. 6. Effective teaching engages students as partners and collaborators in developing practices to

support learning. 7. Government and societal demands call for greater participation and community engagement. 8. Higher education must provide learning experiences that develop graduates who are socially and

ethically responsible global citizens, equipped for personal and professional success. 9. The provision of learning and teaching spaces that support reflective and experiential learning is

essential for students to develop relevant academic practices. 10. Students should be supported to use state-of-art information resources and electronic learning

technologies as part of their development as independent learners. 11. Ongoing professional development opportunities are essential in supporting excellent teaching. 12. Higher education must respond to demands for greater lifelong and life wide learning and

continuing professional development. 13. Higher education encompasses formal and informal learning and requires flexible delivery.

The process Consultation for UCC’s Strategic Plan for Teaching & Learning 2017 – 2022 actively involved students and recognised the importance of students and staff from all domains working in partnership to support student learning. It captured a wide range of perspectives, during many workshops and in-depth consultations with students and staff. The resulting strategy reflects the input of hundreds of students and staff across UCC to

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shape our vision, including the Academic Council Teaching and Learning Committee, the E-learning Sub-Committee, the Colleges’ T&L committees, the Centre for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (CIRTL), the Centre for Adult Continuing Education (ACE), the Online Learning Instructional Design Team, the Centre for CPD Directorate and the Quercus Talented Students’ Programme. Design Thinking Methodology was employed to arrive at an innovative strategy for learning and teaching that speaks to the values of all stakeholders. This process produced a corpus of almost 520 unique terms important to teaching, learning and assessment in UCC. The most frequent words in the corpus were: learning (30); skills (25); work (14), and the relationships between these terms and others are shown in the diagram below.

Following this detailed consultation across the university four priorities emerged, all of which underpin our overall mission. We will achieve these priorities by focusing on people and resources, by assuring and enhancing quality, and by working collaboratively across the University. Strategic Priorities

Strategic priorities for Teaching & Learning at UCC 2017-2022

Enhance Staff Development

Unlock the Potential of Technology

Expand lifelong and life-wide

learning

Deliver Student-Centred,

Research-Based Learning

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PRIORITY 1: Deliver an outstanding student-centred learning and teaching experience in a research-based environment, with a focus on enhancing assessment and feedback

University College Cork will develop high quality teaching and will encourage a culture of innovation where teaching staff can explore new ways of teaching and advance their teaching practices to enhance student learning. Key actions

a. Provide ongoing opportunities for professional development, including innovative approaches to teaching.

b. Develop different forms of teaching, including face-to-face, blended, fully online, with flexible or part-time options built in.

c. Develop and invest in innovative, flexible learning and teaching spaces that encourage and enable a wide range of learning and teaching methods.

d. Enrich our teaching, learning and assessment through research and scholarship, both through discipline-specific and transdisciplinary approaches.

e. Work with students to enhance their learning experience and maintain ongoing engagement. f. Enhance employability by developing learners as socially responsible, globally aware, critical thinkers

equipped for life-long, life-wide learning. g. Embed authentic research and enquiry into the curriculum that address societal grand challenges

including education for sustainable development. h. Recognise formal and informal learning, including micro credentials (digital badges). i. Recognise and cater for diverse learners j. Create opportunities for students to engage in interdisciplinary research in order to meet the

dynamic needs of today’s higher education students. Targets

a. Provide state-of-the art learning spaces to accommodate all learning styles. KPI: Upgrade all learning spaces to a minimum standard and create and develop innovative learning spaces enabling the implementation of innovative pedagogies.

b. Engage all students in authentic research over the course of their studies. KPI: 44% of UG programmes currently engage students in research across all years of programme. Work to embed research-based education across all years.

c. Enhance profile and awareness of the Centre for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning among students. KPI: Optimised web presence to increase visibility of courses and CPD for staff and students, and to make ongoing scholarship in learning and teaching more prominent.

d. Engage students as partners in T&L projects/action research. KPI: Offer a series of competitive research grants to support the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) work with a particular emphasis on students partnering in the research.

e. Diversify assessments and decrease numbers of terminal exams; promote integrative and programmatic assessment. Promote integration of novel assessment and curriculum design. KPI: policy and code of practice on assessment accompanied by University wide initiative to support diversification of assessment.

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PRIORITY 2: Enact and sustain an inspiring, inclusive and highly-coordinated approach to staff development to ensure world-class teaching and learning

University College Cork will promote teaching excellence through recruitment, reward and recognition and will support the staff development needs of teaching staff. Key actions

a. Deliver inspired teaching, learning and assessment excellence, informed by world-class research, delivered by staff who are supported to continually develop their professional practice.

b. Foster a culture in which teaching excellence and innovation are highly valued at all levels and across all Colleges and are embedded in the promotion process.

c. Facilitate staff in developing and implementing best practice in student-centred learning, d. Support staff to develop their skills and knowledge in various learning technologies e. Ensure that innovative best-practice is shared amongst staff and students. f. Value teaching, recognise and reward teaching excellence. g. Recognise and encourage practitioners to engage in reflective, scholarly teaching.

