Enhancing Quality Teaching Through Informal Community Learning In Knowledge Centres

Teaching and learning have always been at the heart of the missions of universities. The growing interest nowadays to pay attention to the quality of higher education teaching results in initiatives such as the establishment of Teaching and Learning Centres (TLCs). The Academy for Learning and Teaching (ALT) at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) has recently been created, and it is still under construction, with the purpose of promoting quality of teaching through engaging staff in interaction and in learning lessons from evidence-based educational practices and innovation in engineering education. Furthermore, ALT supports the professional development of faculty teaching staff through Learning Communities (LCs) as informal learning mechanisms that stimulate knowledge sharing about engineering education experiences across departments (and universities). LCs facilitate interaction with peers, discussions on educational practices, working in teams, and exposing academic and education support staff to have access to state-of-the-art research and information on educational issues. LCs are organized by themes, such as Digitalization, that cover topics relevant to innovative practices, e.g., Learning Analytics, Artificial Intelligence in education or Digital Assessment. The purpose of this study is to present the ALT model as a knowledge centre in engineering education that stimulates the advancement of quality teaching. Specifically, we analyze successful factors to constitute Learning Communities, as well as, the motivation of the teaching staff to participate in the LC associated to the TU/e ALT. ALT may serve as an inspiring model for other engineering and technical higher education institutions and universities wishing to promote professional development of teachers.