Making higher education a more creative place

Creativity is a fundamentally human characteristic that is central to our well-being and productivity, yet so often we undervalue it in higher education. This article provides a practical introduction to the meanings and role of creativity in higher education learning and teaching. It summarises some of the perspectives on creativity that are being developed by the Higher Education Academy’s Imaginative Curriculum Network. The teaching and learning process, with all its complexity, unpredictability and endless sources of stimulation from the discipline itself or from teacher-student or teacher-teacher interactions, is an inherently creative place, and teachers’ own creativity is fundamental to enable them to respond to the individual needs of students. Creativity is also an integral part of being a practitioner in the discipline, be it in academic research and scholarship or some other form of professional practice. But being creative means different things in these different contexts and the next stage of our work is to develop deeper understandings of what being creative means in different disciplinary contexts.