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Pursued by excellence: rewards and the performance culture in higher education

journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-08, 09:16 authored by Imogen Taylor
In the UK, government is both concerned with improving the performance of public services, including higher education, and with ensuring that the public is aware of improvements in services, to convince the public of the effectiveness of the current regime. Success is both an effect of and a dynamic in the process of evaluating performance, and increasingly 'excellence' is established as a performance outcome. Drawing on a critical review of relevant theory and research, primarily from the UK, Australia and the USA, and illustrated by the author's experience of winning a National Teaching Fellowship, this paper examines teaching excellence in the context of two recent schemes: the National Teaching Fellowship Scheme and the Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning. The performance culture in the public sector and the use of excellence as a success criterion are critically analysed. Assumptions about the transfer of excellent practice are explored. Questions about the interaction of competition and equalities issues are raised. The paper ends with arguing that if excellence schemes are to be an established feature of public sector systems, then we must develop strategies to enable them to be implemented equitably, transparently and fit for purpose.

History

Publication status

  • Published

Journal

Social Work Education

ISSN

0261-5479

Issue

5

Volume

26

Page range

504-519

Pages

15.0

Department affiliated with

  • Social Work and Social Care Publications

Notes

This original conceptualisation of excellence in higher education applies social policy concepts of the performance culture to the increasing pervasiveness of excellence competitions, a 2007 priority for Higher Education Academy research. A systematic analysis of literature on 'excellence' in higher education is complemented by drawing on Taylor's experience of winning a National Teaching Fellowship. It has been disseminated internationally, including an invited keynote at an International Symposium on Excellence in Teaching, Soochow University, Taiwan, 2005, attended by Taiwan's university elite; and a presentation at the Annual Meeting of the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, Vancouver, 2005.

Full text available

  • No

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2012-02-06

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