National Teaching Awards: do they make better teachers?

Toni Tidswell, Kerry Shephard, Tony Harland and Sarah Stein

University of Otago

Why is it important?

National teaching awards are now firmly embedded in the culture of higher education in many countries.  Our current research project investigates national teaching awards in England, Canada, Malaysia, Australia and New Zealand. Among the questions that we pose are:

·       In what ways does the national teaching award process influence the way teachers think about their current and previous teaching and learning practices?

·       To what extent do the criteria established by the award-giving body actually influence the applicant for the award?

·       How are the applicant’s conceptions of excellent teaching influenced by these criteria?

·       What are the experiences of the academics are involved in the national teaching award process?

·       Does the national teaching award process influence the way teachers think about their teaching and learning practices after the award process?

How the session will be run?

Firstly, I will ask the group to consider the questions above. Secondly, I will give an overview of the research project and what we have done thus far. Thirdly, I will share some of the information gathered from our interviews and summarise some of our answers to the questions above.