An Introduction to Teaching in UK Higher Education

A Guide for International and Transnational Teachers

Nuala Byrne, Christopher Butcher

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780367186067
• eBook ISBN: 9780429589195
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Covering everything you need to know about teaching within the UK higher education system, this book is the ideal introduction for anyone looking to start their teaching career.

A must-read guide for international staff new to teaching in UK higher education, this key text focuses on what is particular and often baffling to those who are new to higher education teaching in the UK. With practical tips and advice rooted in relevant theory, it is an invaluable resource to guide you through the initial teaching experience. Breaking down all of the aspects involved in teaching, learning and assessing in UK higher education, this book covers:

• The key features of UK higher education – particularly how it might differ from other systems
• How courses and the curriculum are designed
• How to support learning within your teaching practice
• Advice on marking and giving worthwhile feedback
• How to develop your own professional practice
• A full glossary of key terms

An Introduction to Teaching in UK Higher Education is a one-stop resource for those looking to begin a career in UK higher education. Particularly useful for new international staff, it will also be of interest to those looking to improve their teaching practice.

Chapter 1

Key features of UK higher education

[UKPSF: A4, K6, V1, V2 & V4]

Introduction to this book

The aim of this book is to support those new to teaching in a United Kingdom higher education (UK HE) setting either within the UK or overseas: international staff, early-career academics, postgraduate students, graduate teaching assistants and researchers. Having both worked with new international teachers for many years, we are aware that assumptions are often made about what new teachers know and understand about the context in which they are teaching. This can be challenging even for those who have been educated in the UK, and can be overwhelming for international teachers, especially when they are involved in teaching UK HE overseas.

To inform the writing of this book, we carried out a survey of international teachers who were new to teaching in UK HE. Responses from 89 new international teachers of 33 different nationalities were received. Of these, 59 were teaching in the UK, 28 in a UK HE setting outside the UK and 1 in both (1 did not state where they were). This included 56 lecturers, 17 PhD students who teach, 8 researchers who teach and 8 teachers in other roles. The main findings from the survey showed that many new teachers did not feel they had the support they needed to teach in a UK HE setting. In particular, they felt that assumptions were made about what they knew about UK HE, and the support they got was not tailored to international staff. We use the data and quotes from our survey to highlight key findings and issues throughout the book.

At the start of each chapter in this book, we have identified which aspects of the UK Professional Standards Framework (UKPSF) that chapter covers. The UKPSF (2011) is an internationally recognised framework for benchmarking success within teaching and learning support and is explained further in the Teaching qualifications and recognition section of this chapter and in Chapter 8.

In our opening line, we have listed the wide range of academics to whom this book is aimed, whose roles and responsibilities for teaching will vary considerably. Some of you may be lecturers with a full complement of teaching activities and duties (possibly including module leadership), others may have freedom to design classes but have the learning outcomes (see Chapter 4) and content prescribed, whilst others may be following fairly strict guidelines as what to do and how to do it but are interested in developing their role. We have tried to cover all contingencies, but this means that you may need to be selective about which chapters and sections you concentrate on. To help you, we have divided chapters into sections and clearly explained what we aim to cover at the outset of each chapter. In each one, we highlight key terms in bold and italics (like the UKPSF above) which we think are important and are defined in Chapter 9. At the end of each chapter, you will also find a list of further resources that we hope will be useful.

In addition, of course, you will have several other academic roles and activities to fulfil; be those research, administration, outreach, etc. We are only addressing the teaching role in this text and would suggest that if you need guidance/help with the other aspects, you talk to your head of school/department and find yourself a mentor (see Chapter 8 for more on mentors).

Introduction to this chapter

In this first chapter, we identify the key features of UK HE, which we believe all teachers need to be aware of. In the interest of clarity, we shall start by explaining what we mean by UK HE and transnational education (TNE). We shall then provide an insight into the scale of UK HE both within the UK and overseas (in TNE), and then look at the UK HE context and explore some of the key features, such as:

• Regulation and funding
• Quality assurance
• Teaching qualifications and recognition
• Competition
• Equality, diversity and inclusion
• Online and blended learning.

