Continuing professional development for higher education cannot be treated as an individual responsibility. Dedicated institutional support is essential, according to Tony Lelliott, a programme specialist at the non-profit educational trust the South African Institute for Distance Education, or Saide, in Johannesburg, South Africa. Participation in continuing professional development by higher learning institutions requires a clear incentive as part of the institutional policy, he said. Continuing professional development needs to demonstrate immediate utility to be appealing, and time needs to be allocated to allow participation and self-study.
However, digital transformation can be compromised where connectivity is less than optimal, Lelliott said during a presentation about Saide’s work on digital transformation in higher education in the SADC region at the Southern African Regional Universities Association’s Colloquium 9, ‘Regional Collaboration for the Digital Transformation of Teaching and Learning: Experiences from SADC’, held on 1 July 2021.
