New modes of teaching and learning

New modes of teaching and learning create new opportunities for enhancing the quality of the learning experience in on campus programmes, reaching out to new target groups off campus and offering freely accessible courses nationally or worldwide through the internet.

They enhance the quality, visibility and reputation of the institution. The implementation of new modes of teaching and learning requires institutional strategies and frameworks. It cannot be successful without a strong motivation of a professional teaching staff and without a continuous commitment from the top management of a higher education institution.

EADTU has conceived the action programme EMPOWER to support European higher education institutions in their transition to new modes of teaching and learning in:

• Blended education or the combination of e-learning and face to face teaching and learning on campus (in mainstream degree programmes).
• Online and flexible education for 25 + students, in short or degree programmes or in continuing education schemes (incl. CPD).
• Open education, which is freely available in the public domains (e.g. open educational resources, MOOCs).

Empower is about sharing expertise.Our objectives are:

• To establish pools of expertise in all relevant areas for the development of new modes of teaching and learning, embracing:
  • Course related expertise: course and curriculum design, access to knowledge resources, student support, assessment online.
  • Institutional development: staff support services, enabling good teaching and learning; institutional innovation strategies and management.
  • Governmental policy: fine-tuning institutional policy and governmental policy.
  • Some expert areas specifically focus on blended education, open and flexible education, continuous education, international education and OERs and MOOCs.
• To involve associate universities, which are a frontrunner or want to accelerate the adoption of an innovation policy in new modes of teaching and learning by:
  • Setting up a framework for the continuous improvement of teaching and learning.
  • Capitalising on patterns of good practice of course and curriculum design.
• To set up a collaboration in situ between expert pools and the associate universities on pre-selected domains by:
  • Developing leadership ( a vision, policies and strategies) at a programme and/or an institutional level to keep the organisation continuously innovative and effective.
  • Sharing experience and expertise at the staff and management level.
  • Implementing solutions with a high impact on practice in different areas.