Great Moments: Innovation in teaching
Three decades of innovation in teaching
Established to support teaching effectiveness at UVic, the Learning and Teaching Centre (LTC) first opened its doors in 1981, operating out of a small office in UVic’s law faculty. Now a university-wide resource to encourage and support innovative teaching, the LTC coordinates awards programs and conducts a wide range of workshops to help improve teaching skills and curriculum design for faculty and teaching assistants. In 1987, Dr. Andy Farquharson, the centre’s longest-serving director (who was also among the inaugural recipients of Canada’s prestigious 3M awards for national teaching excellence) established the first yearly UVic award for excellence in teaching. Named for a UVic president who advocated support for effective teaching, the Harry Hickman Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching has grown into multiple awards to encourage and support extraordinary instruction, which remains at the centre of campus activity.
The LTC also administers the Jamie Cassels Undergraduate Research Awards program, launched in 2009 to provide support for exceptional undergraduates to gain direct research exposure as part of their learning experience at UVic.
“Our goal at UVic is to inspire teaching and to nurture inspired teaching,” says LTC director Teresa Dawson. “As members of a comprehensive research university, our faculty, instructors and teaching assistants bring their exceptional research ideas into the classroom setting to excite and encourage creativity and critical thinking.”
- Vikes Athletics
- Congress 1990 and 2013
- Commonwealth Games
- Iqaluit convocation
- Indigenous research partnerships
- Learning and Teaching Centre
- Malahat Review
- Destination university
- Making science fun
- Graduate studies
- IESVic
- Norma Mickelson
- First year residence guarantee
- TRIUMF to CERN
- Links to Asia
- CanAssist
- Bamfield
- Fine Arts
- Climenhaga observatory
- Engineering faculty
- ONC Observatory
- CFUV
- LE,NONET
- Alumni association
- Island Medical Program
- Research growth
- Bob Wright Centre
- UVic writers
- Gustavson School
- Maclean's rankings
- Climate solutions (PICS)
- Birth of UVic
- Olympians and Paralympians
- Lafayette String Quartet
- Speakers Bureau
The full set of nearly 250 Great Moments in UVic History nominated and submitted by members of the university community during 2012 is also available on the 50th Anniversary website.