Rhodes University’s Centre for Higher Education Research, Teaching and Learning (CHERTL) has received a positive feedback from the new academic staff members who attended the Academic Orientation Programme (AOP) recently.
“I am enjoying the Academic Orientation Programme and learning a lot of new things from presenters as well as participants; also many things I already know are making new sense in the context of Rhodes,” says Associate Professor Michael Joseph who has just joined Rhodes as a lecturer in the Education Faculty at Rhodes.
“Quite unexpected is to make new friends, and contacts in other departments that promise cross disciplinary involvement around issues such as 'diversity'. Overall there is information but openness to a self-critical attitude on the part of CHERTL, the VC and other presenters which is so refreshing and which invites us to contribute to change and not just receive information,” says Professor Joseph.
“I've just started to think again about my courses and their structure and I'm quite glad to have been able to do that with all the significant input that I got, not only from the CHERTL team (who are amazing and wonderful) but also from my fellow colleagues,” says Dee Mohoto, a new lecturer in the Drama Department.
“I'm finding it really exciting to develop the course material for Computer Literacy now that I have been through the AOP course. I'm finding ways of integrating themes such as ethics in computing, internationalisation, gender sensitivity (or 'Women in Computing') and others. It's a chance to broaden the scope of the material as well as to have interesting discussions in group settings that the students can discuss among themselves in the lecture,” added Dr Mosiuoa Tsietsi a new lecturer in the Department of Computer Science commented.
The theme for this year’s AOP was Scholarly engagement with the roles of an academic. During the Programme the roles of research, teaching & learning and community engagement were explored in relation to the culture of the University, the structures of the University and the way in which academics can choose to exercise their agency.
AOP is an opportunity for lecturers new to Rhodes to meet the University’s senior leaders such as the VC, DVCs and Deans as well as key people in various other structures in the University such as the Human Resources Division, Internationalisation Office, NTEU, Community Engagement, the library, etc.
A range of more experienced Rhodes lecturers are also invited to share their experiences of the various facets of an academic’s life at Rhodes. In addition to these sessions, a series of workshops on integrating technology into teaching and learning is also offered by CHERTL educational technology staff.
Aside from induction to many aspects of life at Rhodes and meeting key people in the University, the AOP also offered an opportunity for new staff from different disciplines and faculties to get to know one another.
This year however saw an additional innovation to the usual AOP – a number of sessions devoted specifically to exploring issues of concern for academics new to teaching. These sessions were highly interactive and offered an opportunity for lecturers to share their ideas around issues such as what makes a good lecture, how can assessment contribute to learning, and so forth.
CHERTL staff Lynn Quinn and Jo-Anne Vorster facilitated these sessions, offering both practical suggestions and theoretical tools for finding solutions to difficult teaching and learning challenges.
A strong theme that emerged from these sessions was the need for lecturers to be aware of the diversity of the student body and to find ways of using this diversity in a positive way.