Introduction
In 2018, Advance HE analysed the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF2) provider statements and found that just under a fifth of them referenced technicians in their claims for teaching excellence. At the time, I was starting my doctorate to explore what I was experiencing as the increasing prevalence and sophistication of technical teaching in creative arts subjects. The inclusion of technicians in the TEF provided a helpful, empirical context for my research. It demonstrated that, while it was still widely problematic for many technicians to claim they were teaching, a significant proportion of providers deemed technician pedagogies to be integral to their educational excellence. I discuss this paradox and its impact in my forthcoming book (based on my thesis), Technical Teaching in Higher Education: Insights from the Creative Arts.
Recent Author Findings: Since completing this analysis, Dr Tim Savage has continued exploring the dataset and some interesting patterns are beginning to emerge. One early finding suggests that institutions that are signatories to the Technician Commitment are nearly twice as likely to reference technicians in their TEF provider statements. He has also started examining the relationship between technician recognition in provider submissions and TEF outcomes. While the analysis is still underway, the initial results are already proving compelling.
Plenty has changed in the eight years since TEF2. Across HE, multiple complex and dynamic pressures have intensified and converged, diminishing resources and elevating expectations, placing unprecedented strain on operating models and the workforce. Academic roles continue to be reported as pressured, disaggregated, and increasingly fractured, while Technician roles have evolved in terms of their pedagogic significance and contribution, particularly in practice-based disciplines.
While Advance HE had analysed the technical contribution to TEF in 2017, to the best of my knowledge, no one had done the same for the 2023 TEF data. I was curious whether sector pressures, changing academic duties, and the trajectory of technicians being drawn more deeply into teaching (a phenomenon I term the ‘technical turn’) would be reflected in provider TEF narratives five years later.
This blog post resolves that curiosity. It describes my analysis of the TEF 2023 provider submissions to explore whether technicians’ contributions to teaching excellence narratives changed significantly between 2017 and 2023, and speculates on possible trajectories for TEF 2027. My aim was not simply to count mentions of technicians (which, of course, I do), but also to explore the nature of the contribution and context of the technicians referenced in provider submissions.
The headline finding is that the number of providers referencing technicians has increased from a little under 20% in 2017 to just over 34% in 2023, and the activities referenced are distinctly richer, but inconsistent. Recognition of how technicians teach and support learning remains partial, context-dependent, and often tied to particular kinds of providers (predominantly small and specialist) and forms of provision (practical and applied). There are also numerous instances in which technicians teach within the curriculum but remain absent from institutional narratives of teaching excellence.
As the sector looks ahead to TEF 2027, lessons from TEF 2023 can and should be learned to reduce the dissonance between ‘what we do’ and ‘what we say we do’. The TEF is one of the sector’s most consequential narratives of teaching excellence. Public perception of the value of universities is already a significant concern to stakeholders, and the situation may intensify quickly in the coming years. In their thought-provoking blog, HEPI reflects on how a populist government might dramatically impact the sector, forcing it to reform the stories it tells about its purpose, ontologies, and epistemologies, specifically, who teaches, what, how, and why. The proposed changes to TEF, currently under consultation, echo this emphasis. It doesn’t seem far-fetched to speculate that in the not-so-distant future, a coherent, compelling, evidence-based narrative about how ‘know-how’ and ‘skills’ are taught and aligned to graduate employment and national economic benefit is likely to carry greater weight than the dominant currencies of ‘knowledge’.
Design and method
My analysis set out to revisit the question posed in earlier TEF2 work: to what extent do institutions recognise the contribution of technicians within their narratives of teaching excellence?
To do this, I needed to gather a dataset of all publicly available TEF 2023 provider submissions. 228 providers took part (186 mandatory, and 42 voluntary), but not all included a full provider submission PDF. The OfS don’t make it straightforward to download these files en masse, so I used a Python script to scrape the relevant documents from the OfS website, excluding the accompanying information (student submissions, panel data, etc.). This resulted in a final sample of 222 providers in PDF format.
The analysis was conducted in two stages. For the first, I used a second script to run a systematic keyword search across the harvested submissions to identify explicit references to technical roles. Search terms included ‘technician’, ‘technical staff’, ‘demonstrator’, and related variants. However, keyword searching in isolation proved insufficient. The term ‘technical’ is frequently used to refer to skills, technologies, or learning environments rather than the staff who support them. A second stage of manual review and verification was undertaken to confirm that the identified instances genuinely related to technician contributions. This also allowed for the exclusion of borderline cases, such as references to learning technologists, technical skills without attribution, or generic mentions without clear linkage to technical staff.
The second stage of the analysis moved from identification to interpretation. Extracts from the submissions that referenced technicians were reviewed to identify recurring themes in how technicians enable, support, and deliver learning, teaching and assessment (the language that looks set to form the basis of how HESA will describe technicians in the forthcoming changes to the HESA Staff Record from 2028/29). This step distinguished between different types of recognition, from technicians as providers and/or supervisors of equipment and facilities, through to technicians as educators, collaborators, and co-creators of the curriculum, student education, and experiences.
