But which teaching competencies do they want to learn? Self-identified priorities ranked

Karin Brown; Sara Petchey; Katarina Martensson; Kai Niebert

doi:10.21240/zfhe/20-3/05

Universities support teaching staff to develop teaching competencies, yet institutional priorities may not align with those of staff. This study examined open texts from 863 teaching staff from 16 departments at a research-intensive university to discover self-identified teaching competencies needs. Five universal priorities were identified (student engagement, course development, specific teaching methods, assessment, and student diversity) however departmental variations also emerged. These findings can inform the planning professional development that requires balancing evidence-based practices, institutional goals, and departmental contexts.

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Not only society, but also the higher education landscape is undergoing fundamental change. This poses major challenges for the quality of higher education teaching at universities and colleges in Germany, Austria and Switzerland: Digitalisation of all areas, educational expansion and mass universities, demands for higher labour market relevance of studies, promotion of future skills, questions about economically sustainable education funding and socio-political challenges of our time call for new skills for contemporary teaching. These developments are contributing to a reflection and readjustment of the goals of academic education and are gradually bringing university teaching more into the focus of politics and society. The increased attention paid to teaching is accompanied by the question of the (further) development of university didactic professionalisation, which is increasingly moving away from traditional forms of knowledge transfer and further towards project-based and more open teaching and learning environments.

Authors

Karin Brown BIO
ETH Zurich
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5318-477X

Karin Brown

Karin Brown is an educational developer at ETH Zurich. She supports continuous institutional change through the professional development of faculty. She develops and teaches courses for teaching staff at various levels at ETH Zurich and has a strong interest in online teaching and the scholarship of teaching and learning (SOTL). She is a doctoral student at the University of Zurich.  
Sara Petchey BIO
University of Zurich
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4190-5036

Sara Petchey

Dr. Sara Petchey is a post-doctoral researcher looking at the role of discipline specificity in educational development. She leads a community of practice at the University of Zurich’s Faculty of Science and offers courses ranging from the MOOC, Teaching Science at University, to workshops on revision of curricula.
Katarina Martensson BIO
Lund University
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7837-4382

Katarina Martensson

Dr. Katarina Mårtensson is a professor of higher education and an academic developer at Lund University. She works at the Division for Higher Education Development (AHU) within the Department of Educational Sciences. Her research focuses on conditions for academic development at the organizational meso-level, in particular the role of informal conversations and networks, collegiality and educational leadership.
Kai Niebert BIO
University of Zurich
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7872-4688

Kai Niebert

Dr. Kai Niebert is a professor of natural science education at the University of Zurich. His research and teaching focusses on topics relevant to society and the future. He aims to improve the quality of science teaching at universities by looking at tools and strategies which aid conceptual understanding. He also enables practical and evidence-based teacher training.

How to Cite

Brown, K., Petchey, S., Martensson, K., & Niebert, K. (2025). But which teaching competencies do they want to learn? Self-identified priorities ranked. Zeitschrift für Hochschulentwicklung (Journal for Higher Education Development), 20(3), 105–122. https://doi.org/10.21240/zfhe/20-3/05

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