Higher education institutions are not only expected to cultivate custodians for tomorrow, but also to interpret, navigate, and conquer current conditions. During the past few years, global changes have been exponential and urgent. How do universities stay at the forefront of these developments?

The university established the Blended Learning and Innovation Services and Support (BLISS) focus area in the Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL) in July 2022 as part of the Multicampus Management Process. This focus area is the result of the amalgamation and reorganisation process between the previous Academic Staff and Curriculum Design (ASCD) within CTL and the IDEAS lab, and Curriculum Design units on the UFS South Campus.

Specialised services

The BLISS structure is unique within the South African higher education environment and allows for the deployment and delivery of specialised services across all three campuses of the UFS. It includes services ranging from curriculum and learning design, multimedia content production and development, online assessment, staff and student training and development, as well as the maintenance and review of a rapidly changing educational technology environment.

Benchmarked with other national universities, the aim is to promote the use of educational technology within the learning and teaching environment and to support the implementation of the newly approved UFS blended learning policy across faculties.

Given the integrated specialised support provided within this new structure, multidisciplinary teams will be deployed to support faculties across all three UFS campuses. These teams will comprise specialists in the areas of curriculum design, learning design, and online assessment.

A team of graphic and multimedia designers will support the UFS drive to produce and develop learning and teaching content and artefacts at state-of-the art studios on the South Campus. A dedicated academic staff development team will support academics through leadership programmes and initiatives such as the Curriculum Renewal Programme, Academic Leadership Programme, and the UFS Learning and Teaching Fellowship.

Student support

Student support includes helpdesks for technologies such as Blackboard, Questionmark, and Turnitin, as well as institutional and faculty-based workshops and webinars. Our Learning and Emerging Technology team will assist faculties with investigating and implementing new technologies. This is aligned to the work done by the Educational Technology and Learning Space Committee, as well as the Central Information Technology Committee – both institutional committees that oversee the implementation of technology at the UFS.

The UFS is a proud advocate of innovation and continues to allocate resources towards impactful teaching and learning. According to Tiana van der Merwe, Deputy Director: CTL, who heads up the BLISS team, the emphasis in 2023 is to finalise and stabilise the implementation of the BLISS structure across all three campuses.