Universities could cater better for the smartest students

In school, teachers differentiate how they teach and amend the curriculum according to their students’ knowledge and understanding. This involves matching students to learning goals and activities that are most appropriate to where their learning is. It is about meeting the individual needs of all students, including those who have learning difficulties and those who are outstanding.

Teachers spend a considerable amount of time coming to understand their students in terms of their levels of learning motivation, their attitudes about and approaches to learning, their receptiveness to different instructional practices and what they know and don’t know. Their goal is to meet the diverse learning needs of all the students in their class.

So, what happens when students arrive at university?

One size fits all

While universities provide credit recognition for formal study completed elsewhere and recognition is given for prior work and other relevant experiences, universities tend not to allow students to ‘skip’ certain subjects or content areas even if they can demonstrate proficiency in the area.

For example, the first-year undergraduate who attained top marks in their final-year results at school in all aspects of their English subject must still enrol in the mandatory introductory communications topic.

Doesn’t this constitute a waste of time for the student who could have been given an exemption based on demonstrating proficiency and who could then enrol in another subject relevant to their degree?

Although students can fast-track their degree by about one semester by enrolling in a three-semester year – an option not all but more universities are now offering – universities tend not to accelerate students through their degree by allowing them to take a higher semester load than usually prescribed, for example, six subjects per semester rather than the traditional four.

Universities tend not to allow self-directed students who have worked through the content material of a subject to complete the required final assessment task, usually an end of semester examination, earlier than the scheduled exam period.

A lot of these practices appear to be driven by what is ‘easiest’ for universities to administer rather than by the learning needs of students. And when almost all universities behave in the same way, there is really no inducement for such practices to change.

Adapting the culture

It would be naïve to suggest that it is feasible to change certain practices or that some could change overnight. For example, it is impractical for university teachers to adapt instruction to each and every student they encounter when class sizes can exceed 400 or so students at any one time.

However, more attention could be given to incorporating strategies that more ably meet the different backgrounds, experiences, prior learnings, interests, ambitions, levels of motivation and approaches to learning of university students.

Given the current teaching-learning context, it is also unrealistic to change the principal teaching methods that have dominated university teaching-learning for hundreds of years, namely, lectures, tutorials and laboratory-type activities.

These tend to prove the most economical and efficacious methods for reaching a large number of students. While they are complemented by other methods such as observations, practical demonstrations and discussions, they underpin how most content is delivered to students, namely, in face-to-face and in digital form.

Curriculum content is generally also not up for negotiation. It has been designed to meet particular higher education standards along with the expectations of the relevant profession. Employers rely on higher education providers to deliver qualified and skilled employees who know and understand and are able to do certain things; and graduates expect they will have the professional attributes that make them ‘work-ready’.

However, universities could provide the brightest undergraduate students with opportunities to demonstrate their knowledge and aptitude up front if they say the subject content is one they have covered or know.

If a student can prove their proficiency by completing the set assessment tasks to a satisfactory level of achievement, why not allow them to demonstrate this, receive credit and enrol in a more advanced subject relevant to their degree?

And similarly, why not make provision for those independent self-directed students who can work at an accelerated pace to complete the required final assessment tasks when they are ready to do so rather than make them wait until the end of the semester?

The right to be challenged

Universities provide many forms of student learning support to the less academically able to help develop their skills in time management, note-taking, referencing, how to prevent plagiarism, how to better prepare for exams, academic writing, statistical literacy, academic writing and how to be critical thinkers.

But all students are entitled to be supported to achieve a level of success not just comparable to the knowledge and skill level they come to university with, but one that demonstrates they have been challenged and extended in their intellectual development. And that means putting in place practices that cater better for smarter students.

Nita Temmerman (PhD) is a former university pro vice-chancellor (academic) and executive dean of the faculty of education at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. She is currently visiting professor to Ho Chi Minh City Open University and Papua New Guinea University of Technology, academic reviewer at the University of Queensland, Australia, as well as invited specialist with the Hong Kong Council for Accreditation of Academic and Vocational Qualifications, invited external reviewer with Oman Academic Accreditation Authority, and a published author.