Who would of thought that the Scotland's Colleges Conference would lead to a reflection on whether we are trying to create a sense of an active learner community based on modern notions of what it means to be a learner , within an institution dedicated to linear progress? What does engagement actually mean ? Who defines it ? Who sets the parameters?
Do our own narratives as learners , the language used , the shared symbols and rituals of learning, create a sense of 'a community of learning'. But is this an imagined community, best loved by the staff who identify with a representation of learning , democratic ideals and community involvement? I reflect on this as someone who loves the world cafe ideology, the sense of empowerment, the discursive nature of learner engagement. However, the students are not actively involved in my sense of community; my narrative. They have, as individuals and small groups found different ways to bring action, by-passing my sense of order, or more significantly my role as an agent for change.
Perhaps we need to let go of the strategy, stand back from order and control (God help me) and watch a pastiche of learner engagement evolve. Is it the outcomes that matter or our own narrative of learner engagement in the imagined community ?
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
Saturday, 7 November 2009
The discourse of accountancy within education
Power (1994) emphasises the discourse of accountancy within education. He argues that teachers' professional judgement, autonomy and academic knowledge are being diminished in favour of accountability, cost efficiency and measuring effectiveness. Current fixation with 'productivity' reinforces this discourse, normalising the practice of lecturers having to acount for how they are spending their non-teaching hours. In this climate how is it possible to engage staff?
Learner Engagement
Learner Engagement, Power and the Institution or
The Janus Face of Learner Engagement
Traditional discourses of learner engagement in college policy and practices have been shaped by the knowledge and understanding of liberal representative democracy, with its underpinning values of individualism and rights. Notions of representation have been influential in establishing a pattern of roles for engagement within the college as an institution. Ideas around empowerment through representation have come to dominate discursive practices, arguably creating a circuit of power that controls what can and cannot be voiced.
A review of literature and language concerning learner engagement demonstrates the dominance of a liberal democratic discourse : empowering learners, personalised education, rights and citizenship . Together they create a compelling image of learners being fully engaged with education settings, and attaining more power and control over their education.
Within a college, this usually involves student representative systems e.g. student guild, course and college committees where 'agenda-setting’ subsequently shapes what students think and, talk about. This could be viewed as empowerment of students, but it could also be considered a control device. However, an offshoot would be that it creates in the students a sense of their 'rights', and a greater willingness therefore to complain.
Scott (1990) drawing from the work of Foucault , asks about what is hidden within the power relations , but also recognises that both the powerful and the powerless are constrained in their behaviour.
In developing an alternative discourse of learner engagement we had to acknowledge that power operates within the established everyday relations that have become ingrained in the life of the college. We needed to establish a forum that would free all actors from their roles, and create opportunities for alternative discussions.
Direct particiation
Ya…..sounds OK, but been teaching for past 6 hours so I’m a bit dozy.
If you use a word like dialectical in this sort of paper, for this audience, then you might be better to use a different word, or briefly say what you mean by it.
Similarly, when you say ‘liberal democracy’ you’d be better saying ‘liberal representative democracy’.
The problem with representation is that it is an elitist approach, springs from an elitist mindset, and almost always quickly turns the rep’s in to an ‘elite’. The rep’s tend not to represent anyone except themselves. The idea of a rep’ is someone who is a ‘trustee’, they get to use their own judgement about what is in the best interests of those they ‘represent’……and in doing this they act ‘responsibly’. The rep’ becomes empowered, but those they are supposed to represent become dis-empowered. Over time it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy – the rep’s become the informed shepherds, and the represented become the uninformed and apathetic sheep – and that then confirms the need for rep’s.
The shepherds then collude with the farmer – they squabble, responsibly, about details rather than fundamental principles, so they converge in a common mindset. Representation is a way of educating and training the rep’s in to a shared mindset. You can see this often with Union officials and management, or student rep’s and staff. The agenda is mostly set by the farmers / managers, but they want a positive outcome, want to be benevolent, will make concessions, and the shepherds get co-opted in to that. Student engagement via ‘trustee rep’s’ is mostly a waste of time, but it might make the managers / teachers more informed, and make the reps feel important and respected.
It would work better via direct democracy, and by abandoning manager / teacher / student roles. Which is maybe where your final paragraph is heading. But students need some time initially to establish their own agenda and mindset, on their own, without us nudging them in the direction we want them to go. We’re often reluctant to do this because we have our own occupational interests to protect.
But, the same problem also exists in the relation between senior management and staff – do senior management really engage with staff ? Think of the ways in which Brian Lister attempted to do this. He wants us to engage with his agenda, and his agenda is at least in part shaped by his own self-delusion, his own career goals, and his own needs. A College strategic objectives summary that begins with the statement that ‘SCE will inspire…….’ is not really about engagement, it’s about impression management and corporate self-delusion.
It’s like Locke’s problem of ‘express consent’ versus ‘tacit consent’. A genuine process of ‘engagement’ would want to be founded on express consent, but it’s usually tacit consent – compliance rather than consent.
