Academics implementing graduate attributes, and the educational developers who support those academics, may experience graduate attributes and disciplinary knowledge and skills as unrelated dimensions of curriculum. Gestalt conceptions of curriculum, together with a figure-ground understanding of the relationship between disciplinary understanding…

The emergence of academic development in Anglophone higher education was linked to post Second World War massification and concerns about student failure. These concerns were driven by increasing statistical investigations into student attrition and degree times to completion, particularly in Australia and Aotearoa, New Zealand. There was a…

In this paper, the authors describe the implementation process of a teaching portfolio at a Belgian university. The case is intriguing because it departs substantially from what others have described as the typical antagonistic way in which academic developers interact with formal leaders. Rather than being caught in an edgy game of compliance and…

The paper provides an analysis of the concepts of agency, compliance, and resistance, drawing on evidence provided in the Belgian, Norwegian, and Polish cases in this Special Issue, as well as the Canadian context. Using the Cultural Historical Activity Theory framework as a lens, it highlights conditions that foster agency, those that may invoke…

This commentary explores the role that academic developers (ADs) play in universities. Three case studies illustrate the roles that ADs may enact as agents of change. They reflect an emergent shift from acting as the institutional teaching and learning "'expert" (i.e. agent of change) to a more adaptive, collaborative partnership…

Academic developers (ADs) often participate in the implementation of programmes or reforms in higher education. Sometimes they agree with these and sometimes they disagree. This paper discusses possible agentic positions during a genuine policy implementation--the National Qualification Framework at a Norwegian university. Through reflexive…

Educational developers tend to be located in centres and units of teaching and learning outside the academic mainstream. They have little opportunity to engage in scholarship. Through an overview of the literature on educational development and educational professional roles and responsibilities, the author suggests that promoting a culture of…

Much has been written about academic developers as change agents but not in an interprofessional education (IPE) context. IPE involves teaching students in different health professions how to work effectively in teams across professional boundaries to improve the quality of patient care. Extensive evidence reveals that implementing sustainable IPE…

The purpose of this multiple case study was to identify threshold concepts in the careers of educational developers. Twenty-one common threshold concepts emerged, with one threshold concept common among all participants: Facilitating a change process. The remaining 20 threshold concepts were captured in the following three categories: (1) Ways of…

Little has been written about academic developers (ADs) working in teams leading other ADs. This paper chronicles the experience of a group of ADs in one Australian university working on a curriculum realignment exercise. Unexpectedly the dominant theme in participants' reflections was group dynamics, not the process. We were confronted by…

This article foregrounds the iterative journey of a group of educational development (ED) practitioners at a research-led university towards an enhanced understanding of the ED opportunities we offer. Reflecting on the intention of our interventions to facilitate academics' professional learning, we developed a framework within which the…

With the acceleration of globalization, academic developers from institutions and countries with established educational development programs and networks are called upon increasingly to share their expertise and offer guidance to colleagues in emerging higher education contexts. Based on a higher education conference held in Beijing in 2009, this…

Educational development has changed in many ways over the last 40?years and the International Consortium for Educational Development has highlighted the sheer variety of practices by bringing together educational developers from countries where activities differ markedly. These reflections identify the wide range of foci of attention that are…

This article describes the responsive evaluation component of an educational leadership capacity-building initiative developed at one Australian university and implemented by three others. The project aimed to develop, implement and disseminate an innovative framework to address the national strategic goal to increase the pool of qualified…

Towards the end of his characteristically straightforward account of the landscape of educational development, Graham Gibbs announced: "I am skeptical about the value of the rush to scholasticism". Gibbs goes on to explain that he sees his most influential contribution to university teachers in his "practical manuals and…