Teacher Development

Lecturers strive for personal development and Utrecht University encourages this. By means of various resources and initiatives, lecturers improve themselves and their education.

Teaching qualifications

Het invullen van een registratieformulier.

In order to guarantee good education skills, Utrecht University has developed teaching qualifications and was the first Dutch university to adopt them in 1995. The university has made the basic teaching qualification (in Dutch: basiskwalificatie onderwijs, BKO) mandatory for all lecturers.

Since then, all Dutch universities have adopted this policy as well and the BKO is recognized by all Dutch universities. Utrecht also has a senior teaching qualification (in Dutch: senior kwalificatie onderwijs, SKO), and the university also organises courses in which leading the implementation and renewal of education or contributing knowledge of education take more of a centre stage.

It does not end after the basic qualification or even the senior qualification. The university expects its academic staff to continuously develop and educate themselves further by means of formal and informal activities. For this purpose, lecturers receive feedback from each other and from their students. Furthermore, they can join the activity projects that the Centre for Academic Teaching and Learning offers.

Knowledge exchange

Docenten wisselen kennis uit tijdens de onderwijsparade.
Lecturers exchanging knowledge during the Education Fair. Photograph by Kees Rutten.

The university sees the exchange of knowledge between lecturers among themselves and between students and lecturers as a condition for improvement of education. One instance where this occurs is during the annual Education Fair: a platform for exchange, knowledge transfer and discussion on quality and developments in education. Both students and lecturers participate in it.

The network Teaching Academy Utrecht University facilitates knowledge exchange among lecturers.

Teacher Awards

Winnaar van de Docentenprijs Alexei Karas met een student.
Teacher Award Winner Alexei Karas with a student. Photograph by Kees Rutten.

Every year, a jury of lecturers and students presents two teacher awards: the Outstanding Teacher Award and the Teacher Talent Award. Study societies nominate candidates and a jury decides who will be put in the limelight during the Dies Natalis.

Centre for Academic Teaching and Learning

The Centre for Academic Teaching and Learning unites all initiatives of Utrecht University that are about teacher development. Aside from that, this centre also encourages and facilitates education innovation and Scholarship of Teaching & Learning.