On markets and mediaeval studies
On a cloudy autumnal Melbourne morning in a Grattan Street coffee haunt, two academic leaders quietly enjoyed coffee between snatches of conversation. Vice-Chancellor, Professor Glyn Davis, and Dean of Arts, Professor Stuart Mcintyre, were exchanging views on a range of issues - beginning with the relationship of the University with its alumni and other stakeholders.
SM: One of the things that I’ve wanted to do is to build relations with all the natural constituents of the Arts Faculty, including the State Library, Museum Victoria, the National Gallery of Victoria. From my time on the Board of the State Library Council, I’m conscious that this area is just calling out to us to do more.
GD: That’s great. I am sure we could do more. At Yale I gather they have a graduates’ weekend. They do it on a faculty basis and senior professors give lectures in their area of interest, pitched at a broader audience, followed by a dinner. People come and spend the weekend or they just drop in. But it shows that they want to keep up with their faculty.
The graduation experience
SM: The other area where we need to improve is graduations.
GD : Yes, the University has a working party looking at different ways of doing graduations. For instance, with the Harvard model you have a major ceremony, after which you go to your faculty for an address by the Dean and afternoon tea. All of the faculty staff turn up, and the graduates’ families are there.
SM: I agree that the teachers should be there. Part of the difficulty here is that our primary relationships are no longer with undergraduates but with postgraduates. Staff will almost invariably attend postgraduate graduations.
GD: Yes, ‘my student is graduating’. But the other problem is timing. Universities that do well in graduations are those that hold their graduations on weekends, at the end of the year, or mid-year to pick up students completing mid-year. Harvard graduations are held outdoors in June. The deal is, if it rains, it rains. The tradition is that it never rains on graduation day.
The Arts degree and marketing
SM: There’s a need to re-think what first-year students do and to avoid departments creating special subjects designed to gain market share in a competitive environment. Some departments stick to the very admirable practice of ‘Criminology 1’ but that is taking a bit of a risk, and there are some departments that make the understandable argument that they are running interdepartmental studies in, say, mediaeval studies and therefore ‘History 1’ needs to be several histories. We need some stronger generic requirements for what all first-year subjects should be covering.
GD: There’s the Columbia University way. That is a shared first year – with a core curriculum covering literature, philosophy, history, science, and social and political theory, fine arts and music.
SM: Every seven or eight years the Faculty says we ought to explore the idea of a shared first year. There is agreement on that, but then immediate disagreement on what the curriculum should be. We’re about to review first year. There are too many subjects.
Higher education and its future after the Commonwealth Government’s recent reforms
SM: Given the rapid differentiation of the sector beyond even the control of any minister, I get concerned about the implications of differentiation for student choice. It places particular disciplines under strain, and paradoxically, the multilplicity of choice often begins to narrow options.
In a sense, universities are a good example of Australian federalism: no matter where a child is born they should have the opportunity to study fine arts or medicine. My concern would be that an arts degree is no longer something that, as for an earlier generation, was a liberal education that led many people from different backgrounds to many different destinations.
GD: That is showing through in the student profile, which suggests there has been a significant shift.
SM: The shift is most pronounced at universities which were set up with a particular emphasis on humanities and social sciences. These universities were quite transformative for people who were the first in their family to attend university, introducing them to a world of possibilities.
Pressures on the idea of a university
GD: The argument that HECS has had no effect is very hard to disentangle from the question, ‘would this shift have happened anyway’ or ‘would the fact that people build up debt result in more risk-averse choices’. The spectacular growth of commerce as a choice from a generation that previously would have contemplated arts is, I think, the most obvious example of that.
Whether that reflects the changes in our society because people are more attuned to their interests in business or whether that reflects risk-averse behaviour by people who know they will be walking out with debts, it’s very hard to disaggregate. But does that mean you then allow student preferences to broadly shape the institution?
SM: It’s very hard not to, isn’t it?
GD: In one sense it happens because that’s where they come into the university. If you did it conclusively, you’d start closing down areas of study and that runs against the notion that most of us have of what a university is and what it is for.
To some extent, the university is for preserving knowledge which is an honourable function, and quite different from teaching students who want to grow up to make money.
SM: It is becoming very difficult – even in the United Kingdom – to get the next generation of economists, who are now doing coursework masters and going into the city to work, to do a PhD. The number is continuing to decline. What’s making it difficult is that these students think of themselves as customers making an investment in a long-term product.
GD: That thinking shapes human behaviour in every other market. So if that’s how students view higher education, there is no reason why it wouldn’t happen at universities!
The Consequences of the Commonwealth Government's VSU legislation
GD: The University Council has firmly opposed the planned VSU legislation. The $12.7 million Amenities and Services Fee that it will prevent the University collecting will undermine so many services and facilities for students.
SM: Yes, students don’t come to university just for the courses. They want to be at a campus where interesting things happen, where there is a life beyond the classroom and encouragement to actively participate in university life.
GD: I think the consequences will affect not just this University, but the nation. Universities have been traditional training grounds in the political process. A prime minister, Sir Robert Menzies, and a foreign minister, Dr Gareth Evans, both led the student council at Melbourne and presumably learned a lot about politics and public life along the way.
Student Choice - and who makes it
SM: Humanities at Melbourne is starting to become a prestigious form of differentiation as opposed to a way of opening up people’s lives.
GD: I sense we then have to resist the temptation to try and sell the humanities on pragmatic grounds. For instance on the basis that ‘you’ll get a job in publishing or some such. All of which is true, but it should not be the compelling reason.
We need to find ways to encourage high school students to make their own choices.
SM: Or even to communicate to them that they are not making a lifetime choice and that they really ought to be thinking about the opportunities for the flexibility they’ll need for the future.
<< Previous: On the ground in Sri Lanka | Next: Eating ethically >>
