The Institute of Instructional and School Development (IUS) of the Klagenfurt University is an Austrian Educational Competence Centre (AECC). Its field of operation is the development of and research on educational practice, schools and educational systems. It incorporates the derived insights in teaching and counselling. A key issue is the interrelation between research and teacher education.
Teachers, teacher educators and other contributors to the field of education are supported in their professional development by innovative programmes. These interventions are evaluated and investigated. The insights gained are communicated to the national and international community of educators and educational researchers.
The support in the development of professionalization is considered a reflective process. This implies and at the same time enhances self-monitoring and individual responsibility. Diversity, sustainability and reflection are regarded as principles that are as important as cooperation and networking among the persons and institutions involved in any developmental process.
This results in an interdisciplinary mode of operation; the IUS is open for different scientific paradigms. In addition to classical qualitative and quantitative research, we foster action research. The discussion about internal and external points of view is regarded as a basic presupposition for learning in social systems. Accordingly, great importance is attached to an open dialogue between academic research, school authorities and practitioners.
The IUS offers participants of university courses a framework for developing their competencies by collaborating in working on professional problems. They are seen as reflective practitioners and are supported in investigating their professional practice using the methods of action research. Participants and staff are regarded as learners and thus as collaborators in a learning system.
The following courses are designed for teachers and educational staff for pre-service and in-service teacher education in all areas of education (from elementary to tertiary education):
BINE (Bildung für Nachhaltige Entwicklung) – Education for Sustainable Development – Innovations in Teacher Education
fBM (Fachbezogenes Bildungsmanagement) – Subject-Specific Educational Management
PFL (Pädagogik und Fachdidaktik für Lehrer/innen) – Pedagogy and Subject-Specific Didactics for Teachers; this programme comprises the courses PFL-English, PFL-ArtHist (Arts, German, History, Music), PFL-Mathematics, PFL-Science (Biology, Chemistry, Physics) and PFL-Elementary Education and Inclusive Education.
Psychoanalytic Observational Studies (Persönlichkeitsentwicklung und Lernen), offers the degree of a Master of Arts in Psychoanalytic Observational Studies – MA.POS
ProfiL (Professionalität im Lehrberuf) – Professionalization for Teachers, offers the degree of a Master of Arts (Education and School Development) – MA
At the moment we are planning a PhD programme.
The research and development activities of the IUS extend across all levels of the field of education - instruction, the single school, and the educational system - as well as the professionalism of teachers. In many cases, the starting point for scientific work is current challenges that teachers, or the educational system as a whole, are confronted with. Research and development, therefore, are frequently interrelated. You can find an up-to-date list of publications of the IUS at:
http://ius.aau.at/publikationen/
The following presents the two largest departmental projects, however, there are various other research and development projects (in the areas of instructional and school development as well as Education for Sustainable Development) pursued at the IUS.
The IUS conducts the national large-scale project IMST (Innovations Make Schools Top) which aims at improving instruction in mathematics, information technology, science, German studies, and technology. The focus is on students’ and teachers’ learning. The project involves about 7000 teachers across all Austria who participate in projects, attend conferences or cooperate in regional networks. The IMST network programme supports and researches regional networks in all nine Austrian provinces. By way of regional educational planning these networks can set their own priorities and support district networks, regional specialist didactics centres, specialist groups in schools and/or inter-school networks. This programme also permits the setting of contextual priorities - for example by promoting specialist didactics within district networks or small-scale projects. Network events provide opportunities for experience exchange as well as for structural upgrading and the dissemination of the knowledge and experience gained. As of 2010, IMST has started supporting five to ten themed programmes for classroom and school projects with a view to boosting specific priorities. The themed programmes address topical challenges and are submitted by the project proponents by way of a bidding procedure. The programme teams, composed of academics at university colleges of teacher education and universities and of school staff, monitor approximately 20 classroom and school projects per theme and school year.
Special attention is paid to gender equality, which is integrated by way of the gender network into both the content and the structure of all the areas covered by IMST. In order to investigate the impacts of IMST, evaluation and research is integrated on all levels.
(www.imst.ac.at, German)
The European project CCT (Career Counselling for Teachers) was initiated with the aim of providing information and help for career decisions in the teaching profession via the Internet. Its most important aim is counselling individuals. If prospective teachers reach their career decisions on a better-founded basis, CCT will develop a systemic management effect which will in turn contribute to the quality of the educational system. The suggestions for self-cognition and reflection exercises offered on the website can also be used as a stimulus for personal enhancement and as a basis for a differentiated teacher training.
The IUS is part of the Faculty for Interdisciplinary Studies (IFF), which is a faculty of the Klagenfurt University and is resident in Klagenfurt, Vienna and Graz. The IUS has two sites, one in Klagenfurt (with the head of the department), and one in Vienna.