What do we mean by UK higher education?

The United Kingdom is short for the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The UK consists of four countries: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, whose capital cities are London, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast respectively. In terms of governance, overall responsibility rests with the UK Government (often, and confusingly, also described as the British government). However Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own devolved governments/parliaments (with homes in their capital cities) that are responsible for a range of issues including education. This is important, because you will find that the devolved powers impact considerably on educational provision in the four countries. Therefore, the policy and practices will vary depending on where your home institution is based.

In the UK, higher education refers to education that leads to the awarding of degrees. So when we talk about UK HE we are referring to HE provided by institutions based in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. There are various bodies involved in delivering HE but the majority are universities, colleges or institutes of technology. These are collectively referred to as higher education institutions (HEIs) but often universities is used in a general sense, and we use these terms interchangeably in this book.

Global reputation of UK HE

UK HE has a reputation across the world for the quality of education it provides, and some universities rank among the best in the world (see League tables below for more details). According to the QS World University rankings (2020), three UK universities are in the top 10 universities and 12 in the top 100. The Times Higher Education (2020) World University rankings places four UK universities in the top 10 and 17 in the top 100, with the University of Oxford in first place and the University of Cambridge in third place. So there is no doubt that UK HE is held in high esteem and as a result attracts many international students to come to the UK to study for a degree. In 2019, the UK had the second highest number of international students behind the Unites States of America (Dept for Education and Dept for International Trade, 2019). It has also meant that UK HE is now offered in many countries around the world.

UK HE transnational education

HE transnational education (TNE) is defined as “the delivery of degrees in a country other than where the awarding provider is based” (Universities UK International, 2019, p.5). Alongside the growth in international students coming to the UK to do a degree, there has been a significant expansion in UK HE delivered outside the UK over the past 30 years or so. According to Universities UK International (2019), this can take the form of undergraduate courses, postgraduate taught courses and postgraduate research, either part-time or full-time. UK HE is delivered in all except 15 countries, and the five countries with most UK HE TNE students are Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, China and Oman (Universities UK International, 2019).

The manner in which the HE is delivered varies and can include an overseas campus (often called branch campuses), local delivery partnerships, distance/online learning or blended learning, which is a mixture of online learning and face-to-face teaching. The latter may be delivered by local staff at overseas locations or by staff flying out from the UK to deliver short, intense blocks of teaching, often called flying faculty. The first UK HE campus overseas was opened by the University of Nottingham in Malaysia in 2000. By 2017, over 40 UK HE branch campuses had been established across the world (Cross-Border Education Research Team, 2017). However, branch campus provision only represented 4.1% of UK HE TNE in 2017/18 with 56.5% being through students registered at overseas partner organisations, 21.4% studying through a collaborative (franchised) provision, 17% via distance/flexible learning and 1% via other arrangements (Universities UK International, 2019).

The advice and ideas in this book are aimed at supporting new international teachers who are either based at an HE institution in the UK or are involved in delivering UK HE in some form of TNE. We shall now look at what we know about the scale of UK HE and TNE.

Scale of UK higher education

The Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) collects and disseminates data about HE in the UK and is a valuable source of open data for all those involved in UK HE. According to HESA (2020), in 2018/19 there were 169 publicly funded universities and other HEIs in the UK; there were 2.38 million students studying at these institutions, an increase of 2% from 2017/18, and just over 217,000 academic staff. Table 1.1 shows the breakdown of numbers for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Table 1.1 Scale of UK higher ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Series editor introduction
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1. Key features of UK higher education
• 2. Education in the UK
• 3. How students learn and what the implications are for teaching
• 4. Curriculum and course design
• 5. Teaching for supporting learning
• 6. Assessing and giving feedback
• 7. Supporting students
• 8. Ongoing development of your professional practice
• 9. Key terms, glossaries and abbreviations
• References
• Index