Foundations/Leadership Core Lead

ABOUT ALU

ALU provides higher education for a higher purpose. Our students declare missions, not majors.
They develop the real-world skills to take on the world’s most pressing challenges. And they take ownership of their learning from day one through our peer and student-led approach – because ALU believes in the power and agency of young people to start shaping the future right now.
Together with a world-class faculty and staff, our students are igniting a ripple of positive impact across Africa and the world.

HOW WE WORK

As a high-growth start-up, the ALU Team works in starkly different ways to traditional academic bureaucracies. We approach education from first principles, empower individuals to design, test, and implement creative new ideas, and work closely together to craft transformative learning experiences. We are deeply passionate about our students and excited by the challenge of building something entirely new.

The African Leadership University is committed to ensuring the safety and Well-being of all students under our care. As part of this commitment , we have a comprehensive safeguarding policy in place , which outlines our Zero-tolerance approach to any violation of safeguarding.

ABOUT THE ROLE

The Foundation/Leadership Core Lead is responsible for contributing to the design, delivery, coordination, quality assurance, and continuous improvement of the Foundation/Leadership Core learning experience. The role focuses particularly on Term 1 courses, including Learning Processes, Reflective Thinking, Leading Self, and Leading Others. The Lead will ensure that these courses are delivered in alignment with ALU’s Learning Model, internal and external quality assurance standards, and the broader objective of supporting students’ transition into rigorous, reflective, self-directed, and leadership-oriented learning. 

Responsibilities 

• Contribute to the design, revision, and delivery of the Foundation/Leadership Core learning experience, with a specific focus on Term 1 courses: Learning Processes, Reflective Thinking, Leading Self, and Leading Others.
• Support the development and implementation of academic orientation, induction, and student transition activities that prepare incoming students for ALU’s learning model, academic expectations, in-person learning culture, reflective practice, and self-directed learning.
• Manage and support a team of Foundation/Leadership Core faculty responsible for course delivery, academic coaching, student engagement, and academic support.
• Lead the induction, onboarding, and re-induction of new and existing faculty to ensure consistency in course delivery, facilitation standards, student support practices, assessment expectations, and use of ALU learning systems.
• Review, validate, and refine the Foundation/Leadership Core curriculum, ensuring that Learning Processes, Reflective Thinking, Leading Self, and Leading Others remain coherent, relevant, rigorous, and aligned with programme learning outcomes.
• Participate in trimester planning and operational coordination to ensure effective delivery of all Foundation/Leadership Core courses, including lesson sequencing, faculty allocation, classroom delivery, assessment timelines, feedback cycles, and student support structures.
• Ensure that all courses are delivered through high-quality in-person facilitation, while making effective use of online platforms, Canvas or other learning management systems, and digital tools to support communication, resources, assessment, feedback, and student engagement.
• Support faculty to manage diverse student learning needs in both physical and online learning environments, including classroom participation, academic progress, attendance, engagement, reflective learning, and responsible use of digital learning tools.
• Audit and refine experiential, reflective, peer-learning, and self-directed learning components across the Foundation/Leadership Core, ensuring that students are supported
  to connect learning to personal development, leadership practice, academic growth, and real-world contexts.
• Organise and coordinate academic and co-curricular learning activities, including live sessions, peer learning engagements, reflective practice activities, group learning experiences, and other student engagement initiatives that strengthen the in-person
• Participate in student-staff consultative group meetings, course evaluations, pulse surveys, and other feedback mechanisms to capture student experience and implement recommendations for improving course delivery.
• Work with relevant academic leaders to review and approve course modifications, learning materials, assessments, rubrics, and delivery plans, whether developed internally or in collaboration with external learning content partners.
• Engage with faculty development and performance management processes, including coaching, peer observation, feedback, workload planning, delivery reviews, and support for continuous improvement.

Requirements 

Essential 

• Master's degree in a field relevant to the course with at least 3 years of experience
• Subject matter expertise and minimum 2 years of experience in education (teaching and/or training)
• Experience designing experiential learning activities that promote peer learning
• Experience guiding student undergraduate projects
• Excellent coaching skills with the ability to support students in both remote and in-person learning environments
• Excellent English communication (oral and written), interpersonal and presentation skills.
• Excellent problem-solving skills with attention to detail.
• Excellent time management skills with the ability to multitask, prioritise own work, and work independently.
• The ability to quickly analyse data and determine the appropriate academic support intervention required by the student or to redirect to other teams.
• A startup mindset to help us scale the programme to the order of thousands of students in the next 12 months.
• A strong customer-service ethos
• An ability to work flexibly with remote team members

Desirable 

• Experience in programme management and leadership at a higher education institution
• Experience in people management - managing a fast-growing team
• Experience in online teaching and learning delivery at challenger universities.
• Experience teaching at the higher education level.