Professional Practice in Higher Education (Taught)

A programme to help staff and research students address the key challenges of working in higher education.

• Opportunities for accredited professional development designed to meet the needs of those working in higher education contexts, by building on prior relevant credit or HEA fellowships.

• Undertake professional development at your own pace. We offer flexible patterns of enrolment, course delivery and credit accumulation.

• Learning activities and assessment tasks have a practical orientation and can be tailored to reflect the needs of your work environment.

This flexible Master’s course is designed to support your continued professional development through a range of module options, and offers both intermediate qualifications (PGCert/Dip) and external (Advance HE) accredited status (for BSU staff with suitable teaching practice in HE only). You'll choose modules based on your role and interests and study over a two to five year period.

The course is suitable for academics, professional services staff and research students and can build on previous relevant PGCerts (in HE practice) , SEDA PDF award or HEA Fellowships via accreditation of prior learning. As a staff member or research student, the PPHE programme will help you meet the key challenges of working in the rapidly changing world of higher education while gaining credit and postgraduate qualifications for your professional development.

These challenges – of teaching, supporting student learning, employability, sustainability, new technologies, team management, enterprise, quality assurance and external accountability – range across the whole business of higher education, and can rarely be addressed in isolation.

They raise many questions about how best to enhance teaching and research within particular contexts, and about how managers and administrators can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of current practices, not least in terms of addressing students’ needs and aspirations, enriching their learning experiences, and raising the enduring value of their learning outcomes.

This course includes or offers the following modules. Please check the programme document for more information on which modules are core, required or optional.

• Teaching and Supporting Learning in Higher Education
• Technology and Innovation in Higher Education
• Researcher Development
• Supervising Research
• Mentoring and Coaching in Higher Education
• Digital Learning in Higher Education
• Independent Study
• Education and Society
• Leadership in Practice
• Research Methods in Social Science
• Research and the Professional Part 1
• Research and the Professional Part 2
• Dissertation

Assessment for all modules is by coursework, based on the completion of assignments designed to promote understanding, enhancement and/or application of professional practices in higher education for your own practice.