“Thinking differently" - New Curricula, New Skills in Higher Education

The 2013 , Annual Galway Symposium.
Date: June 7th 2013 , Venue: Áras Moyola,  NUI Galway

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Conference Overview

“Thinking differently’ - New Curricula, New Skills in Higher Education

In this year’s  Galway Symposium on Higher Education we explored the broad question of what kind of degree and curricula are most relevant to graduates in this age of mass higher education, and what particular attributes and skills graduates should have, emerging from such programmes, to help them in their lives and work.

Amongst the keynote speakers, we welcomed  Prof. Marijk van der Wende, who described a model for the renewal of the idea of the ’Liberal Arts & Sciences’ that has taken hold in institutions in the Netherlands, including her own: University College Amsterdam.  Dr. Camille Kandiko of King’s College London, presented an overview of models of curricular redesign that have emerged in institutions across the world in the past five or so years.   Prof. Derek Raine showed how Leicester University radically  reconceptualised its undergraduate Science programme around interdisciplinarity and higher levels of student intellectual engagement. Other speakers included  Dr. Alastair Robertson (Higher Education Academy) and  Dr. Vicky Gunn (Glasgow University) exploring issues of graduate attributes and research into Curriculum.

Workshop sessions provided participants with opportunities to experiment with course design with a particular emphasis on interdisciplinarity and active learning. Online, blended and hybrid approaches also featured, as did aspects of skills and personal development.

View the Conference 2013 programme.