Teaching in the digital age : adaptation and competency development for academics

When lecturers join a university, they generally possess high-level, domain- specific expertise. In addition, as a result of their education and professional experience, teachers also have good information and communication technology (ICT) competencies. But when examining lecturers' pedagogical skills and knowledge of digital technologies, a completely different picture emerges: Both are often only rudimentary. Plugging these competency gaps is a key goal in the process of socialization and development of new university lecturers. This paper demonstrates how new university lecturers can effectively identify and close these competency gaps – something considered important for the institutionalization of e-learning at universities. To support this process, the School of Management and Law (SML) at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW) has developed the self-evaluation-based online tool, e-Reflection. This tool not only helps to identify competency gaps, it also provides lecturers with advice on how these deficiencies can be rectified effectively. The results are valuable to schools/universities wanting to set up a catalogue of e-learning skills necessary for their lecturers. In addition, we aim to demonstrate how it is possible to manage and support teacher development in order to institutionalize e-learning. 30.09.2016 | Claude Muller, Flavio Di Giusto, Sandra Gross & Stefan Koruna (Zurich)