Academic Development work
Academic Development work could broadly be defined as working towards professional development within a complex system that entails multiple stakeholders, sites of practice, contexts and purposes.
As an 'Academic Developer', for me this means working with colleagues (across institutions) to actively enable staff to develop, improve, research and reflect on their Teaching, Learning, Assessment and Curriculum practices.
The Cape Higher Education Consortium sees collaboration between the four universities in the Western Cape on a range of initiatives. A key intention is to provide short-course training, as well as official Higher Education professional certification, for academics around the country. I have been fortunate to be part of a team running the 'Transforming Tutorials in Higher Education' short course.
Over the years, I have been fortunate to work with committed educators across many institutions. Although the focus is usually on the redesign of the curriculum and/or improving pedagogy, we invariably have to start by understanding context and all the associated factors. This is where my personal research into complex engineering problem-solving has proved invaluable. I believe in a complex systems approach - there are 'parts' with their individual attributes/properties which occur (or are set) in relation to other 'parts' within the whole. Each part (and its relation to others) needs to be interrogated and understood, as well as the multiple possible relationships, before being able to view the 'whole'. 'Seeing' the whole as greater than the sum of its parts is the starting point to enable responsive curriculum and pedagogic design.
Very often, the simple act of providing tools to 'see parts and wholes' is the heart of my contribution. I draw on numerous theoretical and analytical tools, ranging from those within the Sociology of Education (such as Bernstein's Knowledge Structures, Maton's Legitimation Code Theory dimensions, Six Sigma DMAIC/DMAVD, to name a few).
As an Academic Development and Curriculum specialist, I have been privileged to collaborate on several international projects. These collaborations have enabled South African and European collaborators to develop a more informed perspective on each others' contexts and needs, leading to effective practice-sharing initiatives.
Academic Development, for me, is not only an opportunity to lead or guide others. It is also a synergistic and organic form of community engagement. Mlamuli Hlatshwayo (et al) talk of Ubuntu Currere "an emancipatory alternative" to curricula, to be "thought of as an active conceptual tool that is dialectical, inclusive, and democratic...enabling varied voices such as those from students, lecturers, policy makers, communtiy stakeholders, industry, and others" . I see my role in the engineering education space as one of enabling dialogue between the varied voices, and engagement with self, other and knowledge such that we can collectively contribute to society.
(2020, https://doi.org/10.1080/23802014.2020.1762509)Academic Development: Sites of Dialectical Engagement
National Engineering Education capacity building
I am privileged to be able to play a role nationally, and internationally, in engineering education capacity building. As part of the South African Society for Engineering Education (SASEE) leadership, I represent the organisation on the TSP Innovative Engineering Curriculum Project run by A/Prof Lelanie Smith (UP) and supported by Prof John Mitchell (UCL), along with a core team of engineering educators from around South Africa. This role entails collaborative design and facilitation of holistic engineering staff development opportunities, as well as national and international community-of-practice building. We have run multiple national workshops since 2021, and hope to enable organic change from the ground upward, as well as garner support from management structures.
