³ÉÈË´óƬ

The preparation and ongoing development of all university educators is the Centre’s foremost responsibility. Teaching excellence must be actively cultivated through sustained learning, reflection, and the development of inclusive, evidence-informed practices that support growth along a continuum: from developing as effective educators to contributing as leaders in teaching and learning.

The Centre’s portfolio should balance educator-development programming (e.g., workshops, certificates, mentoring) with initiatives that build educational leadership (e.g., support for teaching awards, professional fellowships, and initiatives that support promotion and tenure processes). My objective is for the CTL to invest efforts where the impact on educator capability and student learning is ³ÉÈË´óƬ, with the goal over time of positively influencing Queen’s teaching and learning culture. This focus may require re-evaluating the scale and mode of delivery of some activities: while one-to-one consultations and drop-in supports remain valuable, the Centre’s priority should be initiatives that reach broader audiences, build sustained capacity, and contribute directly to institutional change.

As part of strengthening the culture of teaching at Queen’s, I am exploring ways to formally recognize and professionalize teaching through credentials that demonstrate educational expertise and ongoing commitment to development. One emerging opportunity is to pilot supports for the Higher Education Academy (HEA) Fellowship, an internationally recognized framework for evidencing teaching effectiveness and leadership. Such a pathway could help position Queen’s among institutions that affirm teaching excellence as a professional standard comparable to research achievement, and I would expect the CTL to play a central role in its enactment.

Any future work in this area will proceed in close collaboration with Faculties and academic leaders to ensure alignment with institutional priorities, program contexts, and existing mechanisms for professional growth. Over time, initiatives of this kind can help normalize expectations of continuing professional development and contribute to a culture where teaching expertise is both recognized and rewarded.

All Centre activities should be grounded in evidence about effective teaching and learning. The CTL’s programs, consultations, and resources should reflect established research on educational development effectiveness and on how students learn.

I expect the Centre to make its work and outcomes more visible through public-facing evidence of effectiveness, strengthening institutional accountability and confidence. This includes drawing on the scholarship of educational development and using data to evaluate and regularly communicate the impact of the Centre’s work with the university community.

As the Queen’s Institute for Educational Scholarship and Research (QIESR) develops, the CTL should maintain a supportive and collaborative relationship, ensuring that the connection between scholarly inquiry and professional practice is visible and mutually reinforcing.

The CTL has a hands-on role in supporting academic units to design, evaluate and renew curricula. Working in collaboration with the quality-assurance staff in the Vice-Provost (Teaching and Learning) portfolio, the Centre should continue to help programs articulate learning outcomes, align assessment, and apply evidence in curricular decisions.

The Centre has already begun to engage programs beyond the preparation of self-studies, using outputs such as the Final Assessment Report and Implementation Plan (FAR/IP) as a foundation for continued dialogue and support. This work should continue to grow, reinforcing continuous improvement by helping academic units act on evidence and recommendations generated through quality-assurance processes.

Our portfolio’s curricular work should support working toward an institutional culture of continuous improvement, one where evidence of student learning informs program evolution, and academic units have the capacity to design curricula that are strategic, sustainable, adaptive, and aligned with institutional goals.

The CTL has a formal role in shaping how learning environments and technologies support teaching and learning across Queen’s. This includes both governance and operational collaboration related to classroom design, educational technology selection, and instructor support.

The Centre’s focus should be on pedagogical integration: ensuring that teaching practice and student learning drives decisions about spaces and tools. Where no other unit provides training, the CTL should continue to offer direct support to instructors in the effective use of educational technologies.

Looking ahead, the Centre is well positioned to help articulate a university-wide vision and support model for online and blended learning. With direct supports in Faculties having decreased, the CTL can provide leadership to ensure that digital learning at Queen’s is pedagogically intentional, sustainable, and aligned with institutional priorities for accessibility, flexibility, and excellence.

As assessment defines how and what students learn, the CTL should continue to advance equitable, transparent, and authentic assessment practices that promote learning and uphold academic standards. Equity must be a guiding principle in this work, ensuring that assessment and course design provide fair and meaningful opportunities for all students to demonstrate their learning, minimizing barriers that are unrelated to the intended learning outcomes.

The Centre will, for example, play a key role in supporting the enactment of the anticipated institutional Principles of Assessment, translating these principles into practice through consultation and faculty development, and guiding instructors in adapting to emerging technologies such as generative AI. Supporting faculty in course design is also an area of significant impact, where the CTL’s work can model how evidence-informed and inclusive pedagogical approaches translate into high-quality learning experiences across the university.

Creating an accessible learning environment is a shared institutional responsibility, and the CTL plays an important coordinating and capacity-building role in advancing this work. The Centre supports university-wide initiatives related to accessibility in education, including collaborative efforts to address and act on the AODA Postsecondary Education recommendations and to collaborate in enacting relevant findings of the Academic Accommodations Review.

The CTL contributes to institutional progress through collaboration with the Human Rights and Equity Office, Information Technology Services, and associated planning groups. The Centre’s work bridges planning and  operations, primarily ensuring that accessibility-first considerations are embedded in course design, teaching practice, and future initiatives involving physical, digital, and curricular environments.

Through these collaborations, the Centre will help the university move toward a sustainable, accessibility-forward culture, one where the articulation of essential educational requirements and inclusive design are integral to the teaching and learning experience at Queen’s.

The CTL’s continued impact depends on collaboration, trust, and clarity of purpose. The Centre should clearly communicate its priorities, demonstrate alignment with institutional goals, and engage Faculties, departments, academic support units and governance bodies as partners in advancing teaching excellence across Queen’s.

Collaboration should be active and reciprocal. The Centre is expected to solicit input regularly from academic units to understand their evolving needs and priorities, while also exercising its professional judgment to identify opportunities and challenges that units may not yet see. This balance, between responding to what units want and leading toward what they need, will ensure the CTL’s work remains relevant, trusted, and impactful across the institution.