Post-Symposium Summary Report

1. More than 200 teachers participated in the first Symposium on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, held at the National University of Singapore on 6 - 7 July 2000. The participants included some 30 overseas delegates from 10 countries and more than 50 were non-NUS staff.

2. The keynote lecture by Prof James Wilkinson (Harvard University), invited lectures by Prof David Kwan (McMaster University), Prof Peter Jarvis (University of Surrey), Prof Chong Chi Tat (Deputy Vice-Chancellor, NUS) and Prof Hang Chang Chieh (Deputy Vice-Chancellor, NUS) and oral presentations by some 80 teachers provided stimulating insights on the pedagogical strategies, approaches, and learning outcomes, and generated much discussion and debate. Participants were left with much food for thought, new ideas to experiment/implement in their teaching profession and a hunger to do further research in enhancing teaching and learning.

3. The symposium proceedings, published by CDTL, contain a large number of high quality papers. As a follow-up, some 20-30 papers will be selected from the proceedings and authors will be invited to expand their papers for publication into a bound volume which would be useful to many teachers and teaching administrators.

4. Complementing the technical programme, the symposium participants were treated to a dinner cruise, lunch banquets and local delights at the coffee breaks. During these relaxing sessions, the participants were given ample opportunities to renew friendship and make new friends.

5. The potent combination of fun and serious intellectual discussions create a strong desire to meet again in the next symposium which has been tentatively set in July 2002.