Advance HE Fellowships at the University of Melbourne
Advance HE Fellowships are funded by the University to provide academic and professional staff in continuing or fixed-term positions with formal recognition of their teaching (or learning support) practice, impact and leadership. The Centre for the Study of Higher Education (CSHE) is supporting applications at the level of Associate Fellow, Fellow, Senior Fellow, and Principal Fellow. To check which category is appropriate for you, see the Fellowship Category Tool below.
| Associate Fellow | Associate Fellowship is suitable for early-career academics, postgraduate students, or support staff involved in teaching. This level demonstrates a foundational understanding of teaching, supporting learners, and applying effective practices whilst providing a framework for reflective practice. |
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| Fellow | Fellow is the appropriate category of fellowship to recognise individuals from a wide variety of different contexts whose teaching and/or support for learning practice enables them to demonstrate a high-quality approach to higher education. In practice, this category concerns what the applicant is doing in their own teaching to deliver an impact on their own learners. Fellows are proficient in effective approaches to learning and student engagement. |
| Senior Fellow | Senior Fellowship is awarded to professionals whose comprehensive understanding and effective practice provides a basis from which they lead or influence the learning and teaching practices of others (peers, colleagues, mentees, etc.) who teach and/or support high-quality learning. In practice, Senior Fellowship is focused on how the applicant makes a sustained impact on other educators and learning support staff. Senior Fellows usually mentor or support colleagues in teaching and learning and demonstrate influence beyond their immediate role, regularly overseeing program review or curriculum leadership responsibilities. |
| Principal Fellow | Principal Fellowship is suitable for highly experienced individuals whose practice involves a sustained record of effectiveness in strategic leadership of high-quality learning. Their impact is extensive and recognised across the industry. In practice, Principal Fellows are those who have had significant portions of their careers formally involved in Teaching and Learning leadership at the highest institutional levels and beyond. Principal Fellows influence policy, promote teaching excellence, and often engage in sector-wide initiatives, impacting learning on a national or international scale. |
Which category of Fellowship is right for you?
The Fellowship Category Tool can give an indication of which category of Fellowship most closely reflects your current practice and to reflect on your ongoing professional development and career aspirations. After you have answered a series of choice questions, which will take around 10-20 minutes, you will be shown your results and a PDF report summarising your responses will be sent to you. (Please note that the tool rarely gives a clear-cut response and will often place you in multiple categories. As a general rule, you should discard the highest category indicated unless the percentage shown outweighs the combined scores of any other categories.)
More information
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Fellowship is a formal acknowledgement of your commitment to excellence in teaching and learning. It provides international recognition of your expertise in higher education practice. It can be offered as evidence of your career progression, and by encouraging reflective practice, it asks you to critically evaluate your teaching practices and professional values. This reflection can lead to improved approaches and strategies that benefit your learning communities.
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The application involves submitting a set of written tasks that are dependent on the category of fellowship you are seeking. As an example, Fellow-level applications require the following elements:
*A written account of Professional Practice, which comprises
-A Context Statement (300 word summary of your role and the general circumstances of your work).
-A Reflective Account of Practice (max. 3000 words + 500 words citations) addressing the core knowledge and values of the Professional Standards Framework (PSF).
*Two supporting statements from referees (up to two pages each).Applications for Senior or Principal Fellow require consecutively more complex and longer submissions.
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The UK Professional Standards Framework (PSF) for teaching and supporting learning in higher education provides a general description of the main aspects of the role fulfilled by those involved in teaching and learning at tertiary level. It uses a classification of Core Knowledge, Professional Values and Areas of Activity. Fellowship applicants use the descriptors of these to evidence their practice at the appropriate level.
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No. A core perspective of the Advance HE program is that educational impact does not only come from teaching staff, but also from those who support teaching. Learning designers, librarians, deliverers of professional development….there are many ways to demonstrate impact, and all are welcome to apply.
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Applicants need to show how their practice aligns with the PSF at the level of fellowship they are seeking. They need to focus on their impact in Higher Education and offer evidence of this. The application is a very personal writing process:
*I did this…
*I did it because…
*This was the impact…
*Here is my evidence of that impact…
*Here is my reflection on the process and what it might mean to me going forward.... -
The fellowship application does not require a thorough narrative of your career or CV. It also does not ask for lists of publications (be they pedagogical or in your discipline area), since publishing alone is not proof of teaching impact.
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Advance HE focuses on the last 3-5 years of your activity, though the last 3 years are the most important. If you have significant experiences outside that timeline, you can still include them, but in the context of how those experiences in the past have shaped what you have done more recently. E.g. “From 2017-2019 I was co-chair of the Faculty Research Ethics Advisory Group. This experience motivated me to re-design the Research Methods subject when I took it over in 2022, so that it now includes…..”.
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The category tool often gives mixed results and any one person’s interpretations of the questions will be subjective. The difference between categories will be explained in the information session. If in doubt, please discuss with the CSHE team.
Enquiries
Fellowship requirements
A/Prof Thomas Cochrane (Academic Lead)
Dr Mat Hardy
Registration and submission
Nicole Hutchings (Professional Lead)
Access to Advance HE for all University staff
As the University of Melbourne is a member of Advance HE, all University staff have access to Advance HE resources and programs that support teaching and learning, research, leadership development, diversity and inclusion and governance. Advance HE provides:
- Fellowships, which are professional recognition for teaching excellence in higher education
- Development programs which are carefully designed to support higher education staff at every level of experience
- Conferences and events for staff to hear about the latest developments in policy and practice and from global leaders, within and beyond the higher education sector.
For more information, please visit the Education at Melbourne webpage.
University of Melbourne staff recognised by Advance HE
See list of currently recognised staff
Hear from Dr Annie Gowing on undertaking an Advance HE Fellowship