Student perspectives on good university teachers: communication, clarity, commitment, care

Using findings from a 2-year study, this paper explores undergraduate engineering student perspectives on good university teachers. Findings from open survey questions and semi-structured interviews were analysed using principles of grounded theory, resulting in four themes identified by students as key to good university teaching: communication, clarity, commitment, and care. These findings are discussed in relation to recent international debates on teaching excellence. The basic argument of the paper is that the discourse of teaching excellence needs to be critically reconsidered and would benefit from inclusion of the actual perspectives of students rather than student voice discourses framed by others.