General questions
Whether you submit an application or not this year, be sure to add the nomination to your professional CV as a valuable recognition of the impact of your practice.
We may revise the nomination process in future, but your nomination remains current for three years.
More recent applications have not been published on the website, but links to these older examples were provided in the information sessions:
- Citations (two examples)
- Tutoring and Demonstrating (four examples)
- Program
- Supervisory
Q: Is it correct that we do not need to include a cover sheet signed by the Head of School and ADE in this year’s submission?
A: Yes, we will advise both leaders of your submitted application after the deadline but we are not asking you to obtain their signatures because we are asking you to upload your completed claim for the award via an online form instead of a printed coversheet.
Eligibility
The eligibility criteria say: Nominees must be employed at ANU as tutors or demonstrators in casual, sessional, full time or fractional, continuing or fixed term positions, and must also be in this role during the period of the Vice-Chancellor’s Awards for Excellence in Education Committee’s deliberations and decision.
We are interpreting ‘be in this role’ to mean ‘still be an HDR student or staff member’: otherwise people who only teach in courses that are not offered in Semester 2 would be excluded, which is unfair and unreasonable.
Q: I’ve been nominated for a tutoring and demonstrating award. I’m teaching this semester for the first time in a few years, so all of my evidence in the application (except for the current references) would be from a couple of years ago. Is that a problem for my application?
A: As you have seen in the Guidelines for Tutoring and Demonstrating, there are no eligibility requirements about years of service, so no problems there. In pragmatic terms, it may be that the evaluation panel would consider that someone with more, more recent experience should be rated more highly than someone with just one current semester, so you might like to add a note on why there was a gap in your experience (COVID? a different project? etc.)
If you have been nominated for a standard category but your years of experience make you an early career applicant, please ask your nominator (and copy CLT into the email) if you might apply for the correct category. Similarly, if you have too much experience to be eligible to consider under an Early Career category, check with your nominator that you can instead apply under the standard category.
Evidence and impact
Q: If the criteria for Excellence in Supervision include number of student supervisions then people who aren’t in the sciences and don’t have a lab might be at a disadvantage?
A: There is no formal indication that quantity is considered. We can highlight this potential inequity between contexts to the panel evaluating this category. If you can revise your application to highlight “that which is unique, distinctive and outstanding” [from the Guidelines] to the panel, I’m sure they will consider your application carefully. Simply, because there is only one recipient awarded each year, extremely worthy candidates will miss out.
- historical time-series data for courses is available via the SELT link on a course “Programs and Courses” page
- note – you can actually browse all courses here.
- access personal SELTs here
- you need to apply for access to these via this website.
Referees
One of your referees must be your head of department, school or College. The other referee can be anybody who knows your teaching well and is able to authoritatively comment on it.
Q: All else being equal, would you prefer a reference from an ANU academic to that from a former student? I have a former student who is prominent in her field and who relies on the knowledge and skills gained from my courses in her daily work. So she’s in a very good position to comment on my teaching and what she got out of it. But I’m wondering if the evaluation panel would consider a reference from an ANU academic more credible?
A: The student/graduate sounds really interesting and distinctive: do ask her. Students can be very powerful referees if they are able to clearly talk about the impact your teaching has had on them. You will already have one reference from an ANU academic anyway, since “One of the referees must be the head of the nominee’s department, school or college.”
Q: Can I use someone who is not teaching or studying at ANU?
A: Yes, as long as they are able to authoritatively talk about your teaching. An external referee can be powerful, as it shows your influence beyond ANU.
Q: Who can provide the required ‘Head of School’ reference where the applicant is a College Dean or Director?
A: The ADE would be an excellent referee in these cases.
Q: Is it acceptable to use the same referee who provided a reference for last year’s application?
A: Yes, absolutely. Check with them that they’re OK with you doing that, and give them the opportunity and/or ask them to revise any of their comments in light of your most recent experience.
Supporting material
Some of these items are taken from the Awards Toolkit.
Supporting material is only required in an application for a:
- Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Teaching Excellence
- Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Programs that Enhance Learning
- Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Supervision, or
- Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Indigenous Education (Teaching, Program or Supervision categories).
– that is, not for the Citations or for Tutoring and Demonstrating categories.
No. Quality will always beat quantity, and unnecessary padding is to be avoided.
Only the first 10 pages of your supporting material will be passed on to the assessment committee.
The supporting material should act as an appendix for your written application. For example, if you talk about a really effective resource you have created in Wattle, a screen shot of this could be included in the appendix. If you have developed an effective procedure for teaching and/or testing a concept, you might link to a screen capture or an extract from a recorded session. Make sure everything you include in your supporting material is referenced within your written application.
Evidence of anything that is referenced/discussed in your written application, but does not fit within this written application. This could include:
- Emails or letters from students or colleagues. Extracts of these should be included as evidence within your written application, with the full version provided in the supporting material;
- Invitations asking you to present at a conference or event. Again, extracts of these should be included within your written application, with the full version provided in the supporting material.
- Interesting and dynamic Powerpoint slides that are referenced in your written application;
- Screenshots or links to a Wattle Page or Website that is included in your application;
- Screenshots or extracts of textbooks or publications you have contributed to;
- Screenshots of active social media accounts that are used to communicate with your students, such
- as Facebook pages or Twitter accounts for your courses.
- Photos, if they are relevant and meaningful;
- Marking or assessment rubrics you have developed;
- Extracts from assessment tasks or learning exercises you have developed;
- Any additional student quotes you thought were powerful, but wouldn’t fit within the written application