Grace is a senior lecturer with the First Year College. She has more than 20 years of teaching experience and has taught a variety of Information Technology and Computing courses and units at Victoria University in Melbourne, Hong Kong, China and Malaysia.

Grace has held many leadership roles including units’ coordinator, year level coordinator and graduate diploma course coordinator. Since 2000, Grace has held the pivotal role of undergraduate course coordinator for several degree programs within the College.

Her research interests include:

  • trialling new teaching strategies through the application of information and communication technologies
  • development of effective teaching resources and curricula
  • improving learning outcomes for novice programmers
  • building professional skills in students throughout their studies.

Grace brings a broad perspective of curriculum innovation and course design, developed and honed from many years as course coordinator and curricula leader. She champions quality enhancement through action research and innovative approaches to enhance the student learning experience.

Grace has received several awards for teaching and learning excellence over her career, including being a 2013 recipient of the Australian Government’s Office for Learning and Teaching Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning.

View Grace's publications in Victoria University's Institutional Repository.

Portfolios

Areas of expertise

  • Development of graduate attributes
  • Internationalisation of IT curricula
  • Investigations of innovative teaching methods
Grace Tan

Contact details

+61 (3) 9919 4685
[email protected]

Publications

Refereed journal articles

Venables, A, Tan, G & Miliszewska, I (2013), "Developing Cross-Cultural Awareness in IT: Reflections of Australian and Chinese Students", Journal of Information Technology Education, Volume 12, IIP 91-99

Venables, A & Tan, G (2012), "Measuring up to ICT Teaching and Learning Standards", Journal of Issues in Informing Science and Information Technology (IISIT), Volume 9, 29-40

Tan, G (2010), "Straddling the Divide: Towards an Associate Degree in Information Technology", Journal of Information Technology Education, Volume 9, pages IIP 133-141

Tan, G & Venables, A (2010), "Designing a Network and Systems Computing Curriculum: The Stakeholders and the Issues", Journal of Information Technology Education, Volume 9, IIP 103-112

Tan, G & Venables, A (2010), "Wearing the assessment ‘BRACElet’", Journal of Information Technology Education, Volume 9, IIP 25-34

Refereed invited book chapter

Miliszewska, I & Tan, G (2009), "Web ACE – A Study in Reciprocal Informing", Foundations of Informing Science: 1999-2008, Part 4 – Applications of Informing Systems, Chapter 19, p643-660, the Informing Science Institute Press. Editors: T. Grandon Gill and Eli Cohen. ISBN 193288615X, 9781932886153 (print)

Conference presentations

Jayasuriya, Kanchana, McKechnie, Sandra and Tan, G (2014) Enhancing Student Engagement in Science and Information Technology: A Collaborative Approach. In: The 20th Annual UniServe Science Conference: Student Engagement from the Classroom to the Workplace, 29 September 2014-01 October 2014, Sydney, Australia.

Venables, Anne, Miliszewska, Iwona and Tan, G (2012) Information Technology and Society: An Exchange of Australian and Chinese Perspectives. In: 9th International Conference on Cooperative and Work-Integrated Education - Where East Meets West and Theory Meets Practice, 20 June 2012-22 June 2012, Bahcesehir University, Istanbul, Turkey.

Venables, A., Tan, G. & Lister, R.  (2009). A closer look at tracing, explaining and code writing skills in the novice programmer.  Proceedings of the Fifth International Computing Education Research Workshop ( ICER ’09), Berkeley, California, August 10-11, 2009. ACM, New York, NY, 117-128. DOI= http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1584322.1584336

Miliszewska, I., Venables, A. & Tan, G. (2008). Reflections on a mentoring experience in an undergraduate computing course at Victoria University. Proceedings of the 2008 International Conference on Frontiers in Education: Computer Science and Computer Engineering (FECS 2008), July 14-17, Las Vegas, U.S.A.(ISBN 1-60132-067-1 (hardcover), p. 47-52. Editors: Hamid R. Arabnia, Victor A. Clincy, Nasser Tadayon, CSREA Press). (ISBN 1-60132-090-6 (CD-ROM version) Editor: H.R. Arabnia, CSREA Press).

Tan, G. (2008). ACS Accreditation: What’s in the name? Proceedings of the EDU-COM 2008, November 19-21, 2008, Khon Kaen, Thailand, 464-473.

 

Research grants

Grace has been involved in several grants for projects on teaching and learning innovations in ICT including:

  • DEEWR Short Term Mobility Grant “Information Technology and Society: an Exchange of Australian and Chinese Perspectives”
  • Australian Council of Deans of ICT Learning and Teaching Grant “Shaping the future ICT professionals: Where novice meets expert and theory meets practice”
  • Victoria University Teaching and Learning Studies Grant “Computing for Science”
  • Victoria University Teaching and Learning Studies Grant “IT for Settlement”
  • Victoria University Teaching and Learning Studies Grant “Befriending computer programming: promoting success among first year Computer Science students”
  • DEST Higher Education Equity Project Grant “Engendering equity: fostering Computer Science success among female students

Professional experience

 

Appearances in the media