Targets

a. Sustain participation of staff in accredited programmes and encourage equal levels of engagement across four Colleges. KPI: Increase the number of staff participating in the accredited programmes in College of Business and Law and College of SEFS.

b. Provide diverse opportunities for staff to engage in CPD relating to T&L KPI: Develop and enact a range of staff and student development activities such as the seminar series and T&L showcases. Support national initiatives such as digital badges in Universal Design for Learning, digital badge in Research supervision and staff recognition on national framework for professional development in T&L.

c. Enable succession of staff in the Centre for the Integration of Research, Teaching & Learning (CIRTL) and the sustainability of programmes offered through the Centre. KPI: Move towards staffing levels commensurate with national levels in Teaching and Learning Centres and reflective of the large numbers participating in CIRTL’s online programmes. Ensure sufficient staffing to support the expanding international programme for visiting lecturers.

d. Increase the international profile of CIRTL and build sustainability of core initiatives such as international lecturer programme. KPI: Continue to increase the number of international staff participating in CIRTL’s programmes. Diversify the range of Universities and countries participating in the programme.

e. Embed CIRTL at College level, ensure greater visibility of CIRTL as well as increase the impact of CIRTL Fellows. KPI: Enhanced communication flow between CIRTL and Colleges, greater visibility and connectivity with CIRTL at College level particularly through T&L Committees. Increase profile of CIRTL fellows within their own Colleges.

f. Develop a robust community of practice focussed on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) KPI: 10% increase in staff publications relating to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL).

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PRIORITY 3: Unlock the potential of technology to enhance teaching, enrich learning and to engage learners

University College Cork will provide a personalised learning experience that permits students to choose when and where they learn. Key actions

a. Embed technology within teaching and learning. b. Support and enable staff to exploit the learning opportunities presented through advances in

technology enhanced pedagogies. c. Equip staff and students to use technologies effectively for teaching. d. Enhance and support the use of Virtual Learning Environments e. Cultivate digital intelligence grounded in human values to enable our students become masters of

technology not mastered by it. f. Increase the number of students engaged in some form of online learning such that all students will

have the opportunity to take at least one module online. a. Improve the learning environment and teaching infrastructure, resources and technologies in

classrooms and laboratories, and ensure that the online environment is accessible and adaptable. g. Ensure that all UCC students have access to excellent digital literacy development and support

opportunities. h. Enable greater collaboration and peer support using technology. a. Use educational technologies to support excellent teaching, learning and assessment. i. Enhance capacity for digital learning of students j. Refocus TEL towards teaching, learning and research k. Develop support for staff to advance their courses online underpinned by good pedagogy l. Roll out spikey profiles to support digital fluency

Targets

a. Increase the number of online courses offered by UCC. KPI: Target: 100 postgraduate courses to have some online component

b. Goal 2: Increase the number of students engaged in some form of online learning. KPI: 50% of all UCC students taking at least one online module

c. Ensure all teaching staff increase digital literacy skills. KPI: 90% of Academic Staff have registered spiky profiles and training plans to address gaps

d. Ensure all UCC students have access to excellent digital literacy development and support services KPI: 100% of all UCC students have access to diagnostic assessment and sufficient training capacity to meet demand

e. Goal 5: Establish UCC’s ID Team as a recognised centre of excellence KPI: ID Team producing 4 research papers per annum, presenting at 2 international conferences

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PRIORITY 4: Expand opportunities for lifelong and life-wide learning

University College Cork will extend the reach of its expertise to local, national and global communities, and will inspire students to pursue life-long learning. Key actions

a. Expand and maintaining the quality of educational opportunities to meet the changing demands of our learners.

b. Enhance life-wide skills and world-ready attributes. c. Provide accessible, flexible and diverse lifelong learning and continuing professional development

(CPD) opportunities with flexible access pathways. d. Increase the number of lifelong learners and continuous professional development students across

all disciplines. e. Enhance access and progression routes from our lifelong learning programmes, including better

signposted progression pathways within UCC; collaboration with educational community, statutory and industry stakeholders; development of more robust RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) and VNIL (Validation of Non-Formal and Informal Learning).

f. Create, extend and sustain relationships with external stakeholders to meet the university’s community engagement objectives.

g. Introduce new CPD courses to support the development of our alumni and students. h. Enhance diversity and inclusiveness through Adult Continuing Education (ACE). i. Enhance international student body through CIRTL and UCC Online. j. Enhance the student talent pool through Quercus, including broadening of the programme to

include both post-graduate students and an alumni network, and securing funding to ensure sustainability of the programme.

Targets

a. To increase the number of ACE students. KPI: by 2022 there will be at least 3,000 students registered on ACE programmes.

b. To increase the number of CPD student registrations> KPI: by 2022 there will be at least 500 CPD student registrations.

c. To increase the number proportion of students studying part-time/through flexible learning. KPI: by 2022, this will have risen to at least 22%.

d. To contribute to a more coherent and sustainable internal UCC cooperative system that allows synergy and common goal setting for adult learners in offices including ACE, Mature Students Office, Centre for CPD and other units. KPI: UCC would have a functioning internal forum for cross-office engagement.

e. To enhance access and progression routes from all programmes delivered through ACE. This will require more and better signposted progression pathways within UCC; collaboration with educational, community, statutory and industry stakeholders; develop more robust RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) and VNIL (Validation of Non-Formal and Informal Learning. KPI: An Increased number of full-time programmes with progression pathways. Development of new pathways into UCC part-time programmes from other QQI programmes. An operating RPL and/or VNIL process for access to ACE programmes

f. To create, extend and sustain mutually beneficial relationships with external stakeholders in order to meet the university’s community engagement objectives. In this process enhance outreach engagement by as many academic units in the university as possible.

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KPI: UCC would deepen and increase the network of external stakeholders engaged through ACE; A greater number of academic units would be engaged in ACE led community engagement initiatives.