Formation Continue du Supérieur

Monday 22nd September, 1-2pm
More than just MOOCing around about: the what, how, why, who and wherefore of a mass online course

Abstract
For someone who has lived through decades of technological innovations in teaching since overhead transparencies replaced chalk, the experience of delivering a Mass Open Online Course has been fascinating. This paper describes that experience and reflects both on the implications of the model for campus-based teaching and learning and on the future of MOOCs themselves.

Prof. Peter McPhee
University of Melbourne

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Monday 8th September, 1-2pm
Linking University Research and Teaching

Abstract
In our 1996 meta-analysis we demonstrated a close to zero relationship between university research and teaching. This session will update the research findings on the relationship, comment on the resistance to evidence based research, and provide an interpretation of a null finding that may lead to a higher relationship between the quality or teaching and research.

Prof. John Hattie
MGSE, University of Melbourne

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Friday 29th August, 12:30-2pm
What Australia should not learn from UK Higher Education

Abstract
Although Australia became a quasi-independent dominion in 1901 and achieved a more definite national independence after World War 2, the higher education systems in Australia and UK remain similar. At times the two systems almost feel like one. There are also interesting differences, and larger variations in society, history and world geo-context. This seminar will reflect on these patterns.

Professor Simon Marginson
Professor of International Higher Education, Institute of Education, University of London

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Monday 25th August, 1-2pm
Reinvigorating the Australian research funding system

Abstract
Australia allocates $9 billion a year of taxpayers’ money for research, but how do we know if that money is being spent wisely? With the Australian Government threatening to reduce the amount of money allocated to research, it is time for researchers to take a more serious look at how to improve the research funding system.

Despite a barrage of criticism of the Australian research funding system, there is a lack of meaningful change in the system: the majority of researchers see the system as arcane, overly-bureaucratic and wildly inefficient. In many other areas of policy, including health, education and labour market policy, we subject such government expenditure to rigorous, systematic evaluation. However, evaluation of our research investments is almost non-existent. In this presentation, I review the problem and examine how the research funding system could be reinvigorated to provide better outcomes for researchers and provide the taxpayer with more confidence about the way their money is being spent.

Prof. Paul Jensen

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Dans le cadre de la Stratégie 2020, la Commission européenne a publié en juillet 2014 des recommandations spécifiques à chaque État membre, ainsi qu’une communication générale sur les mesures nécessaires pour relancer la croissance et l’emploi.
La France a reçu sept recommandations pour la période 2014-2015.
Consulter toutes les recommandations. Voir l'article...

Friday 22nd August, 12:30-2pm
Does Higher Education Make You Think?

Abstract
Higher education is a noble and longstanding enterprise. And yet, curiously, it has not been a particularly self-reflective one. Especially in times of economic or political difficulty, the academic community has been more ready to analyse and campaign about what is being done to it than what it does to itself and to its most important members—its students. All too often we can focus on issues like funding, economic returns on investment, relative institutional prestige and the like, and ignore what tutors and researchers working directly with students frequently hear in interviews: “it changed my life”. This seminar is based on my new book, The Question of Conscience: higher education and personal responsibility  (London, Institute of Education Press, 2014).  In it I examine several distinct claims about what higher education does to and for students: in existential terms (how students come to be); in epistemological terms (how they think and appraise information); in behavioural terms (how they learn to conduct themselves); and in positional terms (both through competition and collaboration).

Prof. Sir David Watson
Principal, Green Templeton College, University of Oxford

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