Dr. Avit Bhowmik | Environmental Scientist · Climate Solutionist

Reflection on AUPU2 objectives

In this section, I comment and argue about how the material in the portfolio demonstrates that all AUPU2 course objectives have been achieved.

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Upon completion of the course, participants should be able to:

  • Objective 1: Motivate and assess the planning, implementation and evaluation of course design, such as teaching and examination components and feedback, based on research and proven experience.
  • As a part of this portfolio, I have revised the syllabus of an existing course and proposed the content of the syllabus of a new course including planning, implementation and evaluation of course design based on research and proven experience (see core area 3 and 4 for details).

  • Objective 2: Describe how the chosen course design supports student learning and reflect on and give arguments for their choices made based on research.
  • The revised course and proposed new course aim at preparing students for active citizenship and future careers (e.g. contributing to their employability), and also supporting their personal development, based on a broad advanced knowledge base, research and innovation, as I indicated in core area 2 and 3.

  • Objective 3: Discuss the importance of the physical and digital learning environments for teaching and learning and argue for their own choices regarding ‘spatiality’ or learning environments in course and teaching design.
  • The course I have worked on as a part of this portfolio is an on-campus course. The test course is given both physically and digitally but I am only responsible for the on-campus teaching. However, due to the current COVID-19 pandemic situation, all teaching activities were shifted to online and so was the teaching of the on-campus test course. The teaching activities and assessment procedures worked equally well for the temporary digital version and hence, I argue that the course design in this portfolio sufficiently reflect on both physical and digital learning.

  • Objective 4: Discuss the core values of higher education such as democracy, internationalisation, equality, equity and sustainable development and relate to their own teaching.
  • The course I have worked on as a part of this portfolio explicitly address sustainable development and implicitly the related issues, i.e. equality, equity and internationalization. The course design explicitly addressed and avoided the seven forms of discrimination as stated in the methodology section.

  • Objective 5: Develop teaching and examination in a course within their own subject area based on constructive alignment.
  • As I described in the teacher's profile that I have been actively engaged with the climate action field for the last seven years and the courses I have revised and developed explicitly address climate action.

  • Objective 6: Relate local and national directives as well as research on quality development in higher education to their own teaching practice.
  • I critically reviewed international, European and Swedish quality assurance guidelines and legislation, as described in core area 2: problem analysis. The lessons from the review is included in the course design to ensure quality and institutional alignment of the courses in question.

  • Objective 7: Together with others, reflect on their own and others’ planning, teaching, examination and evaluation of higher education with the support of research and literature.
  • I actively reviewed and discussed other participants' portfolios, which brought me the opportunity of reflecting on my own and compare with others’ planning, teaching, examination and evaluation of higher education. My portfolio has been improved addressing the comments of the peers.

  • Objective 8: Discuss the teaching profession in higher education in relation to their own practice and students’ participation in education.
  • Throughout the portfolio and particularly in core area 4, I discussed my teaching profession in light of the demand and requirements in the actual climate action field based on my experience.

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