This document summarizes findings from a study on professional development opportunities for teaching at the University of Cape Town (UCT). It finds that while UCT provides many PD opportunities, academics are intrinsically rather than extrinsically motivated to participate. There is a perceived mismatch between senior management emphasizing research and the importance of teaching. Academics see risks to participation including sacrificing research time, wasting time on irrelevant activities, being seen as needing help with teaching, or being labeled as a "teaching person." Non-participation also carries risks such as not keeping up with new ideas or missing out on networking opportunities. The incentives and messaging around teaching versus research are unclear.

1. Learning to Teach at UCT:
A risky business?
Jeff Jawitz and Teresa Perez
Centre for Higher Education
Development (CHED)

2. The UCT case study
(Part of multi-institutional NRF study #74003)
Senior
management
interviewed
2 Senior
leadership
2 Deans
Academics
surveyed & interviewed
171 Respondents
75% participated in
PD in teaching
25% never
participated in
PD in teaching
11 interviewees
8 participated in
PD in teaching
3 never
participated in
PD in teaching

3. Lots of PD opportunities
• 74% feel UCT provides lots of opportunities for PD in teaching
• 61% agree it is easy to access info about PD opportunities in teaching.
NAPP
Learning to
Teach in Higher
Education (LTHE)
Teaching with
Technology
Seminars
Teaching
Workshops
Higher Education
Studies
(PGDIP/Masters)
TSCOT – The
short course on
teaching
Commerce
Education Group

4. High quality of teaching
• “[There are] some outstanding teachers in the faculty, enthusiastic,
committed and excellent ...evidenced in the nominations that go for the
distinguished teacher’s award” [SM3].
• Our teachers are fantastic… a number … have been given distinguished
teachers' awards. [Others] have received national education awards and
many of them have gone on to do masters and doctoral degrees in
education [SM4].

5. Love of teaching
Available:
http://www.cpo.org.za/index.php?option=
com_content&view=article&id=191&Itemi
d=150 [2014, October 16].
• “Colleagues who are able to incorporate their
research interests into their teaching love that,
… I would say that the majority of staff in fact
actually enjoy teaching” (SM)
• “I love working with students and I love the idea
that I’m actually building skill that’s useful in the
workplace” (L10)
• “As much as I enjoy the research, I actually really
enjoy the teaching” (L5)

6. Research counts
• “All of the implicit and
explicit messages favour
research and allocating time
there” (SM1).
• “At the end of the day ...
being a researcher is key to
your success ... at UCT”
(SM2).
http://mg.co.za/article/2010-11-05-research-central-to-knowledge-
production-and-sas-development [2014, October 15].

7. Teaching doesn’t count
[There is] no requirement for you to have
done courses, … [or] for you to be a
particularly good teacher. It doesn’t seem to
be rated very highly. (L11)
The academic rat race that requires
people to publish or perish… has a …
detrimental effect on teaching. (L4)
University tends to have a laissez-faire
approach to the way in which
people teach… I don’t think anyone’s
ever been fired because they didn’t
teach properly. (L5)

8. Motivation to participate: Senior managements view
Uneveness
across
faculties
Changed
should be
driven from
the top
SM vs.
faculties
Mismatch between senior management and
academic staff/ mixed messages/ agency

9. Motivation to participate: Academics view
Q18: What may prompt your attendance of PD
opportunities for your teaching?
Code Response %
Intrinsic
motivation
> 60%
If the topic is relevant to my
teaching
68
If I have the time 67
If it can help my teaching 63
If I am interested 63
Code Response %
Extrinsic
motivation
< 15%
If I want to apply for promotion 15
If required by my institution 13
If I need CPD points 6
If there is an incentive or reward 4
“I find that self-motivation
and
a desire for self-improvement
are prime
motivators in
attending
teaching
training”
(Survey)

10. Doesn’t care/neutral/freedom
• “The head of department doesn’t really challenge
us on [teaching] … Nobody does.…Nobody ever
evaluates our lectures” (L2).
• “The only time [UCT] requires that you … are OK as
a teacher is when you apply for promotion.
Otherwise I don’t think the institution could care
less” (L6)
• “Institutionally … it’s kind of neutral. …We’ve
[never] been told not to do something” (L5)
• “Nobody really checks what I teach … or how I
decide to give my lectures … there’s quite a bit of
freedom … which is nice” (L1)
Just get
on with it
– I really
don’t care
Available:
http://distancelearning.anglia.ac.uk/blog/
type-business-development-manager/
[2014, October 16].

