Charles Sturt Executive Dean's Teaching Award

The Charles Sturt Executive Dean’s Teaching Awards celebrate excellence in teaching.

Your application identifies the way your teaching meets a set of criteria, including the Charles Sturt values. The Charles Sturt Executive Dean's Teaching Award is part of Charles Sturt's RED awards program Excellence Awards program, as it recognises excellence in teaching within the university.

These awards are a pathway to external teaching awards, including the Australian Awards for University Teaching (AAUT).

Who's eligible to apply?

All nominations must relate to sustained contributions to student learning in higher education at Charles Sturt. Individuals or teams can apply.

The following staff is eligible to apply for the Awards:

  • Nominee(s) can only be in one nomination in any year.
  • Individual applicants will be academic staff based within the Faculties. This includes full-time or fractional staff, who are continuing, contract, or sessional appointments.
  • Team applications may include divisional staff, but the first-named applicant must be an academic staff member from within a Faculty. Team applications may include cross-faculty/cross-school staff.
  • Unsuccessful nominees for earlier iterations of Faculty or ALTC/OLT Citations are eligible for renomination for a Charles Sturt Executive Dean’s Teaching Award.

if you've received the Executive Dean’s Teaching award or OLT/AAUT Citation in the past five years:

  • you are not eligible to apply for an individual award
  • you may be part of a team nomination as long as you are not the lead nominee and the team nomination does not substantially replicate the original nomination.

How to apply

  • Each faculty will select up to four nominations each year (i.e. up to 12 nominations across the university annually).
  • Applicants will prepare a document demonstrating how their work meets the Award criteria. The alignment with AAUT enables successful applicants of this award to begin preparation for the AAUT awards, while opening opportunities for a wider group to be locally recognised.
  • Applicants complete the Award Application Form
  • Teams nominate a lead team member and indicate a percentage of the work contributed by individual team members.  The maximum size for a team is ten members. You must provide a team name for teams larger than five.

Selection criteria

Nominees must select one of the following four criteria for assessment, as appropriate to their specific contribution. Nominations are assessed on evidence provided about the selected criterion. Please specify how the evidence aligns with the Charles Sturt values.

This may include:

  • Fostering student development by stimulating curiosity and independence in learning
  • Participating in effective and empathetic guidance and advice for students
  • Assisting students from equity and other demographic subgroups to participate and achieve success in their courses
  • Encouraging student engagement through the enthusiasm shown for learning and teaching
  • Inspiring and motivating students through effective communication, presentation and interpersonal skills
  • Enabling others to enhance their approaches to learning and teaching
  • Developing and/or integrating assessment strategies to enhance student learning
  • Collaborating with students in learning experiences that involve problem solving, collaboration and critical thinking around authentic issues (Innovative)
  • Using pedagogical strategies that align with authentic workplace settings (Insightful)
  • Supporting students towards Indigenous cultural competency (Inclusive)
  • Encouraging students to challenge themselves to attempt new experiences (Inspiring)
  • Building partnerships with the community/industry to provide students with insight into the workplace (Successful Graduates)

This may include:

  • Developing and presenting coherent and imaginative resources for student learning
  • Implementing research-led approaches to learning and teaching
  • Demonstrating up-to-date knowledge of the field of study in the design of the curriculum and the creation of resources for learning
  • Communicating clear objectives and expectations for student learning
  • Providing support to those involved in the development of curricula and resources
  • Contributing professional expertise to enhance curriculum or resources
  • Partnering with community/industry to develop authentic resources and materials (Inclusive, Impactful)
  • Leading and working with peers within the school/faculty/university to develop resources and teaching materials that reflect the Charles Sturt regions and student cohort (Inclusive)
  • Designing curricula that explicitly scaffold student learning throughout the program
  • Actively engaging in curriculum design for course and subject review, leading processes that utilise data and field knowledge to inform the design (Insightful)
  • Engaging students/industry/community/professions in the co-design of learning experiences that are innovative and student centred (Impactful)
  • Collaborating to build resources that support integrated learning opportunities for students (Insightful)

This may include:

  • Showing advanced skills in evaluation and reflective practice
  • Using a variety of evaluation strategies to bring about change
  • Adapting evaluation methods to different contexts and diverse student needs and learning styles
  • Contributing professional expertise to the field of evaluation to improve program design and delivery
  • Dissemination and embedding of good practice identified through evaluation
  • Supporting colleagues to reflect and improve teaching through communities of practice, mentoring, collegial review (Inspiring, Impactful)
  • Utilising diverse approaches to gathering student data around learning experience and responding to feedback (Insightful)
  • Engaging in peer review processes to reflect on teaching (Inclusive)

This may include:

  • Participating in and contributing to professional activities related to learning and teaching
  • Innovations in service and support for students; coordination, management and leadership of courses and student learning
  • Conducting and publishing research related to teaching
  • Demonstrating leadership through activities that have broad influence on the profession
  • Providing innovative learning and teaching for different contexts, including technology enhanced environments, for large and small class sizes and/or to meet the needs of a diverse student cohort
  • Influencing the overall academic, social and cultural experience of higher education
  • Researching and exploring opportunities to engage students with issues of sustainability, community building, real world problem-solving in learning and teaching (Insightful)
  • Co-creating learning experiences with the profession/communities that transform student understandings of culture, self and work (Impactful)
  • Leading innovative curriculum design that is multi-disciplinary, multi-cultural and future facing (Inspiring, Inclusive)

Steps to applying for an award.

Applicants prepare a nomination document against a set of criteria, including data and other evidence to support their claims.

Preparing a nomination takes considerable time, and it is important to think about an application well ahead of the actual application. You are required to have evidence over a sustained period of time.

You will need Head of School/Faculty endorsement. The cohort of nominees works together with the Academic Development team to prepare submissions.

Nominations are submitted to dltadmin@csu.edu.au. Submissions are completed in September each year.  Successful nominations are announced in CSEdX each year.

How we support you

The Division of Learning and Teaching (DLT) provides:

  • introductory workshops
  • workshops around reflective writing
  • advice and consultation around processes and steps
  • provision of mentors in small groups,
  • a panel to review submissions; and,
  • individual support if/when appropriate.

Preparing a nomination

  1. Discuss your intent to nominate with your HoS during your EDRS interview at least in the year before you plan to apply, but preferably 2 years before.
  2. Inform the Sub-Dean Academic Development of your intent to apply by June in any year.
  3. Attend the information workshops, and engage with the programme of activities, including workshops and mentor supported activity. This also includes a photo workshop to ensure you have a good image.
  4. Your final nomination is submitted to the Sub-Dean Academic Development in September.
  5. Submissions will be reviewed by a panel chaired by the Sub-Dean (Academic Development), and consist of the Sub-Dean(s) Learning & Teaching (or nominated L&T leader) from each Faculty and a nominated Head of School from each Faculty in October.

Successful submissions are approved by PVC L&T and Faculty.

What do successful applicants receive?

Successful applicants will be awarded a Certificate and one thousand dollars of professional development funds from their Faculty.