I was already an Associate Fellow when I applied for my Senior Fellowship. One of the reasons that I applied was that I felt that I was progressing rapidly in my areas of work and influence and needed to take stock of the work I had been doing myself and in supporting academic staff to achieve student engagement, learning and innovative academic practices.
Completing the Senior Fellowship application additionally helped me define the areas that I wanted to progress in the future, areas that I must continue to work in and the importance of doing so. Writing the application was a thoroughly enjoyable process full of reflection for me. It was interesting to reflect on the development of my own work and its impacts as well.
Writing the Senior Fellowship application is akin to re-visiting the numerous ways one has been able to support academic staff and students and reflecting on the impact that has on enhancing quality of learning and teaching. Being recently appointed as the Chair of the Learning and Teaching committee of the campus, this was particularly important for me to reflect on to continue and enhance the practice. A happy surprise that emerged were the clear trends that I could see in my work in the areas that are particularly important to me such as assessment and academic excellence; leading initiatives; innovative and digital practices; professional development, mentoring and support of academic staff and equal opportunities for everyone.
Faiza Qureshi, Senior Fellow
Programme Coordinator, Foundation & Master of Education (MEd), Chair, Learning and Teaching Committee, Murdoch University Dubai