11. Balancing act
Making
Time
Risk ?
The university is not
always clear about how it
wants its staff to balance
their responsibilities.
We’re primarily a
research institution, but
… within the South
African context we are
also a very important
teaching institution. (L5)

12. Risk of participation (1):
Taking time from research
“it is hard to justify spending time on improving my teaching
when I know that the main determinant of my getting a permanent
position or promotion is my research” (survey)
“Teaching (well) is enormously time-consuming.
… I am not prepared to sacrifice
even more time to further enhance my
teaching skills at the expense of my research”
(survey)
“I happen to be good at teaching, and get
consistently good feedback from students
even about the courses I would prefer not to
teach, but I resent having teaching impact so
negatively on my research time” (survey)

13. Risk of participation (2)
Wasting time
• “Broad general courses not focused on
teaching in a specific set of disciplines can be
annoying time-wasters...!”(survey)
• “Teaching is fine, but huge dollops of time to
deal with theory of education is not” (survey)
• “Went to workshops … other people seemed
to be quite excited, but I didn’t really get
anything out of them” (L6).
• “Allocating time to participate in opportunities
that seem relatively common sense is not a
priority” (survey)

14. Risk of participation (3)
Being seen as needing help
• “[PD activities] seem to cater to academics
who are grossly under qualified, rather than
people who need some advice while learning
the ropes for the first time” (survey)
• “CHED … seems to mainly … help academics
who are out of their depth … to cope with
teaching, rather than helping academics who
are adequate to good to improve further”
(survey)
• “Older academics who have been here for a
very long time who perhaps are quite set in
their ways, … need to go through those
processes. (L8)

15. Risk of participation (4)
Being labelled as the teaching person
• “the more obliging you are and helpful to
other people, with regard to teaching … the
less people take you seriously” (L3)
• “if you put a lot of time and effort into
teaching, people don’t really respect you as
much” (L3)
• “it’s easy [to develop] … a reputation of being
someone who defends teaching over
research and people … put you in a box” (L3)

16. Risk of participation(5)
New ideas may not work
• “I went to [a session on] .. mind mapping …
and I tried to use that in the class but it
didn’t work … it was great to hear about a
new idea, but I wasn’t well versed in it
enough to try” (L2)

17. Risk of non-participation(1) not keeping up
with new thinking about teaching
• “I like to… keep up to date with what’s
happening and see if I can incorporate that in
what I do” (L3)
• “By continuing to go to these courses, and by
being interactive in the dialogue that’s happening
currently, by not … isolating yourself, you keep
up ” (L3)
• “Just to see what people are doing and see
what’s out there because, if you’re not
particularly technological, you’re not always
aware of what you can bring into the classroom”
(L3)
‘I don’t know. I’m
something of a
technophobe.’
Available:
http://thombartley.wordpress.com/2013/0
9/16/all-hail-our-new-robot-overlords/
[2014, October 16].

18. Risk of non-participation (2) You miss out
• “[NAPP] was a nice way to meet people
because I was new here..[and helped with]
finding out how to navigate UCT” (L1).
• “You don’t have to go to them,… [but] you
are a fool not to… I go to anything that’s on
offer if I can possibly schedule it” (L7)
• “It would be useful to be able to go to a
workshop like that once every two years and
keep thinking through what one does as a
teacher” (L4)
• “We constantly need to re-evaluate what we
are doing, … to get ourselves out of our
comfort zones and challenge ourselves and
be challenged by other people” (L2)
Available:
http://www.thelunchboxdiaries.com/fomo-fear-of-missing-
out/ [2014, October 16].