The Universities and ‘Education’
• Where are we?• How did we get to be
where we are?• Where might we/
should we be?
ESRC Demographic Review of the Social Sciences
‘Education is the second largest discipline under consideration and perhaps one of the most complex. Structural, historical
and institutional factors affect all disciplines in different ways but in
Education their impact has been quite profound’
ESRC Demographic Review of the Social Sciences
‘Education is the second largest discipline under consideration and perhaps one of the most complex. Structural, historical
and institutional factors affect all disciplines in different ways but in
Education their impact has been quite profound’
To begin…
• What’s a university anyway?
• The ‘idea’ of a university
• The contested nature of knowledge
The universities and ‘Education’ – a fragile relationship
Individuals and institutions
Where are we now?
People
PeoplePeopleA story of second careersA story of second careers
People People People People People People People People People People PeoplePeople People People People People People People People People People People
Education – one of the largest social sciences
Demography of UDEs
Demography
Demography
Demography DemographyDemographyDemographyDemographyDemographyDemographyDemographyDemographyDemography
Demography
DemographyDemographyDemographyDemographyDemography
Age
Permanent academic staff by subject andproportion aged 50 or over
Year Total % over 501995-6 2894 35%2000-1 3214 48%2003-4 3545 50%
‘Education is the subject area with the largest proportion of staff aged 50 and over (50 per cent)’ ESRC 2006
Gender
Permanent academic staff by subject and sex
Year Total %Female
1995-6 2894 46%
2000-1 3214 48%
2003-4 3545 56%
Education has one of the highest proportions of female academics
Salary
2003/4
Median salary £35,370
% greater than £50,000 4%
Education [with the exception of creative arts] has the lowest proportion of staff on high salaries
Nationality/ethnicity
2003/4
• Non-UK nationals 4%Education has the lowest proportion – nearly every other subject is in the mid teens
• Non white 4%Education has the lowest proportion of non-white academics
Where do educational researchers come from?
Where do educational researchers come from?
Where do educational researchers come from?
Where do educationalists come from?
Shorter academic careers
0.00
5.00
10.00
15.00
20.00
25.00
30.00
35.00
40.00
18-27 28-37 38-47 48-57 58+
Approximate age started as a researcher
Perc
enta
ge o
f res
pond
ents
‘Many academic staff are on their ‘second career ’ making the switch from the teaching profession mid career’
ESRC (2006)
%age of academic and research staff with PhDs
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
Education Psychology
Source HESA 2005/6
Import and export patterns within the social sciences. Field of academic training (JACS) by fields of current employment (UoA) (HESA
2004/5)
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
Academic studies in education
Training teachers
Finance
Management studies
Business studies
Human & social geography
Anthropology
Social work
Social policy
Sociology
Politics
Economics
Planning (urban, rural & regional)
Physical geography
Psychology
Importers and exporters
Institutions: worlds of difference
100 university education departments in England
The pre 1992 Sector• The research elite• The research
insecure
The post 1992 Sector• Ex-polytechnics• Ex-teachers’ colleges
– New entrepreneurs– Teaching only
universities
Different institutional trajectoriesDifferent ‘lived realities’ for staff and students
Teaching
Where are we now?
What do we teach?The pressure of instrumentalism?
Core teaching• BEd• PGCE• CPD
Additional teaching• Ed Psych, TEFL,
MSc, EdDs, PhDs
TDA insist on a market of ‘multiple providers’
TDA defines• Course structure• Course content – standards and
competences• Course inspection – Ofsted• Course/institution league tables
HE has no ‘essential’ contribution
cf Europe
Teaching - the balance sheet in our main market – teacher education
Strengths
• Ofsted• Students• Recruitment
Weaknesses: The pressure of instrumentalilsm
• On theory• On research • On topics – an over emphasis
on schools and classrooms• On staffing
– Who is recruited– Staff development
ResearchWhere are we now?
ESRC Demographic Review
‘There is much to be done to increase research capacity in such a large discipline, and no quick-fix solutions. Education, more so than all other disciplines, is vulnerable to changes in policy legislations, affecting schools and Higher Education alike.’ (p45)
FundingFunding Funding Funding Funding Funding Funding Funding
Total funding: £70-75 million
• Three times more likely to be funded by government than by research councils
• Less likely to receive funds from industry and EU
• Very good chance of receiving charities funding
Where does the money go?A highly differentiated system
While there are at least 100 separate institutions conducting educational research, 80 per cent of the funding from government, charities and Research Councils goes to 22 institutions (OECD)
A mid range of institutions (graded 4 or below in 2001)… with a substantial community of research active staff… are finding it virtually impossible to attract significant funding for research’ (ESRC)
Where does the money go?A highly differentiated system
While there are at least 100 separate institutions conducting educational research, 80 per cent of the funding from government, charities and Research Councils goes to 22 institutions (OECD)
A mid range of institutions (graded 4 or below in 2001)… with a substantial community of research active staff… are finding it virtually impossible to attract significant funding for research’ (ESRC)
Where does the money go?A highly differentiated system
While there are at least 100 separate institutions conducting educational research, 80 per cent of the funding from government, charities and Research Councils goes to 22 institutions (OECD)
A mid range of institutions (graded 4 or below in 2001)… with a substantial community of research active staff… are finding it virtually impossible to attract significant funding for research’ (ESRC)
1996-2005 ESRC Awards
1.London IOE2. Bristol3. Oxford4. Exeter5. Edinburgh6. London KCL7. Sussex8. Bath9. Cardiff10.Lancaster
Awards graded by income
What is good educational research?
