Red Mendoza

Red is currently the Deputy Director (Pedagogical Practice) of the E-Learning and IT Division of the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine (LKC Medicine) at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore. His work has been to advocate and educate on the propagation and conversion of the delivery of a wide-ranging courses into TBL.

This dissemination is under the purview of the university’s Teaching, Learning and Pedagogy Division, through which he engages many different schools and very various disciplines, from engineering, business, education, sciences and humanities. Red trains faculty (and some teaching assistants) in the principles of TBL and allow them to adapt to their various disciplines.

The feedback from the students and the faculty alike are encouraging. Both find the experience engaging and enriching. The students are at the same time scared and thrilled at being accountable for most of their own learning, yet they find it comforting that they learn on their own. They also find that their ability to convince and influence their team mates is exciting. The teachers find that the discussions are usually at the level of ideas and successful teams are those that are able to recognise and adapt to the diverse personalities of their members, rather than those groups that force members to conform.

Overall, Red’s continuing work in TBL has expanded his worldview with regards to teaching and learning beyond my initial field of medicine. He recognises the many similarities and various unique challenges across academic disciplines.