The Higher Education Academy

The Higher Education Academy promotes high quality learning and teaching in higher education through the development and transfer of good practices in all subject disciplines. It is funded by the four HE funding councils in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

The Academy (http://www.hacademy.ac.uk ) offers subject specific expertise through 24 subject centres and generic expertise on learning and teaching issues that cross subject boundaries.

Key objectives are:

• to support HE communities to enhance teaching and support for student learning
• to promote and share good practices in learning, teaching and assessment

The subject focus recognises that for many staff in HE it is at this level where most networking and exchange takes place. The centres provide a pro-active as well as a responsive service anticipating future needs while meeting current ones.

The services provided by the Academy as a whole help individuals, departments and institutions respond to changes in learning and teaching practice, whether these changes are driven by student needs, subject based developments, institutional change, technology, government policy or quality issues.

The Academy shares information in a variety of ways; briefing papers, practice guides, case-study material, web-based resources, workshops, conferences and so on.

There are and have been many different projects and initiatives on learning and teaching in Higher Education so what makes the Academy different?

While a lot of excellent work has been produced through past projects and initiatives, it has often been done in isolation and there have been no comprehensive dissemination networks to systematically share these experiences and outputs. The Academy provides a coherent and accessible means for accessing, sharing and using good practices in learning and teaching.