At the Ivan Franko National University of Lviv on the basis of the project “UTTERLY: University Teachers’ Certification Centers. INNOVATIVE APPROACH TO PROMOTION TEACHING EXCELLENCE” on December 7, 2021, a training entitled “Strategy and Model of the Teaching Improvement Center” began. The representatives of each Higher Education Institution-partners of the project in Ukraine were invited to take part in it. The universities delegated two of their representatives: an employee who has managerial authority to improve teaching and a leading representative of the institution’s teaching community.
This event was organized by Ivan Franko National University of Lviv and the Institute of Higher Education of the NAES of Ukraine. The welcoming speech was delivered by Vitaliy Kukharskyy, Vice-Rector for Research, Teaching and IT Development of Lviv University, Coordinator of UTTERLY at Ivan Franko National University of Lviv. In particular, Vitaliy Mykhailovych noted: “The University already has some experience in launching two such courses to improve teaching skills, so we are happy to support another joint initiative with UTTERLY, which aims to help Ukrainian Higher Education Institutions to understand all the intricacies of teacher certification and key powers and authorities of the certification centers.”
Svitlana Kalashnikova, a representative of the Institute of Higher Education of the NAES of Ukraine, pointed out that it was not the first time when the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine joined such initiatives. For example, together with the British Council in Ukraine, the British agency “Advance HE” and with the support of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine and The National Agency for Higher Education Quality Assurance (NAQA), the Higher Education Teaching Improvement Program has been implemented. (The Ivan Franko National University of Lviv also took part in it). According to Svitlana Kalashnikova, these integrations are a good tradition, as they motivate institutions that have so far had little or no practice of university teachers’ certification to adopt such practices.
The training participants are the following: the representatives of Kyiv National Economic University named after Vadym Hetman, Kryvyi Rih National University, Lutsk National Technical University, Poltava V.G. Korolenko National Pedagogical University (PNPU), Volodymyr Vynnychenko Central Ukrainian State Pedagogical University, Hryhorii Skovoroda University in Pereiaslav, National Academy of Educational Sciences of Ukraine, Nizhyn Mykola Gogol State University and Union of Rectors of Higher Education Institutions of Ukraine.
Within the program, all participants will effectively work on improving teaching (Teaching Excellence, hereinafter TE), in particular on such topics as “TE as a priority of European Higher Education Area development”, “Models of the modern university and TE strategies”, “Trends in higher education and TE “,” CELT Organizational Model “,” CELT – Commitments in the Project “, ” Teacher Professional Development Program Profile “,” TE Model “,” TE Strategy “, “Model Legalization and TE strategies “, etc.
During the meetings, the important issues related to the organization of teacher certification will be discussed, in particular, the organizers will bring about the following issues: which governance board at your university is responsible for TE issues? What procedures and rules are applied at your university when developing and approval of institutional policies related to teaching? What are the basic Educational Program meaningful modules for the professional development of Your university teacher? What does TE mean within your university, etc.?We sincerely believe that such four-day mini-courses will help many higher education institutions in Ukraine to organize high-quality certification of teaching staff, as well as add a lot of European educational innovations into the process of explaining certain disciplines to students.