Collection
Understanding the Ever-Changing Normal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education
The post-pandemic era in higher education brought with it pedagogical uncertainties and transformative opportunities for university teachers and students. This Collection entitled “Understanding the Ever-Changing Normal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education” gives university teachers, policy makers, and curriculum designers the opportunity to examine, through different methodologies and perspectives, the complexities of the learning design, academic performance, technology use, teaching strategies, and student success and retention in higher education today.
The Collection will feature articles about current and innovative theoretical models, frameworks, concepts, informing and guiding practical aspects of teachers’ and students’ roles today. These articles might address various issues facing higher education today in regard to how they impact the roles of teachers and students. Such challenges might include reduced funding, influences of neoliberal management, threats to democracy around the world, global challenges of war and displacement, public health crises, natural disasters, mental health issues, the glut of information and misinformation, and the advent of AI-supported learning environments.
Perspectives may be either local or international with empirical aspects or review papers that illustrate the contribution of sociocultural factors within and outside the classroom to students’ engagement, performance, motivation, agency, autonomy in the higher education today. We have been observing dramatic changes in the ways students are prompted to engage in self-directed learning, reading, using, and doing research, and learning through pedagogical and technological pedagogical advancements. Our Collection aims to bring together a comprehensive exploration of these transformations to offer insights and reflections that will contribute to the ongoing discourse on reimagining and reshaping teaching and learning higher education.
Keywords: Higher education; academic performance; engagement; motivation; agency; globalization and internationalisation.
Editors
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Kenan Dikilitaş
Kenan Dikilitaş, PhD, University of Bergen, Norway
Dr. Dikilitaş currently works as a University Pedagogy Professor at the University of Bergen in Norway. He is affiliated with the Faculty of Psychology. He conducts pedagogical courses designed for university teachers, focusing on their professional development, particularly in integrating technology into teaching practices. Prior to his current position, he had worked in Turkey, contributing to the field of teacher education. During this time, he engaged in teaching and supervising both undergraduate and graduate students in the realm of language education.
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Robert Morris Gray
Robert Morris Gray, PhD, University of Bergen, Norway
Dr. Robert Gray is Associate Professor of University Pedagogy at the University of Bergen in Bergen, Norway. He holds a Ph.D. in Instructional Technology from the University of Alabama and has over twenty years’ experience in the professional development of university faculty, particularly in regard to using technology in the teaching and learning process. He has also taught literature and writing at a number of American universities. In addition, he has published three books of poetry and directed an award-winning documentary film on race relations in the American South.
