The Impact of Senior Leadership Roles in Teaching and Learning: Evaluating Strategic Approaches to Culture Change

In recent years in Canada, senior leadership positions with strategic oversight of teaching and learning have emerged across post-secondary institutions. In the past three years, Queen's University, a mid-sized Canadian university, has implemented two such positions: Vice-Provost (Teaching and Learning) and Associate Vice-Provost (Teaching and Learning). This session assesses and articulates the impact of these strategic roles. The session will apply the Henard & Roseveare (2012) framework and subsequent work by Kustra et al. (2015) to frame the intense efforts to enhance the student learning experience through a combination of strategic and grassroots initiatives, all intended to further entrench a rigorous and reflective approach to teaching and learning at Queen's. We will identify the value of these new roles, provide examples of strategic approaches and initiatives, and highlight successes and failures in our journey thus far.