Dr Ayona Silva Fletcher awarded National Teaching Fellowship

Dr Ayona Silva-Fletcher, senior lecturer in veterinary education at the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) has been awarded a National Teaching Fellowship from The Higher Education Academy (HEA).

The National Teaching Fellowships are the most prestigious awards for excellence in higher education teaching and support for learning. This year 55 award winners were selected from over 180 nominations submitted by higher education institutions across England, Northern Ireland and Wales. Each will receive an award of £10,000 which may be used for professional development in teaching and learning or aspects of pedagogy.

Successful nominees were backed by their institutions and submissions had to show evidence of three criteria: individual excellence, raising the profile of excellence and developing excellence.

While at the RVC Dr Silva-Fletcher has had a major impact on the postgraduate distance learning programme; placing greater emphasis on student experience and motivation for those studying from outside the RVC. She developed a tutor training programme to ensure that student feedback is appropriate and valuable to a veterinarian studying from a remote location whether they are in Australia or Africa.

One of the major achievements of Dr Silva-Fletcher during the past four years has been the development of the MSc in Veterinary Education. This is the first discipline-specific postgraduate education programme anywhere in the world targeted at veterinary and para-veterinary educators.