This week on the podcast the government is to consult on “minimum service levels” during industrial action at universities. What could happen next?
Plus Michelle Donelan is kicking “woke ideology” out of science, immigration and international students were the talk of the Conservative Party Conference fringe, and there’s new findings on student views of engagement analytics.
With Julian Gravatt, Deputy Chief Executive at Association of Colleges, Elise Page, Postgraduate Officer at University of East Anglia Students’ Union, James Coe, Associate Editor at Wonkhe, Mike Ratcliffe, Academic Registrar at City, University of London and presented by Jim Dickinson, Associate Editor at Wonkhe.
Read more:
- Jim Dickinson has been on the fringe of Conservative Party Conference – and detects a shift in the debate over international students and housing.
- Abuses in the international education system are causing a crackdown.
- The Research England executive chair announces details of the new Regional Innovation Fund, and celebrates her first year in office.
- Students have views on how learning engagement data should be collected, analysed and used. Michelle Craig and Debbie McVitty share findings of new research from Wonkhe and Solutionpath.
- Gillian Keegan announces “minimum service levels” in universities.
@13:07 I really love the dismissive, mocking tone of how this ‘wedge issue’ is introduced by the host. It is so illustrative of our sector where a considerable number of humanities academics (mostly in Identity Studies) terrified of becoming irrelevant and eventually unemployed. As Gen Z and beyond wake up to the fact that so many ‘woke’ studies are also irrelevant and not really conducive to a sustainable, decently well paid career. Pass the Starbucks application form… But yes, I agree the Tories’ tone is shrill and grating.
@16:36: “You can’t take Ideology out of science..” What qualifies this person to be a panellist on this podcast? I am curious on her scientific field of study. Everyone knows we ‘must’ take ideology out of science… for it to be ‘science’. Her’s reminds me of a certain mid-20th century position on ideology, science, and and racial purity…. Not very Wonkhe methinks.
No wonder the kids laugh at us as they shirk their lectures for yet another protest where they can smoke grass and flirt. The editors should invite a biologist to discuss these matters, but that would be inconvenient and ‘problematic’… Thanks for discrediting the sector Wonkhe!!
I remember the Uni where I worked tried to set up a cloud based IT system to track student attendance figures to better understand the patterns that cause students to drop out. I remember this didn;t get broad approval as it was seens as ‘intrusive’ and ‘judgemental’.
The fact that we as educators must bend over backwards to spoon feed young adults on life skills that only 20 years ago were par the course for any university student is lamentable. Was it Martin Amis that said “University used to be the first years of adulthood… now it is the final years of childhood”…?
@33:10 The female sounding person states that “Students are time poor”…. I agree … if they are holding 2 or 3 McJobs to pay their fees or hungover now and again (I was one of the latter!) … in which case it is the students decision to remain Students… not ours.
If the path they take is one of study, then they shouldn’t be time poor.
Treating young adults as children is yet another example of the overreach of administrators’ duties and this is what happens when HE employees lobby for more and more job creation, at the expense of the ‘cash cows’ (viz the UK but mostly overseas students) that keep our mortgages paid and fund our pots of organic Waitrose hummus ….
Earlier in the podcast this person insinuates that we should be ever more lenient on students that fail (@10:40 … “Education is not about assessments…”) but how is this fair to students that work hard and have the impulse control to study and show up for exams?
Seriously, this conversation really demonstrates how we make an target the conservatives and the ‘anti academics’ to jeer and mock us in academia. This also explains the grade inflation argument that is so beloved of the Right…. with panelists like this, we certainly don’t need enemies!
Corrections (caps) on my above post (I can’t edit my post):
1) Was it KINGSLEY Amis that said “University used to be the first years of adulthood… now it is the final years of childhood”…?
2) Seriously, this conversation really demonstrates how we make an EASY target OF OURSELFVES FOR conservatives and ‘anti academics’ to jeer and mock us in academia.
Thank you.