All faculties employ individuals who have made the move from practitioner, to academic - whether teacher, business leader, lawyer, social worker or nurse - very often these individuals have attained seniority in their professional lives. Yet the literature on this transition illustrates that it is rarely straightforward.
The move has implications for values and purpose whilst prior assumptions on academia can create a great deal of cognitive dissonance for the individual.
Pedagogical research, or the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) is now a feature of the higher educational landscape, brought about in no small measure by policies that place a premium on evidence-based practice and knowledge exchange.
Having employed SoTL as a mechanism to craft my own professional identity, here I discuss how SoTL can aid practitioner/academic transition, helping individuals make sense of their work and feel part of valued communities of practice.
