HEA Teaching and Learning Impact Awards Celebrate Excellence in Higher Education

Posted: 26 March, 2026

The Higher Education Authority (HEA) today hosted the Teaching and Learning Impact Awards event, recognising excellence and impact in teaching and learning across higher education in Ireland.

The event brought together the Disciplinary Excellence in Learning, Teaching and Assessment (DELTA) Awards and the Strategic Alignment of Teaching and Learning Enhancement (SATLE) Impact Awards to acknowledge thirteen teams and projects, announced during 2025 and early 2026, making a significant contribution to learning, teaching and assessment across the sector.

At the event, the HEA formally announced two new DELTA Award recipients including the Section of Midwifery, Department of Nursing, Midwifery and Early Years, School of Health and Science at Dundalk Institute of Technology and the Department of Anatomy and Neuroscience at University College Cork.

The DELTA Award recognises discipline-based teams that demonstrate sustained excellence and impact in learning, teaching and assessment. The new recipients join a national group of DELTA Award holders whose work supports student learning, collaboration and enhancement within and across disciplines.

The event also recognised the recipients of the 2025 SATLE Impact Awards. These awards recognise initiatives supported under the SATLE fund that have demonstrated significant impact, including in areas such as academic integrity, digital transformation, education for sustainable development and interdisciplinary practice.

Speaking at the event, Tim Conlon, Head of Policy and Strategic Planning, HEA said: “These awards recognise the work being carried out across higher education to enhance teaching and learning and the student experience. The creativity, commitment and collaboration shown by this year’s recipients demonstrate the impact that evidence-informed practice can have across institutions and disciplines.”

The HEA congratulates all recipients and will continue to support and highlight excellence in teaching and learning across higher education in Ireland.

The next call for DELTA Award applications is currently open, with a closing date of 1 July 2026.

The full list of award recipients is set out below.

DELTA Award

• Department of Anatomy and Neuroscience, University College Cork
• REEdI (Rethinking Engineering Education in Ireland), Munster Technological University
• Hincks Centre for Entrepreneurship Excellence, School of Business, Munster Technological University
• Department of Marketing and International Business, Munster Technological University
• Tourism and Hospitality Department, Munster Technological University
• School of Food Science and Environmental Health, Technological University Dublin
• Section of Midwifery, Department of Nursing, Midwifery and Early Years, School of Health and Science, Dundalk Institute of Technology

SATLE Impact Awards

• Promoting a Culture of Academic Integrity in Unsupervised Assessment through Co-Design of Instructional Tools, Academic Integrity, University College Dublin
• FAIR Game – A Student-Created Academic Integrity Game, University College Dublin
• Digitally Enhanced Practical Teaching in Health Sciences (DEPHT), Trinity College Dublin
• Embedding Education for Sustainable Development across the Disciplines at Trinity, Trinity College Dublin
• SustainF1 TUS – Design and Manufacturing of a Formula Student Race Car Using Recyclable Materials and In-House Technology Through Collaboration Between Multidisciplinary Academic Staff and Student Teams, Technological University of the Shannon
• FACCtS – Enhancing the Data Literacy and Analytics Learning Experiences of 1st and 2nd year university students, Dublin City University