[Xmca-l] Re: The imploding university

[Wendy Maples]

Interesting that Chris Patten is on board with proactive intolerance of intolerance. And I am saddened to find myself wholeheartedly agreeing that some of the more pernicious intolerances are emerging from within Universities themselves. Not only of Student Union addresses, but also of research styles (the prioritisation of qualitative, measurable, observable, over anything that smacks of interpretation in the UK REF) and, I fear, of a particular form of 'outcome-focussed' evaluation in the new Teaching Excellence Framework, where outcomes are strictly limited to a thin set of 'measurable' data. Don't get me wrong, I actually LIKED some of what I saw in the early TEF proposals (how nice to prioritise excellence in teaching!), and I think there are still potentially positive outcomes, but I also fear we are going to have to revise quite substantially what we understand what we mean by 'being an academic', as Patten points out.Thanks for sharing, AnnalisaWendy

> From: annalisa@unm.edu
> To: xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
> Date: Thu, 25 Feb 2016 22:45:11 +0000
> Subject: [Xmca-l]   The imploding university
> 
> Hi XMCArs!
> 
> 
> Saw this at Project Syndicate:
> 
> https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/academic-freedom-under-threat-by-chris-patten-2016-02#
> 
> 
> Thought it might be of interest!
> 
> 
> Kind regards,
> 
> 
> Annalisa