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Fight the cuts to NB education: sign the petition
Not to defend P-3s — at all — but the following sentiment still gives one pause:
“The people of New Brunswick don’t need Cadillacs,” one official told [Jamal] Instrum [CEO of Atlantic Medical Imaging Services Inc. (AMIS)]. “A Chev is good enough for us.”
From “A picture of health: Rejected Did ‘big politics’ kill P3 plan to use latest medical imaging technology?” Chris Morris, Telegraph-Journal (July 2/09, A1).
David Campbell would seem to be making the argument, by implication if not directly, that the business sector ought to worry about its own development and leave education to the educators:
For too long New Brunswick has been the labour market incubator for Ontario and other “have” provinces in Canada. Many of our most talented people leave the region not long after graduation.
If we focus on strengthening our learning environment and ignore our economic development, we will just be ramping up our investment in Ontario’s future labour needs.
University World News has published a Special Edition:
The UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge was established in 2001, to follow up the outcomes of two major UNESCO world conferences – the 1998 World Conference on Higher Education, and the 1999 World Conference on Science. The Forum provides a global platform for critical engagement with research issues and findings, and its mandate is to help chart, analyse and widen understanding of the systems, structures, policies, trends and developments in higher education, research and innovation.
At the conclusion of the first phase of activities in 2009, the UNESCO Forum published a Research Report, Systems of Higher Education, Research and Innovation: Changing dynamics, edited by Lynn Meek, Ulrich Teichler and Mary-Louise Kearney. The report takes stock of the numerous and rapid changes of the past decade, identifies new dynamics and trends in global knowledge systems, and synthesises the Forum’s main findings. In this Special Edition, University World News reports on a decade of the Forum’s work as encapsulated in the just-published Research Report.
A taste: in “Funding and resources: Doing more for less,” Lynn Meek and Dianne Davies outline the dangers to the university mission from declines in public funding.
Several days ago, I was considering the options in the poll (”strategic plans ‘r’ us,” appearing just to the right here this past week) regarding what model we might use to “renew” UNB. Hmmm. Given the range of options presented, my contemplations were focussed on such penetrating questions as: “Would it be best to emulate ‘the real thing’ that was once Coca Cola or go for the entertainment appeal of Clown Arts?” I hummed, I hawed, and I felt, well, uninspired, and just couldn’t decide. So I went to bed, resolving to continue my deliberations after a good night’s sleep. But that plan was not to be realized. Sometime after midnight, I awoke in a cold sweat with the image of “CDU” fresh in my mind. Yup, Consumers’ Distributing University, where the front counter part-time faculty service representatives distribute pre-packaged curricular items purchased wholesale from the education industry to student consumers and credit the appropriate points to their CDU degree cards. “Oooo,” I shuddered, “these can’t be our only options!” Hours later, exhausted by my shudders, I was in the process of drifting back into some sort of sleep when I thought I heard a voice say, “well, how about a renewal model based on reclaiming higher education as a public good…for all?” Just dreaming? The folks forging ahead with the “New University Cooperative” don’t think so. Now, however you might assess the merits of that particular initiative, you have to admit it does go to show that our inspiration for university renewal need not be restricted to the likes of CDU.
See “Three Strikes and You’re Fired: When the punishment for factual inaccuracy doesn’t fit the crime,” Craig Silverman, Columbia Journalism Review (June 26/09). It would seem that this story has resonance well beyond the local issues.
[Thanks to Rob for the link.]
a series of meetings last week between government officials and the editorial board of the Telegraph-Journal. Several stories came out of these meetings, one of which concerns UNB in particular: “Money main factor in centre location, Keir says,” Quentin Casey, Telegraph-Journal (June 26/09). Passing over the Minister’s shaky grasp of history — the fear of the Saint John campus being closed “was absolutely, positively the farthest thing from the truth”? — and his lacklustre defense of the integrity of either campus — he said he’d “love to” “pick up the Grandview Avenue community college and plunk it out there” at Tucker Park — he does seem fairly clear that even though the reason is mainly budgetary, wholesale co-location of NBCCSJ and UNBSJ is not going to happen.
So another round of “Bravo! Stay the course, Minister!”
And let’s all hope the T-J finds something else on which to focus.
According to Wikipedia, “In the ancient world many sites gained a reputation for the dispensing of oracular wisdom….”
It would appear that UNB (among others) is about to become such a site: “The world’s largest business software company, Oracle, will be providing the Oracle Academy advanced computer science program at New Brunswick universities and community colleges, post-secondary education, training, and Labour Minister Donald Arseneault announced today…” (read more).
So whaddayathink of that? And who knew that there are vice-presidential jobs out there in citizenship? (Oh, make that “corporate citizenship.”)
I heard on the radio this morning that, to be effective, vaccinations require booster shots. So here’s a booster from Giroux:
Turning higher education into the handmaiden of corporate culture works against the critical social imperative of educating citizens who can sustain and develop inclusive democratic public spheres. Lost in the merging of corporate culture and higher education is a historic and honourable democratic tradition…that extols the importance of education as essential for a vibrant democracy. Education within this democratic tradition integrated individual autonomy with the principles of social responsibility. Moreover, it cast a critical eye on the worst temptations of profit-making and market-driven values. (The University in Chains, 2007, p. 116)
Okay, I have to confess that, for a buzzword, “synergy” holds a certain attraction for me. It sounds so positive, progressive, potent — don’t you just feel an urge to cry out, “Bring it on! Synergize me!”?
