Claire Gordon,
Head, LSE Eden Centre
Welcome to all new teachers at LSE. I hope you will enjoy the challenges and stimulation of working with our diverse international social science student community, and that you will find the School to be supportive of you in this important role. You join a team of some 900 full-time (equivalent) academics at LSE.
Whether or not this is your first experience of teaching and supporting student learning in higher education, we hope this guide will help you develop your identity and practice as an academic teacher giving you the confidence, insights and tools to address any challenges that you may encounter.
We also hope you find the experience of class teaching enriching: it should help to embed your own understanding of the subjects you teach; it will also provide some useful breadth, to complement the focus of doctoral research work. In addition, there may be opportunities for you to discuss your own research with students and without doubt the experience of teaching will strengthen your communication skills,and provide useful evidence for future job applications both within academia and beyond.
LSE is keen to support the development of future faculty. We know our PhD students go on to take up academic posts in universities across the globe. That is why we take this development work seriously, and offer all teachers in the School the opportunity to undertake our LSE Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education if they so wish.
There are plenty of things about the teaching and learning process that you can usefully find out about from interactions with other members of your department and colleagues in the LSE Eden Centre from reflecting on your own practice and from getting feedback from students and colleagues. There is also a large body of educational research which can usefully inform your evolving practice. Take advantage of what is on offer both from the Eden Centre and from the departments where you teach. These different voices and perspectives can all make important contributions and help you develop your personal and distinctive approach to teaching and supporting student learning.
Please feel free to contact the LSE Eden Centre and in particular, your department’s departmental adviser, if you have questions about teaching and student learning development at LSE.
My colleagues and I look forward to working with you in the coming years.