Prof. Kopp, FAU is launching a good practice campaign based on the Guidelines for innovative teaching. What is your message for students?
This campaign has an important message for students: We want you to enjoy the best possible standard of teaching and will do all we can to support you by designing innovative concepts. The good practice videos created in consultation with the Innovation in Learning Institute (ILI) and the guidelines drawn up across the whole of FAU should also encourage students to get take an active part in shaping teaching and in demanding teaching of a high quality. We hope that our teaching can inspire our students, both in their position as students today and possibly also as the prospective teaching staff of the future. If we are to move knowledge, we have to provide inspiration for finding new ways to convey knowledge. This is the aim behind the latest campaign.
The campaign is of course aimed predominantly at teaching staff. What are the impulses you hope to convey?
For teaching staff, the main aspect is to encourage their potential for development. We want to give them tools they can use to revamp their teaching. The idea behind the examples of good practice are to provide inspiration and examples of how to take a fresh approach to designing your own teaching concept. As examples of good practice, we approached some of our outstanding teaching staff who are particularly motivated and asked if they would be willing to share their enthusiasm for good teaching. We want to showcase good teaching at FAU effectively and offer a platform for exchanging ideas. This gives all teaching staff the opportunity to exploit and optimize their pedagogical potential.
Which support does the University offer teaching staff in order to encourage the development and implementation of innovative teaching approaches?
One of our main concerns is to encourage ideas and engagement at FAU. We support innovative projects, particularly through the Innovation Fund for Teaching, and are always available to provide advice and support via the Center for Continuing Education in University-Level Teaching (fbzhl) and the Innovation in Learning Institute (ILI). Our experienced teams offer practical and individual advice for implementing teaching and examination formats, they provide handy tips on their websites and offer a wide range of training courses. For this academic year and the next, the focus of our concentrated efforts will be on the topic of AI in university-level teaching. Impulses will be given for using AI in learning, teaching, and examinations. We are currently working on designing a number of different formats for teaching. In addition, our teaching staff can work together with the team responsible for degree program development in order to develop innovative concepts for degree programs. Like I said before, please feel free to get in touch at any time. We are happy to receive any suggestions.
What are the next steps you would like to see at our University and concerning teaching at FAU?
While it is certainly true that FAU’s most outstanding achievements are in the area of research, we also provide excellent teaching for 40,000 students. FAU has set itself the goal of becoming the place to be for students. In my opinion, it is therefore essential that we involve students at all times. Working for students means that we must work together with students at all times when it comes to learning, teaching and examinations, no matter whether the focus is on successful studying, innovation incentives or open educational resources.
For me, the most important thing is that dialog encourages innovative developments. Teaching staff have a lot of good ideas which we can take to work together on new developments. An important aspect that we have focused on in recent times is exchanging opinions between the Executive Board and Deans of Studies. This will continue to be an important and effective aspect in all issues concerning the quality of teaching.