Sadly, my synergistic bliss has been short-lived, for recent commentaries in the local paper have forced me to look beyond the playfulness of the word itself and contemplate how it is being used in connection with “knowledge clusters” and “centres of excellence.” My contemplations have been sobering and have left me feeling much less enamoured, for I now know that synergistic happy faces can mask serious complexes. Let me explain.
In these recent discussions in the Telegraph Journal, the idea appears to be that if universities like UNBSJ cluster together people from a range of academic disciplines (e.g., biology, business, the social sciences, applied technology and engineering…) in a “knowledge incubator” with other “stakeholders” from, say, the community college and corporate sector, and have them focus their attention in a collaborative fashion on economic growth areas (e.g., energy), we will be able to create new forms of knowledge in these areas that wouldn’t have been created without the snugly “synergies” that clustering makes possible. One might ask, “Well, does this actually work? Does this sort of clustering generate more and better knowledge than other forms of knowledge production?” I’m not sure we have a definitive answer to that question. But, for the sake of argument, let’s assume for the moment that “knowledge clustering” does meet the expectations of the clusterers and, once clustered, our biologists, business people, social scientists, applied technologists, engineers and other “stakeholders” put their heads together and “synergize,” coming up with new ideas that solve production problems, generate new commercial applications, and boost economic growth. What’s not to like?
Well, for universities, there is an ethical and moral issue that has to be addressed, and it stems in large part from the principle that universities (at least those of the public variety) are to serve the public good. So what does it mean to serve the public good? During the PSE debates and struggles of 2007, a good number of people in Greater Saint John and beyond articulated clearly and passionately their commitment to this principle and their belief in the importance of safeguarding the integrity of the academy. Here are a few examples:
Why have people studied the liberal arts from the time of ancient Greece? The universal answer is to enrich their lives. No, this is not the kind of monetary riches that are gained from selling LNG or nuclear power to the States. These riches are called culture. They are the music, the acting, the teaching that makes life worth living. They increase our appreciation of other people and by so doing insure against racism and bullying that downgrade others and also ourselves. These riches insure our country’s democracy and fight against exploitation and autocracy. These riches are also the pure sciences and the history of science and thought. (Carl Wolpin, Telegraph Journal, Oct. 5, 2007, A6)
The challenges that will face our community will need young minds that think outside the box. We will need minds that have been schooled in the human tradition. A good Arts education can strengthen our virtues of tolerance, sympathy, and respect for others. A liberal arts education will also help us to engage in the controversies of our time.” (Michelle Hooton, Telegraph Journal, Sept. 13, 2007, A6).
Dr. McGahan…taught me what a university education was meant to do. It was to teach me to think and to build the capacities to be a good citizen, not to prepare one for a profession per se…. The more the university aligns itself with a business model of operation, with its emphasis on tangible products, the more the university will move away from the very definition of a university. (Dr. Glendon R. Tait, Telegraph Journal, Sept. 1, 2007, A8)
A collegial form of governance is found in all ‘true’ universities…. [T]his model is essential to ensuring intellectual inventiveness. (Willis D. Hamilton, Telegraph Journal, Sept. 29, 2007)
Too tight a coupling of public institutions with private interests can limit the questions being researched, as well as the lens through which problems are perceived and therefore investigated. It also creates inequity in the relations between universities and the community, since it is usually industries with research money to spend for whom the welcome mat is laid. (Janice Harvey, Telegraph Journal, Nov. 7, 2007, A5).
So, as the public recognized in 2007, the university has an obligation that extends beyond preparing workers for the labour market; it has a responsibility to prepare people for citizenship. As Henri Giroux has said:
While the university should equip people to enter the workplace, it should also educate them to contest workplace inequalities, imagine democratically organized forms of work, and identify and challenge those injustices that contradict and undercut the most fundamental principles of freedom, equality, and respect for all people who constitute the global public sphere (Universities in Chains, 2007, p. 104).
As Janice Harvey suggested, the ability of the university to meet this responsibility is likely to be jeopardized when it is “coupled,” or “clustered,” too tightly with private interests. That’s where we risk developing a complex out of our synergizing efforts. And I mean “complex” in the sense that outgoing US President Dwight Eisenhower used the term back in 1961 with reference to what he identified as the “military-industrial complex.” Eisenhower’s concern was that this new partnership between the military wing of the US government and the emerging armaments industry would exert undue influence and endanger America’s liberties and democratic processes. Interestingly, he identified “an alert and knowledgeable citizenry” as the ultimate protection against the “potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power.” (Hear an excerpt from his speech)
No, I’m not trying to suggest that some “energy-educational complex” is in the works that will rival the likes of the US military-industrial complex. But what I didn’t know, until I read Henri Giroux’s recent book (cited above), is that, in the initial drafts of his farewell address, Eisenhower cautioned against the “military-industrial-academic complex,” fearing that the university’s commitment to academic freedom and research guided by intellectual curiosity and social needs would be eroded in favour of the pursuit of commercial and military interests. He said:
[T]he free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity…. The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. (Cited in Giroux, 2007, p. 15)
Eisenhower considered the military-industrial complex to be a necessary development for the time, but he urged the American people to be vigilant. Universities have an obligation to equip citizens with the knowledge and capacities for critical thought that they need to be vigilant and to be bold stewards of democracy. And universities need to ensure that their ability to meet that obligation is not compromised in the pursuit of synergies.
