In a groundbreaking collaboration, Advance HE worked with the University of Roehampton to support the development of a university community of programme leaders by offering a bespoke, face-to-face version of Enhancing Programme Leadership (EPL).
So far, 55 programme leaders have completed the development programme, across four cohorts, and soon after joined Roehampton’s Programme Leader ‘Community of Practice’ to consolidate their influence and impact.
Investment in a pivotal role
As the first UK higher education institution (HEI) to invest so comprehensively in this Advance HE leadership programme, Roehampton’s motivations are worth reflecting on.
Strategic sponsorship at Roehampton is offered by Professor Laura Peters (Pro Vice-Chancellor (RKE, Academic Development & Transformation) and Andy Lamb (Executive Director, Human Resources), who value the crucial contribution of the programme leader in sustaining innovative education delivery and developing future-facing curricula. Part of the rationale for their decision to invest lies in recognising the pivotal and mediating role of the programme leader in ensuring high quality student learning.
Programme leaders bridge strategic and operational dimensions as they inhabit their role, contributing to decisions about portfolio reform and validation, but also overseeing teaching teams and holding accountability for the student experience, quality assurance and data-reporting elements in a programme’s lifecycle.
Reflecting on the drivers for such an ambitious programme of development, Professor Peters asserts that the programme leader role is crucial to the University’s education strategy.
She says, “Programme leaders are at the forefront of delivering the University’s strategic mission of providing transformational education. At the interface of staff, students and the University more broadly, the programme leader provides influential leadership to ensure an excellent student experience. Working collaboratively with students, the programme leader ensures that the student voice is at the heart of the curriculum.”
Andy Lamb oversees staff CPD, reward and recognition. He also identified the programme leader community as one that needed to be “celebrated, recognised and made more visible, as the role the programme leaders play is pivotal in supporting student education.”
Designing a bespoke solution for Roehampton
EPL is run by Advance HE as an impactful open, online programme for mixed cohorts across universities. Transitioning this to a bespoke, face-to-face delivery raised several questions, given that a successful model for digital and cross-institutional delivery already existed.
What did the institutional community really need, as opposed to a cross-institutional community of programme leaders? How could we exploit the diversity of participants, context and challenge across departments, instead of across universities, and generate equivalent energy and debate? What kind of cohort community and legacy could we build within a single university, in contrast to across a sector?
Adapting Enhancing Programme Leadership involved extensive diagnostics and dialogue between Roehampton and Advance HE, scoping the right ‘fit’ for the range of staff who would be attending, thinking about their needs and wider portfolio ambitions at Roehampton.
Charles Knight, Assistant Director of Knowledge & Innovation at Advance HE, says, “We adapted existing expertise and resources but also designed sessions attuned to particular development needs and educational themes pertinent to Roehampton University, opening up the programme so that participants could bring more of their own experience, issues and aspirations to the table.”
As I adapted the programme content and activities, I understood it was crucial to get the balance between pedagogy and people right, since the core value of the programme lies in creating a collaborative environment where programme leaders feel able to share the major obstacles as well as opportunities associated with their work. From that foundation scholarly models of education leadership, curriculum design and student partnership can be debated to align with local needs.
Professor Fiona Smart, co-designer and co-facilitator on the programme, emphasises that the Roehampton version prioritises the development of “a community of creative educators keen to enhance their strategic impact.”
She adds that “critical to the success of the programme is the co-construction of a safe space within which participants feel able to talk, share, listen, challenge and be themselves, recognising that we are all learning and developing.”
A foundation for future impact
Whilst the core of this leadership programme focuses on current and often urgent challenges (for example, effective stakeholder engagement, directing programme teams and adapting curricula to changing student needs), the emphasis in later modules is set squarely on the future. Participants are encouraged to outline a ‘manifesto’ for a Programme Leader Community of Practice at Roehampton, and this energises the legacy and impact of the programme as participants shape their own collective identity and institutional influence.
Programme leaders are also encouraged to diagnose the ways their work maps onto other forms of development, such as Senior and Principal Fellowships, and are asked to plot routes into learning and teaching leadership roles and networks. This fits with the ambition of Roehampton to recognise and value programme leaders as leaders, and to invest in their continuing professional development and impact.
Enhancing programme leaders is part of an important initiative in the University to recognise leadership as a valued career trajectory and to support colleagues’ continuing professional development in this area. As such, Advance HE developed a suite of CPD with external training agencies; this programme is the cornerstone as colleagues often start their leadership journey in the programme leader role.
The CPD suite arose in response to the changing HE landscape and in response to feedback from colleagues: skilled, agile leadership is needed to lead the change and transformation required to respond to sector shifts. Colleagues were eager for this professional development.
The University of Roehampton places importance on colleagues’ leadership, and this now comprises part of the promotion criteria so it was a natural step once the suite of CPD was conceptualised to turn to Advance HE to work on this offer.
“The result has been fantastic. A programme of CPD was developed that was particularly relevant for our University context. The delivery has been skillful, thoughtful and thought-provoking. The feedback from colleagues has been amazing and they have appreciated the space and time for reflection. As a result of this, a community of practice has been established; the contribution from colleagues to the University’s mission has been noticeable.”Andy Lamb, Executive Director of Human Resources, University of Roehampton
About the author: Professor Raphael Hallett is an Advance HE Associate. Rafe was the Director of the Leeds Institute for Teaching Excellence (LITE) and Associate Professor In Early Modern History at Leeds. His areas of educational specialism are interdisciplinary programme design, employability and digital literacy. He has recently led two major projects at Leeds: the design of their new Liberal Arts degree programme and the design and delivery of a cross-campus module, Studying in a Digital Age. He is a National Teaching Fellow and has worked with JISC and HEA on multiple projects and events.
This article has been kindly repurposed from Advance HE and you can read the original here.