Professionalising Teaching Practice in Higher Education: a study of disciplinary variation and ‘teaching-scholarship’

There has been extensive research in the last few years on adapting teaching to differences among learners, on the social and institutional context of teaching in higher education and, more recently, on the theory and methods of research on teaching. Less attention has been paid to how academics from different discipline areas actually prefer to engage in teaching-scholarship. The terms ‘teaching-scholarship’ and the ‘scholarship of teaching’ are used interchangeably in this article to include both ongoing learning about teaching and the demonstration of teaching knowledge. Most studies in this regard have been normative or descriptive. The ‘professionalisation’ of teaching practice in higher education is becoming more important as universities try to respond to an increasingly diverse and discerning student population, issues relating to standards and quality, growing international competition, and generally ‘doing more with less’. This study sought to inquire into the relationship between a number of factors that characterise academics working in higher education and their approaches to the scholarship of teaching. Findings from this exploratory study suggest that discipline and teaching conceptualisation have the strongest influence on teaching scholarship, while qualifications and years of teaching have a moderate impact, and gender and post do not appear to play a significant part. General strategies in support of teaching scholarship that emerge from the study and the literature relate to the importance of educational and organisational development. Future investigations might examine institutional ethos, work distribution and climate factors and their relationship to promoting teaching scholarship in different types of higher education institutions.