What makes a good Teaching Merit Certificate?

Getting Started: How to focus an application

When writing an application for a Teaching Merit Certificate (TMC) it is important to be both concise and comprehensive. The best way to do this is to build your application around a specific focus area whichoutlines your teaching contributions – particularly those which canbe validated by evidence. While this focus area may be the aspect of your teaching (or related practice) for which you were recognised by a student or peer (as detailed in your nomination), it is more important to choose a focus for which you can provide substantial evidence of support. Therefore, it is important to give some thought and reflection as to which aspects of your teaching you are most proud, have been most successful with, or which have had the most influence on student learning.

Key questions to assist you in these reflections might be:

  • What are you most proud of in your teaching?
  • How do you teach? Why do you do it that way? What skills do you teach?
  • How do you motivate students? How do you inspire them to learn? How do you know that they are learning?
  • How do you assess your students? What do you assess?
  • In what ways do you encourage them to become independent learners?
  • In what ways do you respect students as individuals?
  • How do you encourage students individually to develop to their full potential?
  • Have you ever written/presented/shared about learning/teaching?
  • Have you made any contributions to learning/teaching in your field/discipline/school/faculty/the University?
  • What are some/one key challenge(s) you have faced as a tertiary teacher and how have you attempted to overcome it/them?
  • What legacy has/will your style of teaching leave for your students?
  • Do you have any educational 'heroes', if so, who are they and why? How do you use their approach or philosophy to inform your own teaching?

By identifying a specific focus area, you can then identify, organise and summarise the information necessary to support your application. For instance, if your application focuses on your innovative approach to assessment, each section of your application – the context of your teaching, the claim of excellence, the evidence you provide, and the statement of support from a colleague – should all concentrate on this particular aspect of your teaching.

Another way to focus an application might be to write about a challenge (i.e. split campus teaching), an identified problem (i.e. low levels of writing skills in students) or a specific teaching experience (i.e. coordinating and supporting students in an internship). The context of your application would describe this challenge, problem or situation and your evidence and statement of support would focus on how you have identified, responded and made a positive impact within the identified context.

Getting Going: Writing the application

The application forms are split into several sections: Teaching context; Claim/s of excellence; and Evidence in support of your claim/s. Applications for a 2nd or 3rd Teaching Merit Certificate include a section for Evidence of progression and also require a Professional Learning Plan. All applications require a Statement of Support be provided on the correct template. Although there are separate sections, each should contribute to the overall focus of the application.

Context and Claim/s of excellence

There are a number of approaches you can take to writing your teaching context, as this is the section were you are telling the assessors who you are, what you do and how you do it. Often teaching philosophies form the basis of the teaching context in a TMC application. A teaching philosophy can describe what inspires you as a teacher, what goals you have and what methods you use to achieve these goals. Your philosophy might be grounded in the literature; it might drive your own scholarship in learning and teaching; or it might be based on your personal experiences as a teacher. While a teaching philosophy is an important part of the context for many applications, it is important that your philosophy supports your whole application and is substantiated by the evidence in the next section. For instance, if you write that your teaching philosophy is centred on authentic student learning, the remaining part of the context statement needs to describe how you create or support such environments in your teaching. The Evidence section of the application will then need to provide evidence to substantiate how you go about doing this. Aligning your teaching philosophy with your claims and evidence for excellent practice are essential to writing a good TMC.

In addition to a teaching philosophy, you must also set the scene of your teaching in relation to your claim and evidence of merit. Noting the recommendations in the previous section of this resource, it is important to be concise and comprehensive when writing your application. Once you have determined your focus area, your context should be written to describe this area of your teaching. If for instance your application is about how you provide support to international students, you might describe what classes you teach that have international students enrolled in them, how many international students you teach, what modes of delivery you teach in, and how you have determined that international students needed the supports you have provided. If building your application around a challenge or problem, use the context section to explain how you identified this problem and how it relates to your own teaching.

Evidence in support of your claim/s – Getting Proof

This section of the TMC application requires you to provide evidence to substantiate the claims you have made about your excellent teaching. To write this section you must first consider what types of evidence you have to demonstrate impact: that is, how your teaching or related practiceshave had a positive influence within the identified area of focus of your application. If your application is based on the claim that your teaching helps students to become ready for the realities of the workplace, you will need to provide evidence of what you have done to achieve this, as well as evidence of how this has impacted on students and their learning. For example, you might provide feedback from employers commenting on how students from your class or program are more work-ready than they have been in the past. You might also provide feedback from graduates about the influence of your teaching on preparing them for the workplace. Other forms of evidence might include a peer review of your teaching program from industry professionals, or SETLs data indicating that students feel work ready after taking your class.

As shown in this example, it is important when writing this section to include as many varied forms of evidence you can provide. A combination of qualitative and quantitative evidence is definitely advantageous, particularly when writing your second or third TMC. Always ensure that the data you are providing, however, is relevant to your claims and aligns with the context and the case you are making throughout the application. The following model represents a useful way in which to organise the types of evidence you might like to draw upon.

Smith (2008): 4Q Model for Evaluating Learning and Teaching

Evidence as provided by your professional peers – potentially through processes of peer review – might include reflections or an assessment on your:

  • Classroom performance;
  • Course materials and content;
  • Assessment practices;
  • Scholarship of learning and teaching publications;
  • Management of teaching;
  • Learning and teaching strategies;
  • Leadership roles; and/or
  • Industry and professional association memberships.

The types of evidence that you might draw upon as a result of your own or self reflections might be documented in your:

  • Teaching journal/portfolios;
  • Teaching philosophy;
  • Self reflections, analysis and evaluation;
  • Reflective course memo;
  • Responsiveness to student feedback;
  • Publications;
  • Leadership roles; and/or
  • Professional learning and skills development.

In addition, you might have good evidence derived from feedback that reflectsstudent reactions to your teaching and related practices. These might include data from:

  • Student evaluations (course and teaching);
  • Unsolicited/solicited student feedback;
  • Student interviews;
  • Informal class student feedback;
  • Course experience questionnaires;
  • Student logs and journals; and/or
  • Online feedback.

You might also have relevant data that evidences student learning outcomes which might include:

  • Students’ self reported knowledge/skills;
  • Rates of attrition/failure progression to honours/postgraduate;
  • Evaluation of generic attributes;
  • Student work (assessments, theses, projects);
  • Employer/workplace /industry feedback;
  • Graduate feedback; and/or
  • Assessment results (pass and failure rates).

You might also choose to provide evidence about how you have engaged with teaching as a professional learning experience. This is of considerable importance whenwriting your third TMC in response to the professional learning plan you will have articulated as part of your second TMC application.

Evidence of professional learning opportunities you have taken up (and indeed, that you may have included in your professional learning plan) might include any leadership roles you might hold (i.e. teaching and learning committee membership), grants you have led or participated in, workshops or courses you have attended, papers you have presented or written, peer reviews you have participated in, or mentor relationships you have engaged with.

A quick note on using eVALUate dataas evidence

Quantitative data taken from your eVALUate student feedback reviews needs to be presented clearly and concisely and only that which is relevant to support the claims for excellent practice made in your TMC application. It is important to use current data, but it is also useful to show examples of sustained performance if it is available (particularly when applying for your second or third TMC). Quantitative data can be presented well in tables or graphs but amalgamating and listing this data is also fine. However, don’t just list quantitative data without describing its relationship to the context and focus of your application.

For more assistance with the development of your TMC, please contact TILT at .