Imperial is distinct as the UK’s only STEMMB university and has a crucial role in tackling humanity's most complex problems such as climate change, clean energy, global healthcare, responsible AI, international security, and innovation-driven economies. Our most pervasive pathway for international impact and influence comes from our highly skilled graduates. We train the next generation of innovators, researchers, doctors, entrepreneurs, and leaders to tackle these challenging problems in their stride. To do this our education must reflect modern, relevant, innovative, and evidence-based teaching practices.

We strive for this outcome while knowing that our students are graduating into an increasingly uncertain global economy and may well end up following careers that do not yet exist. The future will demand new skills – particularly emotional resilience, flexibility, and creativity, alongside exacting technical knowledge, and sophisticated communication skills. 
 
Our graduates are sought after internationally both by employers and other universities for their distinctive attributes including independent problem-solving, multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary team-working, strong digital and interpersonal skills, and as entrepreneurial initiators of innovation that brings benefit to society.

The Learning and Teaching Strategy has facilitated investment in our people and places, our digital and physical infrastructure, and the student experience. In fact, Imperial’s dedication to the highest quality of learning and teaching has also been reflected in both objective and subjective external benchmarking – with the university securing its highest ever student satisfaction scores in the National Student Survey in recent years, a Gold Award in the Teaching Excellence Framework, and several University of the Year awards from respected, high-profile rankings.

To continue our momentum, we are embarking on the next phase of this project with a sense of confident determination. Through collaboration with academic departments, faculties, our student support teams and the student body, comprehensive community feedback gathered during the 2022/23 academic year identified five fresh aims that build upon our progress, while aligning students’ experience with the broader objectives of Imperial's new strategy – Science for Humanity:

• Reviewing our approach to assessment and feedback, with the aim of improving quality and reducing workloads for students and staff
• Delivering degree programmes that challenge students to achieve their full potential through authentic discovery-based learning
• Developing lifelong learning opportunities for our current students, alumni, and a global community of learners yet to discover us
• Growing our digital education capabilities both in scale and in scope to enhance our use of novel digital technologies, virtual educational spaces and data
• Fostering a supportive environment which offers a sense of community both inside and beyond the learning environment 

Of course, we also want to retain and build upon new collaborative approaches that have been successfully embedded across our community in recent years. The Learning and Teaching Strategy will continue to drive institution-wide strategy, while supporting academic departments and teams for bottom-up innovation in discovery-based learning, digital technologies, inclusivity, and community-building, and continue to give Imperial the agility to respond to world-changing developments.

A key tenet of the Strategy has been to recognise the immense value and insight that our student community can offer. Our close partnership, collaboration and co-creation with students and Imperial College Union are a focal point for our enduring success and remain at the centre of all we do.

These webpages host a wealth of information for members of the Imperial community wishing to innovate, network with one another, seek new funding or training, and ultimately have a positive impact in an educational setting. Whatever your level of engagement with learning and teaching, I recommend finding out more and getting involved!

Professor Peter Haynes
Vice-Provost (Education and Student Experience)