Quantitative findings
When both stages of analysis were completed, 76 providers (34.23%) were found to have referenced technicians’ contributions in their submissions. While not directly comparable in methodological terms to the 2018 analysis conducted by Advance HE, this finding represents a significant shift from ‘just under a fifth’ to ‘just over a third’ reported in earlier TEF2 analysis.
It seems, therefore, that the sector is, at least in part, beginning to identify and articulate the educational contribution of its technical workforce more explicitly. However, the distribution of references is very uneven across the dataset. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it appears to be led by institutions with a strong emphasis on practice-based learning, in particular the visual arts (with Norwich University of the Arts and University for the Arts London providing compelling accounts of how technical and academic teams can be effectively integrated to deliver teaching excellence), but this was found to be less consistent in the performing arts, where all provider narratives describe extensive technical training and skills-teaching, but for some, these pedagogies were described as being delivered and supported by academic rather than technical staff.
Qualitative findings
The quantitative analysis provides a measure of technician visibility but doesn’t articulate how that contribution is understood or valued. Reading the relevant extracts illustrates a spectrum of scale, recognition, and engagement. Some providers move beyond traditional models of technical support (maintenance, equipment, processes, and such), acknowledging technicians as active and valued actors within teaching and learning communities. Activities described include delivering inductions and demonstrations, configuring VLEs, leading workshops, providing one-to-one and small-group support, and giving formative feedback. In some cases, teaching practical skills aligned with learning outcomes and contributing to summative assessment. In a small number of submissions, technicians were recognised as pedagogic partners, contributing directly to curriculum delivery and development. Several described how their technicians engaged in pedagogical research and had published peer-reviewed academic journal articles, and keynoted national and international educational conferences.
Technicians were closely associated with the ‘hands-on’ learning in specialist environments: studios, workshops, laboratories, performance spaces and specialist facilities. Providers describe how their technical staff are integral to enabling appropriate, high-quality access to industry-standard equipment, supporting live briefs, and facilitating learning that reflects the habits of professional practice. Indeed, some describe the essential role of technicians in delivering courses accredited by, or aligned with the requirements of, professional technical bodies, such as the Association of British Theatre Techniciansand the Association of Accounting Technicians. Others rely on technicians to deliver accredited technical components, such as Adobe Certification, and Avid Certification and Digital Credentials. Where these skills relating to new and emerging technologies weren’t available in-house, providers describe employing technical sessional staff.
Another theme emerging from the data is the extent to which technicians support independent, autonomous, experimental, and student-led learning outside the curriculum. Submissions describe how technical staff can provide guidance outside formal teaching sessions, supporting students in autonomous and self-directed study as they develop projects independently, troubleshoot, and experiment with materials, technologies, and processes.
In some instances, technicians and technical managers were described as valued elements of integrated teaching teams. References to ‘academic and technical staff’ working collaboratively indicate a growing recognition that teaching and learning is a shared remit rather than exclusive to academic staff. One provider (non-arts) described developing and supporting technicians to transition their careers into academic roles. However, mentions of technicians in non-arts disciplines are more commonly made in relation to infrastructure and resource provision. In these disciplines, technicians’ contributions were more likely to be described as maintaining facilities, managing and issuing equipment, supporting access to specialist resources, and ensuring the safe and effective use of technical environments – less overtly pedagogic, but of critical importance to learners in these disciplines.
Another area in which technicians featured strongly was via student feedback, as reflected in NSS comments and internal feedback forums. Themes included technical staff being described as approachable, supportive, and creating a sense of belonging within studios, labs, and workshops. Several providers also cited external examiner reports praising their technicians and their impact on student learning. In a similar vein, numerous providers evidenced that their technicians had been recognised through student-led awards (often by the student union), institutional recognition schemes, and high-profile external accolades such as the Times Higher Education ‘Outstanding Technician of the Year’ award, and the Papin Prizes, awarded by the UK Institute for Technical Skills and Strategy.
Technicians were also referenced in relation to employability and graduate outcomes. Sometimes implicitly through teaching the skills aligned to the professions, but in several submissions, providers gave examples of how students are supported to work alongside and shadow technicians and encouraged to apply for both professional technician roles within and beyond the institution.
It is also noteworthy that many of the submissions that did not reference technicians include extensive references to ‘technical skills, technical provision, or technical support’ but do not explicitly identify the staff or job family responsible; in all likelihood, these are technical roles.
Discussion and implications
The findings offer a mixed picture. It is clear that technician visibility within TEF submissions has increased since 2017, and in some cases, this recognition is both explicit and meaningful. Technicians are described by some institutions in ways that were far less common even a decade ago. But recognition is patchy and does not always accurately reflect institutions’ delivery models or students’ lived educational experiences of teaching.