Differentiated in relation to:• Methodology – from RCTs to
action research• Theory – from atheoretical
positivism to post modernism• Purposes
– policy– applied and practice based work– blue skies
Vulnerable to:
• critique • fashion and • government
intervention
Education: a field not a discipline
Research – the balance sheet
Strengths• Examples of
– excellent academic work– excellent policy work
• Established institutions with profile as good as many social sciences
• TLRP – largest ESRC programme ever
• 11/17th success rate in ESRC funding
• Good profile internationally from ISI data
• 1400 academics in grade 4 or above departments
Weaknesses• Success in relation to size• The recruitment base• Training opportunities• Quality of some work• Limited methodologies• Major emphasis on schools
and classrooms• Questions not asked• Growing separation from
other disciplines
Who is missing?Think tanks
Who is missing? Consultancy companies
Why are we where we are?
Higher education and ‘global marketisation’
‘As higher education and science became increasingly important instruments of national economic policy… the relationships between higher education and the state were redefined. Higher education institutions and their members were subject to unprecedented government steerage and scrutiny but also had to locate themselves and compete in various forms of market’ (Henkel 2005)
The neo-liberal university
Coming together of
human
capital theory
+
economic rationalism
‘Driving these changes is a redefined internal economy in which under-funding drives a ‘pseudo-market’ in fee incomes, soft budget allocations for special purposes and contested earnings for new enrolments and research grants’
Neo-liberal research policy
1. Massification of Higher Education
– insufficient funding– government not convinced
that research is essential for Higher Education teaching
– RAE – 20 years of progressive differentiation
– 2006 – the first ‘teaching only’ universities appear
2. Harnessing research for global competitiveness
– The ‘new social contract’ for research
– More money – Government defined issues
and methodologies– Increased accountability
3. Mode 2 knowledge production – research carried out ‘in the
context of application’ should become the norm
Higher education funding paradox
‘The paradox of this new openness to outside funding and competition is a process of ‘isomorphic closure’ through which universities with diverse histories choose from an increasingly restricted menu of commercial options and strategies’ (Marginson, 2007)
Alternative markets provide positional advantage
• Non ITT undergraduate teaching
• The international post-graduate market
But• TDA remains
the dominant
market
Universities become vulnerable to a highly
assertive government
Teaching and the new professionalism
• Schools too are now part of the national drive for international competitiveness
• And competitive institutions in a quasi-market
• Schooling is now too important to be left to individual teachers or educationalists
• The collapse of confidence in individual professionalism – from the Conservatives to new Labour
Michael Apple ‘The move towards a small strong state that is increasingly guided by market needs seems inevitably to bring with it reduced professional power and status’
Marilyn Cochran Smith
• The ‘ends’ question – debates about the purposes of teaching and learning in school is closed
• In contrast, at the heart of teacher education from a more critical perspective is continuous problematizing of the ends question:
Many people, myself included, have argued for years that good teacher education focuses on an expansive rather than narrow notion of practice.
Where Education should/might be?
‘Re-tooling’ Education
‘Re-tooling’ Professional Education
Rebuilding from belowLearning for an uncertain world
– Technology– Knowledge– Society – mobility, values,
conflictMore than ever before, we need to educate young people to think critically about knowledge and about values, to recognise differences in interpretation, to develop the skills needed to form their own judgments in a rapidly changing world
The implications for professional education
• If those who teach are to be ‘critical educators’ then part of their own professional education must be based on the same approach to teaching and learning.
• We also need high quality practical training relevant to institutional and national need.
• The University is a key contributor but not as before. Complementary partnerships with schools as institutions are essential.
• This will be highly challenging to schools and to universities.
Implications for universities
• We must maintain our commitment to ‘the contestability of knowledge’ in all our teaching.
That means:• Every lecturer must be a participant in a
‘scholarly culture’ – able to contribute to the ‘conversations at the forefront of their discipline’.
• Personal research as ONE key strategy for maintaining a ‘scholarly culture’.
‘Re-tooling’ for new forms of knowledge production
• Knowledge transfer as an essential part of university life
• Growing numbers of institutions, including educational institutions, that can and do manage without us
• The development of new Web 2.00 and social media is pushing this process forward at a dramatic rate
• What universities have to offer• Education as a field has not
responded well – apart from action research
• A not-for-profit organisation, we work in partnership with others to:
• incubate new ideas, taking them from the lab to the classroom
• share hard evidence and practical advice to support the design and use of innovative learning tools
• communicate the latest thinking and practice in educational ICT
• provide the space for experimentation and the exchange of ideas between the creative, technology and education sectors.
• Partners• Futurelab is a consortium
comprising some of the top players in the software, hardware and creative industries. Our partnerships are diverse: we work with individuals and large corporations, practising teachers and Government bodies, academics and venture capitalists.
• Policy - details about our key strategic partnerships
• Industry - a list of all our industry members and project partners
• Education research - our academic project partners
• Education practice - a list of all the schools involved with our R&D work
‘Re-tooling’ for researchWe need:
HODs insisting that:• All programmes
demonstrate a commitment to ‘the contestability of knowledge’
• Research is essential for higher education teaching
As a community • to get better at doing
research – across the full range of methods now demanded
Well resourced, privileged institutions:
• To take responsibility for the future of the foundation disciplines
• In return, those in the disciplines to maintain their commitment to the field of
education
To broaden our research agenda
• Getting better at collaborations
Broadening our research agenda
Social change
Religion
The economy
PovertyGlobal warming
Social equality
Finally
We must not lose sight of what we are and what we are not...
Two things follow:
1. For good interdisciplinary work to take place …
2. Our job … teaching, research and scholarship that puts the contestability of knowledge at its heart.
This is our truth and we need to remain true to it in all that we do.
Putting the U back in UCET
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