Teaching Award — Have You Taught About it?
Day 051. Teaching is an act of art that requires passion and dedication
I was the recipient of the University Teaching Award in 2020 under the Engineering category. Before that, I submitted the application for Teaching Award in 2019 and 2022, and due to technical reasons, my application was not accepted.
Prior to that, I was also the recipient of the Faculty Teaching Award in 2018. That same year and event, I was also awarded Faculty Best Webometric Award 2018 (but this is not to be discussed here).
Winning the University Teaching Award in 2021 was indeed a sweet victory and an amazing personal achievement. Just imagine, out of hundreds or thousands of lecturers at my university, I won the award. The feeling was so good!
There is substantial preparation in order to get to the final stage and win. I need to prepare a detailed and convincing Teaching Portfolio, have my lecture in class monitored, and finally, once I got through those two stages, I will have an interview session with the appointed panel.
Those were the process I went through in 2021. Now that I have experienced the process, I was recently appointed to be on a special committee to select the new University Teaching Award winner.
This special committee had a meeting today, after lunch at the School of Postgraduate Meeting room, Block F54, my university.
It’s another new level for me and we were scrutinizing the criteria for us to seek the winner, together with the special committee. We also have to ensure that the criteria being considered will be in line with the prestigious Anugerah Akademik Negara (National Academic Award) which will receive a whooping MYR 50,000 plus a trophy and certificate.
Should Lecturers Consider the University Teaching Award
It is all totally up to the lecturers. If they are really focused on providing high-quality teaching and learning delivery for their students, this is one award they should grasp.
It is not about glamour and fame as the award recipient. To me, it is about systematically organizing our teaching and learning strategy, and effort, and documenting all of the required evidence.
The compilation of the Teaching Portfolio alone requires a massive effort if we start from the beginning. However, once a lecturer has the teaching portfolio ready, the next process would not be such a great burden.
The first criterion that must be included in the Teaching Portfolio is the Teaching Philosophy. We need to have our own unique and dedicated teaching philosophy. That will be our guideline to continuously perform as an excellent teacher.
Subsequently, the Teaching Portfolio must contain our teaching innovation, teaching creativity, teaching evaluation, teaching impact, testimonials, professional development, and a few more.
How Do I Feel?
I’m so excited to be on this journey of searching for the next winner for the University Teaching Award. I will be joining more meetings and also participating in class observation as well as the interview session. All of those which I have personally experienced before.
At the same time, I need to prepare myself for the university's bigger goal, which is to prepare for the National Academic Award. Hence, all of the processes will provide me with a nice learning platform. I have participated in a program for this purpose before, as reported here.
Final Words
As a lecturer or educators in a university, despite how busy we are (research, projects, consultation, position held, etc), we still need to do our very best in the teaching and learning part. Our prime clients are the students. Do the best for them. Create a positive impact for them.
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Other official tasks performed today:
- Attended and worked in the Malaysia Council of Engineering Deans (MCED) project workshop at Meeting Room C09, Centre for Engineering Education (CEE).
- Assigned new reviewers for a newly submitted manuscript to the ASEAN Journal of Engineering Education (AJEE) journal.
- Checked and edited a manuscript that we will be submitting to a Scopus journal. I’m glad to have Anas assisting me on this.
- I personally vacuumed my new carpeted office using my new yellow vacuum machine, which will be donated to CEE.
- Attended a religious lecture at the surau near my house after Magrib prayer. This is the food for our soul.
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