Research‐led teaching: moving from a fractured engagement to a marriage of convenience

Abstract

There are many reasons to develop closer links between research and teaching. To do this, we argue the need to move beyond university rhetoric that fractures the engagement of teaching with research and instead focus on the development of what is necessary to bring these two core academic activities closer together. Opening with a review of the current literature on research-led teaching, the paper then highlights the various debates about whether or not the divide between research and teaching can be broached. We then explore a number of often contradictory myths that we argue universities subscribe to in their efforts to bring teaching and research together as they simultaneously create structures to separate them. The paper seeks to better 'marry' research and teaching activities in higher education settings, concluding with a set of principles that could be used by university leaders to guide the implementation of research-led teaching. IntroductionOur purpose in this paper is to shed light on why, despite wide recognition of a reciprocal relationship between universities' core activities of research and teaching, relations between them are often experienced by academic staff as quite distinct and differentially rewarded activities. We do this by reviewing the literature on researchled teaching to then analyse our experience of institution-wide efforts to bring research and teaching closer together. We then interrogate a range of myths around research-led teaching that not only deny the complexity of the issue but then come to operate as accepted assumptions that guide subsequent policy development on research-led teaching. We, along with Brew (2006) and Healey (2005), argue that research-led teaching relations are complex, disciplinary-based and universitycontextual. In recognition of this we conclude with a set of guiding principles for university leaders that acknowledges the role of disciplines and the institutional environment that shape the relationship between research and teaching.We start our discussion with the catchy 'sound bites' recently articulated by two of the most senior academics at Monash University, an Australian, research-intensive university. The first is the phrase 'the twin peaks of excellence' to describe the aspirational goals for teaching and research to be pursued by academic staff at Monash. The second is the description of teaching and research as 'the two solitudes'. Although

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