Block Teaching and Active Learning Improves Academic Outcomes for Disadvantaged Undergraduate Groups

In 2018, Victoria University adopted a new teaching delivery model, now known as the Block Teaching Model (BTM). The aim of this study focuses on how this new approach to teaching has impacted student learning and academic success, in particular for students who come from a disadvantaged background, compared with those who come from a non-disadvantaged background. In this study, disadvantage is defined by the following categories: non-English speaking background (NESB), first in family to attend university (FIF), low socio-economic status (SES), low Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) and gender (male students). Results indicate that when compared to nondisadvantaged students, the newly established BTM has achieved a significantly higher reduction in student failure rates across ATAR, SES, and NESB versus ESB and gender, while the reduction in fail rates for FIF was not reduced significantly more than NFIF. This work encapsulates the University’s central vision, “The VU Way”, which focuses on opportunity and success, and being transformational within the community in which it operates. More generally, this research lends support to the importance of active and intensive learning models in reducing disadvantage in tertiary education.