Joint Oireachtas Committee on Education and Skills
Meeting on Curriculum Issues
Tom Boland, Higher Education Authority
Introduction
Preparing Irish citizens for life in the twenty first century will require renewed emphasis on
core skills such as quantitative reasoning, critical thinking, communication, team-working and
the effective use of information technology. In terms of future skills needs, the emphasis has
switched away from over-specialisation towards deeper and broader disciplinary foundations
accompanied by learning objectives which explicitly seek to nurture creativity in students and
an appreciation of the importance of continual engagement with learning. The Innovation
Taskforce emphasised the importance of independent thinking and “the development of
creative, high-skilled graduates as well as lifelong learning and continuous professional
development” this theme was also reflected in the HEA’s submission to the National Strategy
Group on Higher Education:
“The pace of change renders the future increasingly unpredictable and the key
characteristic that we desire of graduates, and of the system from which they graduate, is
responsiveness, or adaptability to change. This refers to the internal responsiveness of the
academy to the needs of learners and researchers and also to the external responsiveness
of the system to the key challenges of our time – social, economic, environmental and
civic.”
Context
Investing in and improving the knowledge, skills and creativity of people is at the heart of
Ireland’s current strategy for sustainable economic renewal:
“A key feature of this [Smart Economy] approach is building the innovation or ‘ideas’
component of the economy through the utilisation of human capital – the knowledge, skills
and creativity of people - and its ability and effectiveness in translating ideas into valuable
processes, products and services.” 1
The most direct contribution of the higher education system is in the supply of skilled
graduates and in the advancement of knowledge through research. Society is also looking to
higher education to play an increasingly direct role in the application of new knowledge to
innovation in products and services.
1
Government of Ireland (2008), Building Ireland’s Smart Economy: A Framework for Sustainable Economic Renewal, p.7
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Significant advances in teaching and learning in Irish higher education
Significant advances are being made in teaching and learning in the Irish higher education
system. The last decade has seen the establishment of centres for educational development and
academic practice, the availability of professional programmes on teaching and learning,
developments in technology-supported learning, the adoption of new forms of pedagogy for
greater student engagement and an increasing emphasis on teaching in the tenure and
promotion processes. The challenge now is to convert the many examples of excellent practice
within Irish higher education into standard practice across the system.
The increasing diversity of learners will have to be matched by a broad range of teaching and
learning and assessment methods to enable students from a range of backgrounds to discover
and exploit their strengths. While large group teaching, supplemented by tutorials and
laboratory sessions, will continue to be the bedrock of teaching and learning in higher
education, it will increasingly be complemented by e-learning (including podcasting and
online discussion groups), self-directed learning, problem-based learning and collaborative
projects. Fundamentally, teachers in higher education “need to stimulate active, not passive
learning, and to encourage students to be critical, creative thinkers, with the capacity to go on
learning after their colleges days are over.”2
The importance of academic preparedness
While the many benefits of the Leaving Certificate are recognised, there is also a growing
concern that it does not adequately prepare students for the challenges of higher education.
There is a growing sense within higher education that new entrants entering directly from
school lack the critical thinking, problem solving and independent learning skills required for
successful engagement in higher education.3 Particular concern has been expressed about
students entering higher education without the necessary skills and knowledge to engage
effectively with learning in the STEM4 disciplines and the proportion of Leaving Certificate
candidates taking higher level Mathematics has remained persistently low over a prolonged
period.5 The higher education system alone cannot solve this problem which requires
complementarity and consistency in the approach to curriculum design and delivery through
primary, secondary and higher education. As Committee members are aware, these
challenges are core to the NCCA’s ongoing work in curriculum review and reform at first and
second level.
2
Ernest Boyer (1990) Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
Students indicated to the National Strategy Group that the move from second to third level is a daunting one and that the
type and processes of teaching and learning in second level is a barrier to successful access to the higher education
curriculum. “The strong emphasis on rote learning, the absence of training in higher order thinking skills, the focus on
the Leaving Cert as a memory test, did not furnish students with the skills to progress in college. (Report of Focus Group
meeting of the Strategy Group with students, Nov 09).
4
The term STEM refers to disciplines in the areas of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.
5
The percentage of students taking the higher level papers in Leaving Certificate Mathematics was as follows: 1995 –
17%, 2000 – 18%, 2001 – 18%, 2002 – 18%, 2003 – 17%, 2004 – 18%, 2005 – 19%, 2006 – 18%, 2007 – 17%, 2008 –
17%, 2009 – 16%.
