Tech. College, Denmark visit to Coatbridge (7/12/22) - various NCL representatives

The team were delighted to receive a visit from Danish lecturers on December 7th, 2022, welcoming a delegation of colleagues from a College in Denmark, specifically, Tech College, which is in Aalborg.

Tech College is very committed to sharing experiences with other educational institutions and experiencing their approach to professionalism and pedagogy, both in Denmark and internationally. 

TECHCOLLEGE is one of the largest business schools in Denmark, offering a wide range of vocational education and training (VET) for young people who want to qualify in vocational areas similar to the curriculum activity offered at New College Lanarkshire.

NCL was represented on the day by Robert Allan, Sinead Lithgow, John Gould, Fiona Thomson, Calum Crosbie and Mark Hetherington. It was anticipated that Sharon MacGregor would join us too, via Zoom, but alas the link was not in operation on the day. Best plans and all that!

The session was well received from our new friends and a great deal of discussion ensued around the following topics:

• Historical context of Scottish FE and education provision locally (an innovative, entertaining and informative presentation delivered by John Gould from the Cumbernauld campus). Delegates were particularly impressed with this detail and delivery. Well done, John
• Sharing intel on what each College provides, the constituent groups, academic awards, political landscape
• Demonstrating Infopoint and the function of
• ESOL in the curriculum
• Displaying resources from the Humanities Department
• Discussion of  the Communication and English curriculum - the pitfalls and delivery of
• Educational blogging
• Danish English education
• Assessment delivery
• The role of SQA 

Delegates from both institutions were treated to a lovely lunch at the Coatbridge refectory, where topics of conversation ranged from where to taste haggis locally to formative assessment ideology and what constitutes traditional festive fayre in the respective countries to travel experiences in both Scandinavia and Glasgow.

We were joined by colleagues from the International Office too, who mentioned that there could be some overseas exchange possibilities to Aalborg in the near future, and I am sure there will be no shortage of volunteers when this has been firmed up, in order to strengthen academic links even further.

All in all, this was an extremely positive exchange of professional discourse and it is certain that strong collegiate bonds have been formed as a result of everybody's industry and engagement on the day. The College food wasn't too bad either!

The link to the Danish College is found here: TECHCOLLEGE