Faculty Professional Development and Its Impact on Teaching Strategies in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

This qualitative study explores a group of male and female faculty members (n = 85), drawn from diverse academic disciplines, who participated in a two-day Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) workshop held at a university in Saudi Arabia. Shortly after participating in this two-day workshop, the faculty members were surveyed to obtain data about their experience. Three months later, a random sample of these individuals progressed to an in-depth follow-up interview in order to determine whether they had fulfilled their participation objectives. The degree of planned and enacted HOTS workshops, the analysis of post-workshop abilities, and the level of knowledge of and ability in HOTS are topics that have not yet been explored in the professional faculty development literature. Ideally, the assessment of the impact on the professional development of faculty members should measure the effect of learning in terms of their ability to implement what they have learned. The results show that 89% of the faculty members were initially enthusiastic about applying the knowledge and skills acquired through the workshop but that what they had learned started to diminish and to be set aside within the first three months. This was largely because the faculty members became heavily focused on routine activities including lecturing.