Areas of the sector with the greatest recognition of technicians were found to be those where learning and high performance depend on technical expertise. In these contexts, technicians are often explicit within provider narratives because they are central to the pedagogy. Elsewhere, however, while the technical contribution to learning and teaching is significant and expanding (a recent sector-wide survey of HE technicians found that 77% were involved in teaching students), two-thirds of providers make no reference to the contribution of technical staff. A simple explanation is that some institutions don’t offer practical subjects or employ technical staff. But there are many more that employ technicians, technical demonstrators, and instructors, but omit their contribution from TEF submissions.
That, in turn, invites some reflections on the TEF. If TEF is intended to identify and communicate teaching excellence, then it relies on institutions to submit credible and authentic accounts of how learning is designed, delivered, and experienced. This, however, relies upon the pedagogies of practice being clearly articulated to the senior teams that actually write the TEF submission, which, in my experience, cannot be taken for granted. The waters are murkier in this regard because the evolution of technical roles has generally occurred via creep rather than strategy, and is not always visible in the formal narratives, evidence, and metrics that TEF often draws on. A notable exception is when institutions have introduced a requirement that technicians obtain teaching qualifications. In about 5% of statements, providers cite the percentages of their technicians who hold Advance HE fellowships (largely at AFHEA, and FHEA, though several providers identified technicians with SFHEA, and one PFHEA) and other HESA-recognised teaching qualifications. These were predominantly, but not exclusively, arts providers, while several STEM-focused providers referenced professional registration of technicians via the Science Council.
Finally, there is a question of workforce alignment and the trajectory of change. The sector has, in recent years, placed increasing emphasis on technical education, skills development, and employability. Concrete examples include the establishment of T-Levels, Skills England, Higher Technical Qualifications, the UK Modern Industrial Strategy, Institutes of Technology, and higher and degree apprenticeships.
Initiatives such as the Technician Commitment and the Research England TALENT programme have reinforced the importance and enabling function of technical roles in this regard. Several providers mentioned the significance and recommendations of the TALENT Commission, but in 2023, they had not yet had sufficient time to integrate them into their articulation and evidence of teaching excellence. However, many of the recommendations have subsequently been adopted by the sector, leading to a significant number of universities establishing promotional pathways for Educational Technical Professionals, specifically designed to recognise and enhance the contribution of technicians to teaching and learning. These are not limited to the creative arts; indeed, they are being established in large multidisciplinary universities and are likely to be highly prominent in future provider responses to TEF and Technician Commitment Action Plans.
In other forums, providers have expressed concern that recognising or facilitating elevated responsibilities for learning and teaching in technical roles may lead to pay inflation. To explore whether salary was a factor in technicians being acknowledged in TEF narratives, I cross-referenced the findings with a previously published league table of technician salaries across UK higher education providers. Broadly, this supports that institutions paying technicians above the sector median were more likely to mention them in their TEF submissions, but this is by no means conclusive.
Recommendations and reflections
There are two ways to interpret the findings. On the one hand, the visibility of the contribution that technicians make to excellent learning and teaching has increased. There are clear examples of great practice that can be shared, where institutions are not only recognising technicians, but positioning them as integral to the student experience and teaching excellence. On the other hand, the technical contribution to learning and teaching remains in the shadows for two-thirds of the sector.
This raises the question of whether TEF does enough to recognise the full range of contributions to teaching and learning. To be of genuine value, TEF should identify the full range of learning and teaching activities within institutions. In a similar way to how REF 2029 is changing to be more inclusive of all who enable research. While some institutions may choose not to acknowledge technician pedagogies, in the future, this may be beyond their control. The OfS are consulting on the inclusion of NSS responses in the TEF, which, as Susan Orr points out in her afterword to my book, “If you do a targeted word search across NSS open comments, what you will repeatedly find are comments where students unpack the difference technicians have made to their learning”.
Accordingly, clearer guidance to providers about the appetite for a more complete picture might encourage a fuller account of how excellent learning and teaching is enabled, supported, and delivered in HE. One provider referenced this point specifically, describing how the scope of the university teaching observation scheme had been expanded to include technicians and library staff, noting that they chose to do so to capture (and improve) ‘what actually takes place in teaching’ at the university.
These kinds of progressive shifts help institutions move on from the outdated view in which academics teach while professional services teams support in the background. This is helpful for externally facing benchmarking activities such as TEF, as well as for improving internal understanding, identity, and value. It reflects how institutions understand their own educational models and who they see and value as contributing to them. Clarity in this regard points to a more inclusive way of thinking about institutional pedagogies, one that is more reflective of practice and arguably more aligned with how students actually experience teaching excellence.
About the Author: Dr. Tim Savage is a Principal Fellow. He has spent over two decades at the intersection of academic leadership, professional services, and workforce development. His early training was in photography, a technical art form where success relies on a complementary blend of theoretical knowledge and practical skills. This foundation ignited his lifelong passion for helping universities create environments, facilities, and staffing that integrate theory and practice to support learning, innovation, and sector-leading educational experiences.
Original article title: Reflecting on the recognition of the contribution of technicians in Teaching Excellence narratives.
This article has been kindly repurposed from Advance HE and you can read the original here.