Building your portfolio HEA membership Building your portfolio
CPD Route UKPSF has identified four types of recognition depending on the roles and experience that an academic has and each has its own descriptor: Descriptor 1: An Associate Fellow Descriptor 2: A Fellow Descriptor 3: A Senior Fellow Descriptor 4: A Principal Fellow PGCAP or CPD route For example: an academic may see their career path (expressed in terms of teaching professional development) as moving through the roles of Graduate Teaching Assistant (Descriptor 1) through a Lecturer post (Descriptor 2), as the main career grade, to an academic leadership role or middle management (Descriptor 3); and possibly to a more senior leadership role with demonstrable impact (Descriptor 4). Direct application (See Handout for full breakdown)
What is expected from staff… Undertake a review – present your evidence indicating how you meet the requirements for the role you are aiming for. This involves: Construct a portfolio of examples to show in the review to illustrate how your role and duties meet the requirements in each of the three dimensions: (Areas of activity, Key knowledge, Professional values) 2. Produce a narrative to talk through the examples and how your role meets the UKPSF– can be a series of prompts for you, not polished. Crucially, staff are only examined on the review itself. The portfolio and narrative are not assessed.
What the reviewer is looking for
Developing ‘the story’ You are essentially constructing a story that demonstrates how you meet the criteria It needs to cover the five activity areas These represent the roles we do as academic and support staff. The simplest way to imagine this story is a series of five pages. Each page uses one or two examples to show how you tackle the particular activity area.
My ‘Story’ Activity Area 1 Activity Area 2 Activity Area 5 Design and Plan Learning Activities Activity Area 2 Teach and/or support learning My ‘Story’ Activity Area 5 Engage in cpd in subjects/ disciplines & their pedagogy Activity Area 3 Assess and give feedback to learners Activity Area 4 Develop effective learning environments & approaches to student support & guidance
Using powerpoint
Using a blog
Using a word document
Using Pebblepad
Advice from the reviewers 1) Meet with your CF especially when you have a near ‘final draft’ to make sure there is nothing obvious missing 2) Make sure that you have sufficient evidence to draw on 3) If going for D3 make sure the leadership of others is a key feature and you use the word ‘I’ 4) Expect reviewers to seek clarification at some points…i.e. don’t plan a timed presentation which does not allow for ‘interruptions’. 5) Make sure any linked docs will open…e.g. practise somewhere other than on your own desktop. 6) Scholarship is a key feature…if the work of one or more key authors in teaching and learning in HE is not something you make reference to when describing your approach to your work, you will most likely be prompted to do so: lots of useful resources on DEAP which is already grouped under the Activity areas.
Types of evidence What might be useful evidence? Remember this is for you to demonstrate your role in creating or applying teaching / design / feedback/effective learning environments/cpd. How can we obtain evidence?
Engaging established staff with UKPSF SD3 A presentation from the Higher Education Academy Annual Conference, 22-23 June 2010. https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/node/3300
Activity Area 2: Teach and Support Learning. This is an example of one approach to this activity area. Activity Area 2: Teach and Support Learning. List the roles/activities/projects you are involved in that relate to teaching and supporting learning. Choose an example that allows you to demonstrate how you meet this activity area. In this case, Activity Area 2 is specifically about: Your awareness of different approaches to and methods of teaching and supporting learning Your ability to choose the most appropriate approach to achieve the module/course aims.
Example: Developing & Assessing Reflective Practice Demonstrates the way in which cpd, and research have been drawn on to inform your practice Pedagogic /academic context Application e.g. Designed a new assessment Evidence and outcome Module assessment brief Module brief (teaching schedule) Student work examples Offer a little more detail – could be on notes rather than a slide. Evidence can include anything to help demonstrate the approach taken and the way it worked out in practice. These need to be hyperlinked documents.
Pedagogic /academic context For your Example What is the context? Pedagogic /academic context Application Evidence and outcome Offer a little more detail – could be on notes rather than a slide. Evidence can include anything to help demonstrate the approach taken and the way it worked out in practice. These need to be hyperlinked documents.
The HEA has lots of Resources which may help with the Pedagogic /academic context for example: Reflective practice: some notes on the development of the notion of professional reflection https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/sites/default/files/3573.pdf Supporting Portfolio Development https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/node/4524 Blackboard Discussion Boards - Adding Value to Work-Based Learning https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/node/2906 Engagement through partnership: students as partners in learning and teaching in higher education https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/engagement-through-partnership-students-partners-learning-and-teaching-higher-education Online teaching https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources/detail/internationalisation/ISL_Online_Teaching Internationalising the curriculum http://www.brookes.ac.uk/services/cci/resourcekit.html Feed-forward: Supporting Transferable Skills with Formative Feedback https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/sites/default/files/Feed_Forward.pdf
Access to materials via MyBeckett
Develop effective learning environments & approaches to student support & guidance What theory or research underpins your approach? Why is this appropriate for your particular group of students? How do you know it is effective? How does your approach demonstrate respect for individual learners and/or diverse learning communities? Some suggestions: Flipped classrooms Audio feedback Discussion groups Online materials Mentoring Peer feedback Feed forward Experiential learning
Engage in cpd in subjects/ disciplines & their pedagogy How do you keep your knowledge and expertise up to date? What activities do you engage in as part of your professional development? How does feedback from students and others inform your development and practice? How do you evaluate your own teaching practice in relation to pedagogic theory and research? Is your teaching influenced by professional body standards? Some suggestions: courses conferences professional interactions networking consulting experts working with others learning by teaching feedback mentoring personal research discussion groups communities of practice membership of professional bodies journals external examiner duties conference or journal paper reviews
Your examples should also demonstrate:
For Senior Fellow Demonstrating DVII Successful co-ordination, support, supervision, management and/or mentoring of others in relation to teaching and learning. Usually to demonstrate this examples need to be drawn from the following academic roles: Course leadership, Academic lead/Group Head Programme/scheme leader Module leader of complex modules (lots of staff /students to manage) Need to emphasise the ‘I’ in the examples. Need to show that this has been sustained over a period of time (at least one to two academic sessions).
Examples might include: Managing one or more courses Supporting course leaders in ug/pg refocus Managing staff eg Staff deployment /PDR to enhance teaching and learning Supporting and mentoring staff School level strategic roles (related to teaching and learning)
Change to the ‘learner’ for D3 Normally, D3 submissions will include evidence drawn from work you have done/are doing direct with students, and work with colleagues/other HE professionals which impacts on student learning. However, in some cases the whole submission may be built around academic leadership work where this is demonstrably directly linked to the student learning experience. In such cases, you will need to evidence, across all Dimensions of the Framework (Activity Areas, Core Knowledge & Professional Values), how your work impacts upon colleagues, upon their work withstudents, and upon the student experience. Examples of the kind of learning and teaching leadership work you might include would be heading up project teams/working groups, development and implementation of faculty/school-wide work in response to student feedback, influencing learning and teaching policy/practice at a faculty, institutional, or national level. In terms of mapping this to the UKPSF D3 descriptor, those influenced through your work may be considered to be your “learners”.
Next Steps Your critical friend will help you review your evidence against the appropriate descriptor. If you have any further questions or to book a review please contact your faculty lead: