A Study of a Teaching and Learning Centre in a Post-Secondary Educational Institution

The purposes of a Teaching and Learning Centre (TLC) include helping faculty improve their teaching and enhancing students’ learning. The functions of a TLC vary, depending on the needs of the higher education institution. However, it is important for faculty to utilize the services of a TLC to become more effective educators. Using a mixed methods approach, this study examined the faculty awareness level of a TLC, how innovative teaching ideas were being diffused, and how faculty (as clients) view the services offered by a TLC (as a service unit). A convergent design was used to collect data via an online survey and personal interviews. This study focused only on faculty and close to 1,700 faculty were invited to participate in this study. More than 200 faculty responded to the survey and from that pool, fifteen randomly selected faculty were interviewed. All the interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed to uncover themes that emerged from the data. There seemed to be a low faculty awareness level of the TLC within the institution in this study. Faculty felt that the TLC needed to “connect” more with them because there was a lack of marketing of the TLC to present itself more visibly within the institution. There was a concern regarding the lack of diffusion of innovative teaching ideas reported by the majority of interviewed faculty voiced such opinion. It was suggested that more communication channels needed to be used for diffusing new teaching ideas. Also, most faculty felt that there was a need to improve the service quality from the TLC personnel. Results from this study indicated that there was a need for the TLC to improve its communication strategies (e.g., marketing and social media) so that faculty could be better and more frequently informed about the unit. Future research projects may include marketing strategies and service quality of the TLC, as well as the nature of the management support of the unit.