PLENTY OF BLAME TO SPREAD AROUND:

Losing our common wealth of knowledge (PROFESSOR JOHN HALDANE, 2/16/05, The Scotsman)

EDUCATION has long been regarded as a strength of the Scottish nation, but recent trends raise the question of whether we might have squandered our inheritance. That possibility is suggested by Lindsay Paterson, professor of educational policy at the University of Edinburgh.

Having hitherto celebrated the character of Scottish education, he has now turned to challenge it, complaining that Scots have "stopped thinking about what real learning is" and may be changing the function of universities to a point where "they are not worth having".

With parliament re-established in Edinburgh one might dismiss such criticism as untimely disloyalty. Yet precisely because Scotland cherishes an ideal of national commitment to educational excellence - and because it is now in a strong position to promote that ideal - it is important to consider whether he is right. [...]

Along with centralising political trends, and a concern in the 1960s to spread the benefits of higher education more widely, this led to an increasingly uniform UK system. Some differences remained north and south of the Border but by comparison with the growing similarities they meant less and survived like the exterior of a building whose inner structure has been transformed.

Then came the accelerated expansion of higher education, pulling ever-greater numbers into colleges and universities, including ill-qualified entrants. Even had resources been increased to match the enlargement, there would have been the difficulty of adapting teaching and study to the circumstances of those with limited or forgotten academic training. But the funding fell behind and, inevitably, the quality of education was impoverished.

To admit that would have been heard as a confession of failure; to have linked it to the fitness for study of some of the enlarged intake would have incurred the old charge of elitism. Instead, many institutions developed new courses, changed styles of assessment and adjusted standards of expected performance, to better "manage" the new situation. Failure is a word now rarely heard in higher education.

Individuals, departments, institutions and the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council made real efforts to adapt teaching to the new circumstances. But it is one thing to be in the company of an experienced scholarly or scientific mind, quite another to be downloading course notes and re-expressing them for the benefit of graduate tutors working to fund their own studies.

Teaching underwent a qualitative change, becoming more standardised with short modules replacing extended courses of study, areas of a subject being turned into self-contained packages with abbreviated summaries, and small group tutorials being replaced by large seminars. Meanwhile, academics were required to justify their employment mainly through ongoing, assessable research. Since this became a main source of institutional income - and thereby a route to promotion - a further force began to prise academics apart from undergraduates.

By stages we have arrived at policies which Paterson can reasonably describe as "diluting seriousness, by fragmenting difficult programmes of study into modularised segments, and by trying to divert students into intellectually undemanding courses of ostensible vocational relevance". The last point is ironic, since it was the boast of traditional Scottish higher education that it fitted students for any calling by training them in the use of the "intellectual and active powers". By sharpening observation, discrimination and judgment and by developing responsibility, the sense of duty and the ideal of worthy achievement equipped young adults for any form of employment in which intelligence and character are the primary qualifications.

The advocates of specialised vocational degrees risk building structures without foundations; and outside some areas of science and technology it is not even what employers want. They would far rather have a well-formed general intelligence with a developed sense of responsibility, which could then be trained in the specifics of tomorrow’s job, than have someone lacking in settled knowledge but trained in the specifics of yesterday.

That last is a dubious proposition. Industries, professions and other employers have certainly fed the increasing specialization of education.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 18, 2005 11:36 PM