This went out earlier today:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
New Brunswick faculty add their voices to nation-wide outcry against political interference in university research
FREDERICTON and SAINT JOHN, NEW BRUNSWICK (June 18/09) – The Association of University of New Brunswick Teachers (AUNBT), the union that represents a thousand full-time and contract academic staff and librarians at the University of New Brunswick, is adding its voice to the groundswell of disapproval which has greeted Federal Science Minister Gary Goodyear’s unprecedented interference in academic matters. By attempting to intervene in a funding decision of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Minister disregarded the principles of academic freedom and university autonomy, principles that are central to maintaining a pre-eminent post-secondary system with any international credibility.
Minister Goodyear asked the SSHRC to reconsider their funding of a conference jointly sponsored by York and Queen’s universities. Happily, the funding remains in place and the conference goes ahead next week.
AUNBT was also disappointed to learn that Dr. Chad Gaffield, President of the SSHRC, bowed to ministerial pressure and violated the SSHRC’s own policy when he requested from the organizers a list of any programme changes.
“The political situation in the Middle-East, the focus of the conference, is a subject guaranteed to invite controversy, but that is all the more reason to study it,” said David Bell, president of AUNBT and professor of law. “Universities exist, in large part, to provide venues for detailed discussion of complicated issues. No university should be subject to political pressure when it seeks to exercise one of its central tasks: to further knowledge and understanding. The conference was awarded funding after undergoing a peer-review process, and that should have been the end of it.”
AUNBT sees this most recent incident as a symptom of a wider trend of government and corporate jockeying for more control in the post-secondary sector.
“Research cannot be subject to transitory political or economic whims. Academic freedom is our bedrock principle. Without it, universities would be reduced to reinventing themselves after each election or with each shift in the economy.”
“This is certainly a lesson that we have learnt here in New Brunswick,” Bell added, referring to ongoing upheavals in the provincial post-secondary sector.
“We would hope that the Minister has learnt a valuable lesson about the value of academic freedom,” Bell continued. “And we trust that Dr. Gaffield has taken the opportunity to reacquaint himself with the purpose of government-sponsored funding councils: to support research for its role in the expansion and exchange of knowledge, pure and simple. I certainly have no answers on the Middle-East question and AUNBT takes no position on the theme of the conference,” Professor Bell concluded. “But if we can’t even ask the questions, where does that leave us?”
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For further information, contact:
David Bell, President, AUNBT
As university leaders increasingly appeal to the corporate world for funding, engage in money-making ventures as a measure of excellence, and ignore that the line between for-profit and not-for-profit institutions of higher education is collapsing, many schools, as educator John Palata observes, will simply ‘serve as personnel offices for corporations’ and quickly dispense with the historically burdened though important promise of creating democratic mandates for higher education.
Of all groups, university and college educators should be the most vocal and militant in challenging the corporatization of education by making clear that at the heart of any form of inclusive democracy is the assumption that learning should be used to expand the public good, create a culture of questioning, and promote democratic social change. Individual and social agency becomes meaningful as part of the willingness to imagine otherwise, ‘in order to help us find our way to a more human future’ (Chomsky). Under such circumstances, knowledge can be used for amplifying human freedom and promoting social justice, and not simply for creating profits. (Henri Giroux, The University in Chains, 2007, p. 117)
what pisses me off even more than being sold?[as I sat writing this, my clone alter-ego fellow-traveller colleague Lee Chalmers posted her own take on the same issue. She anticipated me in some points but perhaps they bear repeating. And she thought of so much else besides. But what the hell; here goes:]
Someone at this university a few years back described his fellow-academics as “dinosaurs,” unwilling to contemplate change. As a quasi-raptor myself, I would add the following caveats: unwilling to contemplate change for its own sake; unwilling to jump into change without a thorough examination of the changes proposed and how they address an existing problem or set of problems; unwilling to be blindly reactive.
Fair enough?
Otherwise, we are lemmings.
Now you might argue that there is little to choose between the two, that dead is dead. I would merely respond that while that may be so — dead is indeed dead — dead after millennia of magisterial global dominance is not quite the same thing as being a screaming rodent falling off a cliff.
In the spirit of the foregoing observation, I would suggest that members of both the university and college communities would be foolish to embrace the changes being pushed by Enterprise Saint John and the Telegraph-Journal without having full campus- and institution-wide discussions, and then open and transparent discussion with each other, about the following questions. And no doubt I will miss some so please, use the comments section: read more…
