Teaching for Quality Learning at Changing Universities. A tour de force of modern education history – an interview with Professor John Biggs

Abstract

Professor John Biggs is a world-famous psychologist and educationist who in 2017, was invested as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for “significant service to tertiary education, particularly in the fields of curriculum development and assessment”. John Biggs has been actively involved in education for six decades and has been a Professor of both Education and Psychology. Professor Biggs’ most ground-breaking and innovative contributions – such as SOLO taxonomy, constructively aligned OBTL (Outcome-based Teaching & Learning), criterion-referenced assessment and students’ surface and deep approaches to learning – are all discussed in this wide-ranging interview. Moreover, Biggs discusses his illustrious academic career, his concerns about the corporatisation of universities and his alternative vision of higher education, and also what he refers to, tongue-firmly-in-cheek, as his “constructive but misaligned retirement”.