What is excellence in teaching? Is excellence in teaching simply facilitating students to achieve learning outcomes through innovative teaching or to enhance student learning experiences? Can the achievement of teaching and learning outcomes, adoption of learner-centred approaches, leadership in curriculum development, innovation in teaching as well as development of effective teaching practice and assessment method for learning be considered as excellence in teaching? The speaker has a somewhat different view on excellence in teaching. He has developed the 7-MUST teaching approach, which he has successfully applied for many years at universities in Hong Kong, Singapore and Sydney. This teaching approach has been enthusiastically received by the students. Furthermore, it is a great challenge to teach large class of students. Conventional face-to-face lectures in large classes require special teaching skills. The speaker will also share his experiences on large class teaching of over 300 students. Pertinent issues on the outcome-based approach to student learning (OBASL) will be discussed. Finally, the speaker will share his view on future challenges to the higher education system in Hong Kong.

Dr Ben Young is currently a Professor of structural engineering in the Department of Civil Engineering, The University of Hong Kong (HKU). He is also the Deputy Department Head, Assistant Dean of the Graduate School and Warden of Suen Chi Sun Hall, HKU. He received the BSc, BEng and PhD degrees from the University of Sydney in 1991, 1993 and 1998, respectively. In his three years of teaching at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), he received the Teaching Excellence Appreciation Award in 2002, the Bechtel Foundation Engineering Teaching Excellence Award on 2003, and the Michael G. Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching Award in 2004 that awarded to only one teaching staff every year. After joining HKU in 2005, Professor Young received the Best Teacher Award in 2006, the Outstanding Young Researcher Award in 2006 and the Outstanding Teaching Award in 2008.

Professor Young was one of the code writers for the "Hong Kong Code of Practice for the Structural Use of Steel" for the Buildings Department, Hong Kong Government. He is a committee member of SEI/ASCE-8 Specification for the "Design of Cold-formed Stainless Steel Structural Members", American Society of Civil Engineers. Professor Young is currently a member of nine editorial boards, such as the Journal of Constructional Steel Research, Journal of Thin-Walled Structures, Journal of Advanced Steel Construction, Journal of ICE Structures and Buildings and so on. His research interests include cold-formed steel structures, testing and design of steel structures, stainless steel structures, aluminum structures, structural stability, fire resistance of metal structures and engineering education. He has published over 240 International journal and conference papers of which over 100 journal papers are indexed by SCI.