Similarly with the HMI. Who did they engage with to work out what their current inspection agenda should be ? And how can they engage with teachers and learners on a 3 day visit.
In all this you can make use of Foucault’s conception of power. In working in the college you tacitly buy in to a management agenda, and they govern and engage via compliance rather than consent. Ditto for students. In doing this they reflect the wider discourse and procedures of liberal representative democracy.
But things move on, ideas are released in to the world, unintended effects occur. But the risk is always that elitism prevails, and mostly we remain or return to being compliant ‘sheep’…….or become rustlers, bandits, gypsies, drifters, living in the highplains but coming down to the valleys to earn a living as a compliant sheep and pretending to be engaged.
The Janus Face of Learner Engagement
Traditional discourses of learner engagement in college policy and practices have been shaped by the knowledge and understanding of liberal representative democracy, with its underpinning values of individualism and rights. Notions of representation have been influential in establishing a pattern of roles for engagement within the college as an institution. Ideas around empowerment through representation have come to dominate discursive practices, arguably creating a circuit of power that controls what can and cannot be voiced.
A review of literature and language concerning learner engagement demonstrates the dominance of a liberal democratic discourse : empowering learners, personalised education, rights and citizenship . Together they create a compelling image of learners being fully engaged with education settings, and attaining more power and control over their education.
Within a college, this usually involves student representative systems e.g. student guild, course and college committees where 'agenda-setting’ subsequently shapes what students think and, talk about. This could be viewed as empowerment of students, but it could also be considered a control device. However, an offshoot would be that it creates in the students a sense of their 'rights', and a greater willingness therefore to complain.
Scott (1990) drawing from the work of Foucault , asks about what is hidden within the power relations , but also recognises that both the powerful and the powerless are constrained in their behaviour.
In developing an alternative discourse of learner engagement we had to acknowledge that power operates within the established everyday relations that have become ingrained in the life of the college. We needed to establish a forum that would free all actors from their roles, and create opportunities for alternative discussions.
Direct particiation
Ya…..sounds OK, but been teaching for past 6 hours so I’m a bit dozy.
If you use a word like dialectical in this sort of paper, for this audience, then you might be better to use a different word, or briefly say what you mean by it.
Similarly, when you say ‘liberal democracy’ you’d be better saying ‘liberal representative democracy’.
The problem with representation is that it is an elitist approach, springs from an elitist mindset, and almost always quickly turns the rep’s in to an ‘elite’. The rep’s tend not to represent anyone except themselves. The idea of a rep’ is someone who is a ‘trustee’, they get to use their own judgement about what is in the best interests of those they ‘represent’……and in doing this they act ‘responsibly’. The rep’ becomes empowered, but those they are supposed to represent become dis-empowered. Over time it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy – the rep’s become the informed shepherds, and the represented become the uninformed and apathetic sheep – and that then confirms the need for rep’s.
The shepherds then collude with the farmer – they squabble, responsibly, about details rather than fundamental principles, so they converge in a common mindset. Representation is a way of educating and training the rep’s in to a shared mindset. You can see this often with Union officials and management, or student rep’s and staff. The agenda is mostly set by the farmers / managers, but they want a positive outcome, want to be benevolent, will make concessions, and the shepherds get co-opted in to that. Student engagement via ‘trustee rep’s’ is mostly a waste of time, but it might make the managers / teachers more informed, and make the reps feel important and respected.
It would work better via direct democracy, and by abandoning manager / teacher / student roles. Which is maybe where your final paragraph is heading. But students need some time initially to establish their own agenda and mindset, on their own, without us nudging them in the direction we want them to go. We’re often reluctant to do this because we have our own occupational interests to protect.
But, the same problem also exists in the relation between senior management and staff – do senior management really engage with staff ? Think of the ways in which Brian Lister attempted to do this. He wants us to engage with his agenda, and his agenda is at least in part shaped by his own self-delusion, his own career goals, and his own needs. A College strategic objectives summary that begins with the statement that ‘SCE will inspire…….’ is not really about engagement, it’s about impression management and corporate self-delusion.
It’s like Locke’s problem of ‘express consent’ versus ‘tacit consent’. A genuine process of ‘engagement’ would want to be founded on express consent, but it’s usually tacit consent – compliance rather than consent.
Similarly with the HMI. Who did they engage with to work out what their current inspection agenda should be ? And how can they engage with teachers and learners on a 3 day visit.
In all this you can make use of Foucault’s conception of power. In working in the college you tacitly buy in to a management agenda, and they govern and engage via compliance rather than consent. Ditto for students. In doing this they reflect the wider discourse and procedures of liberal representative democracy.
But things move on, ideas are released in to the world, unintended effects occur. But the risk is always that elitism prevails, and mostly we remain or return to being compliant ‘sheep’…….or become rustlers, bandits, gypsies, drifters, living in the highplains but coming down to the valleys to earn a living as a compliant sheep and pretending to be engaged.
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