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A renewed focus on the first year experience
For their part, higher education providers need to focus on refreshing and redesigning the
induction and preparation courses for first year students to enable them to engage successfully
as learners in higher education. Such courses would include skills such as self-directed
learning, time management, information literacy and critical analysis. A positive first year
student experience is crucial to achieving the goals of higher education, and failure to address
the challenges encountered by students in their first year contributes to high drop-out and
failure rates, with personal and system-wide implications. A recent HEA study on student
progression in Irish higher education highlighted the shortcomings in the mathematical skills
which persist among entrants to Science and Engineering programmes. It is clear that the
continuing development of foundational mathematical competences must remain a central part
of the first year curriculum in relevant disciplines. More generally, the first year experience
must serve as “a foundation of learning activities entailing more inquiry-based formats and
engendering employability and lifelong learning outcomes”.6 Now that Irish higher education
institutions are re-writing their programmes and modules in terms of learning outcomes, it is
timely that they undertake a thorough review and reform of the first year curriculum.
In the HEA submission to the National Strategy Group on Higher Education, we argued that
the Irish system of higher education requires students to choose a specialised area of study too
early, and that there is over-specialisation of subjects and little flexibility at undergraduate
level.7 The HEA also advocates greater interdisciplinarity at undergraduate level and believes
that the implementation of modularisation and semesterisation, introduced under the Bologna
process, provides the opportunity for introducing greater interdisciplinarity into student
learning. At all stages of higher education, institutions should ensure alignment and balance in
the design of courses and programmes between learning outcomes, pedagogy and assessment.
The application of learning
There is a need to encourage creativity and entrepreneurship to a much greater extent in higher
education so that the system facilitates reflective learning, applied knowledge, practical
experience in laboratories and scientific skills. It is vital that we move beyond a
conceptualisation of education as the simple acquisition of knowledge to one which equally
emphasises, nurtures and assesses innovation and expertise in the utilisation and application of
knowledge. This emphasis on the application of knowledge applies at all levels and underpins
the HEA’s commitment to ensure that every doctoral graduate in Irish higher education will
have completed accredited generic modules as part of their doctoral programme. These will
include modules on innovation, enterprise, and teaching and learning.
6
Bill Johnston (2010) The First Year at University: Teaching Students in Transition (Open University Press) p 31.
There has been a rise in very narrowly focused undergraduate programmes over recent years, with the total number of
undergraduate programmes listed in the CAO (Central Applications Facility) doubling over a ten year period between
1998 and 2008.
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The HEA welcomes the renewed focus on experiential and problem-based learning that is
evident within Irish higher education. Many students (eg. In UL and DCU) benefit from work
experience opportunities during their undergraduate studies. Formal work placements are built
into many programmes such as teacher education, nursing, medicine and a significant number
of minor dissertations and projects, particularly but not exclusively in the business area, are
now required to be based on solving real life problems in a workplace. The HEA supports
greater opportunities for work experience for undergraduate students and believes that the
concept of Service Learning has the potential to benefit students from a broad range of
disciplines. Service learning is a teaching and learning strategy that integrates meaningful
community service with instruction and reflection, to enrich the learning experience, teach
civic responsibility and strengthen communities. The HEA believes that there is significant
merit in expanding work placement and service learning opportunities across a broad range of
higher education programmes.
Supporting system-wide excellence and innovation
There are exciting and dynamic teaching and learning initiatives in many Irish higher
education institutions. Many of these initiatives have been supported by targeted funding
invested and administered by the HEA under the Strategic Innovation Fund (SIF) and the
Programme for Research in Third-Level Institutions (PRTLI) has been innovative in requiring
a demonstrable link back to teaching. This has helped to keep the core undergraduate
curriculum in Irish higher education up to date with leading edge research.
NAIRTL - the National Academy for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning and
the Learning Innovation Network (LIN) have done much valuable groundwork in this area as
they seek to integrate research based teaching practices in the context of academic
professional development. This work needs to continue, and to be disseminated, supported and
developed at institutional and national levels, so that Ireland’s higher education system will
provide an exemplary teaching and learning environment. In the interests of the Irish higher
education system as a whole, there will be an ongoing need to preserve some of the best
system-level infrastructures that have emerged through the Strategic Innovation Fund. The
dissemination of good practice through national networks for teaching and learning and the
recognition of excellence in teaching should underpin strategy for the ongoing development of
higher education. As part of the performance management process, academic staff should also
be required to engage in continuing professional development to ensure that their teaching
skills and expertise remain up to date.
The challenge of sustaining improvement in curriculum and learning poses challenges for
institutions and for the higher education system as a whole. I think there is great strength in
the diversity of institutions that we have in the Irish higher education system. Institutional
differentiation will be strengthened in the future as institutions focus on their key strengths in
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terms of teaching and learning and continue to align teaching, research and engagement
strategy to ensure quality and institutional coherence. There are clear benefits emerging from
the collaborative approaches to innovation in teaching and learning that have been supported
with modest investments over recent years. In the interests of efficiency and also in the
interests of quality and impact, I would like to see continuing support for collective
approaches to the challenges of teaching & learning and of curriculum & assessment in Irish
higher education. There are clear system-level benefits that can emerge from collective
engagement, particularly with the challenges of continuing academic professional
development and in the recognition and dissemination of good academic practice.
Those are my opening remarks. I welcome the Oireachtas Committee’s interest in these issues
and I look forward to our discussion.
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