The 6th annual teachers’ retreat was held on Dec 2nd and 3rd 2019 at the Fleischers’ Hotel, Voss, a short train-ride from Bergen. As always, our aim is to promote a collegial teaching culture at BIO. This year, the teachers’ retreat was devoted to the goals and visions for our study programs, inspired by the (re)design project on the BSc in Biology.
The retreat consisted in a workshop conducted by Linda Herfindal Lien, guiding us through the “big questions”, such as what do we aim for with our BSc education, what are the biggest challenges facing future biologists, and what skills are the most important to learn in a BSc degree of biology? We also learned more about sustainability and about using real data in our teaching and learning.
A student panel discussion gave us insights from the student workshop held earlier this year, and important insights on how students appreciate the BSC in biology, and what they find are the obstacles of today’s degree. As one of the students said, “we want you, the teachers to talk together, showing us that the degree as a whole fits together” – and our teachers’ retreats are certainly an attempt to do exactly that – talk together about our teaching and learning in biology education.