UNSW's commitment to excellence in learning and teaching

The current Mission Statement of the University of New South Wales articulates several principles to support the statement that "UNSW will be an international university of outstanding quality". The first of these principles is that UNSW will provide an "excellent educational experience" for our students. The Vice-Chancellor is committed to this principle, highlighting the theme of "strengthening excellence in learning and teaching" in his March 2004 report to Academic Board on the new strategic planning process. In the same report, he outlined several strategies that can help UNSW achieve this: "integrating research-based learning into our students' learning", "clearly demonstrating a student-centred approach to teaching", and, most importantly, demonstrating that "we highly value teaching through support, recognition and reward" of teachers. In other words, to be a university of outstanding quality, UNSW must aim for excellence in both research and teaching.

The Guidelines on Learning that Inform Teaching at UNSW provide one important - and highly practical - vehicle for implementing the university's commitment to excellence in learning and teaching. The Guidelines are designed to support and assist staff in reflecting on and improving their teaching, in order to enhance the educational experience we offer our students. In the Toolkit section of this website, the Guidelines are presented in a format that will facilitate this.

This section of the website frames the Guidelines with an overview of UNSW's vision of high-quality learning and teaching and the values and strategies that support this vision. The Guidelines will be an important complement to and enabler of these values and strategies.