After two months on the job, inaugural Associate Vice-Provost (Teaching and Learning) Peter Wolf spoke with Senior Communications Officer Craig Leroux about trends in higher education and the direction of the Centre for Teaching and Learning.

Craig Leroux: What does your new role at Queen’s entail?

Peter Wolf: This is a new position that came out of the Teaching and Learning Action Plan. My job is to work to enhance teaching and learning across the university and to lead the Centre for Teaching and Learning.

CL: You came to Queen’s from the University of Guelph. Tell me about your work there.

PW: I started at Guelph in 1998 as a distance education instructional designer, after beginning my career as a social worker and then an adult educator. At Guelph, I was eventually responsible for the university’s teaching support services unit. In my last position I had the opportunity to focus on educational innovations, trying to figure out what higher education will look like five years from now and how to ensure we stayed at the leading edge of educational practices and innovations.

CL: So what will higher education look like five years from now?

PW: Experiential learning will continue to be a focus, as will other practices that help students develop transferable skills while learning the critical content of their disciplines. Many Queen’s graduates will work in a variety of careers throughout their lives, and the ability to apply key skills across situations will be a solid foundation for success.

I think there will also be a deeper intersection between physical spaces and our teaching and learning practices. We are already seeing this with our Ellis Hall active learning classrooms. I also see a greater use of online tools to extend learning out from the classroom.

Doing these things well will require us to better understand the ways people learn. This means furthering evidence-based approaches to teaching and learning and embedding a process of continuous improvement into our practices.

CL: What’s in store for the Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL)?

PW: Well, first of all, we’re moving! We are renovating the former Arts and Science faculty office in Mac-Corry and should be in there in the spring. The new space will reflect our approach in that we are putting a high focus on collaborative and flexible spaces. We want it to be a welcoming space for educational enhancement.

As far as the work of the CTL, we are currently looking at our services and where Queen’s is now educationally. We want to determine the best way to build on what the CTL is already doing to promote a university-wide culture of learning-centeredness. That will involve building further capacity around teaching and learning and supporting the wide range of people involved in teaching and learning across campus.