You work in educational development, a Teaching & Learning Centre, or within a faculty. You want lecturers to improve their teaching based on evidence, systematically investigating what works in their own classroom, and why. That’s the heart of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, or SoTL.
But you’ve probably seen what happens in practice:
- Lecturers come to a workshop, get inspired, and then life takes over
- Ideas stay broad and don’t translate into concrete action
- Projects get started but don’t get finished
- Insights don’t travel — and when someone asks what the impact has been, it’s genuinely hard to answer
Not because people don’t care. But because the step from idea to concrete, manageable SoTL project is harder than it looks.
The SoTL Intensive is designed to bridge exactly that gap.
What is the SoTL Intensive? A hands-on SoTL training for higher education
The SoTL Intensive is a concentrated, hands-on trajectory in which a group of lecturers works through the first steps of a real SoTL project — guided and supported throughout.
The key word is intensive. Not as in ‘intense suffering’, but as in focused, concentrated, and purposeful. Rather than spreading sessions thinly across months, the work happens in a short, focused period: ideally three to five consecutive days, though the exact format is always tailored to your context.
That concentration is deliberate. It creates momentum, keeps people engaged, and means participants leave with something real, not just good intentions.
Using the Utrecht University Roadmap for SoTL as a shared backbone, participants move from:
“I want to improve something in my teaching”
to a clear, concrete plan for a SoTL project they can actually carry out.
In practice, that means participants:
- Define a focused teaching and learning question
- Explore what meaningful evidence looks like in their context and discipline
- Develop a concrete, feasible project approach
- Connect their work to that of colleagues, building shared understanding rather than isolated projects
From inspiration to action
Most SoTL support in higher education stays at the level of awareness. A talk, a session, a bit of inspiration. The SoTL Intensive goes further: the work happens during the trajectory, not after it. Participants don’t go home with a reading list. They go home with a plan.
It’s also designed with disciplinary diversity in mind. Colleagues from STEM, medicine, the arts or the humanities often feel that SoTL — or educational research more broadly — isn’t for them. The Intensive makes explicit room for different research traditions, while keeping the focus on what matters most: getting a meaningful answer to a real teaching question.
For you as an educational developer or T&L professional, this means:
Your role shifts from organiser to credible strategic partner in faculty development
- Lecturers actually finish what they start
- Insights become visible and discussable
- The impact of evidence-informed teaching and learning becomes easier to demonstrate to leadership and accreditation bodies
- And your role shifts from organiser to credible strategic partner
Who am I?
Building the Utrecht University Roadmap for SoTL together with colleagues was just the start. Since then, I’ve spent years working with educational developers and lecturers across Europe — as Chair of EuroSoTL, co-editor of a book on SoTL leadership, and now as an independent consultant.
Working independently means I can focus entirely on what works — without institutional agenda.
How we work together
The SoTL Intensive is always designed in close collaboration with you. Typically it involves:
- Focused working sessions (on-site, online, or a combination)
- A group of lecturers from your institution, faculty or programme
- Three to five days, concentrated where possible
- Hands-on guidance throughout — not just input, but support in doing the actual work
Group size, number of days, and level of support are tailored to what makes sense for your context.
Optional follow-up: After the intensive, I can offer online check-ins or feedback sessions to support participants as they move into the next steps of their SoTL project. Sometimes that’s what makes the difference between a plan that stays in a drawer and one that actually gets carried out.
Let’s think together
Interested in bringing a SoTL Intensive to your institution or faculty?
If you recognise what’s described here, and want to explore what a SoTL Intensive could look like at your institution, feel free to get in touch. I’d love to hear what you’re working on.
The SoTL Intensive Summer School, originally planned for 6–9 July 2026, will not go ahead this year; we aim to run it again next year.