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Changing the Higher Education Culture – Is It Possible? Rob Cuthbert Professor of Higher Education Management University of the West of England.

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Presentation on theme: "Changing the Higher Education Culture – Is It Possible? Rob Cuthbert Professor of Higher Education Management University of the West of England."— Presentation transcript:

1 Changing the Higher Education Culture – Is It Possible? Rob Cuthbert Professor of Higher Education Management University of the West of England

2 Changing the Culture of the Campus Towards an Inclusive Higher Education – Ten Years On Maggie Woodrow: To achieve a genuinely pluralist higher education which meets the needs of students from under-represented groups will require a shift from an ethos of selective normality to one of diversity and inclusion. 1999 conference debate: is the function of higher education to promote academic excellence rather than social inclusion?

3 Changing the higher education culture What is culture? Teaching, research and academic practice The social purposes of higher education What have we done that worked? Conclusion: what do we need to do now?

4 What is culture? By cultures we refer to sets of taken- for-granted values, attitudes and ways of behaving, which are articulated through and reinforced by recurrent practices among a group of people in a given context. Becher and Trowler (2001 p23)

5 What is cultural change? … culture is the result of all the daily conversations and negotiations between the members of an organisation. They are continually agreeing (sometimes explicitly, usually tacitly) about the proper way to do things and how to make meanings about the events of the world around them. If you want to change a culture you have to change all these conversations – or at least the majority of them. And changing conversations is not the focus of most change programmes, which tend to concentrate on organisational structures or reward systems or other large scale interventions. Richard Seel (2009)

6 Changes in HE culture Globalisation Managerialisation Marketisation Massification Diversification: institutions and students Privatisation and academic capitalism

7 Elite university strategy Selective Meritocratic Uncompromising on rigour and standards Globally competitive

8 Elite university strategy S elective M eritocratic U ncompromising on rigour and standards G lobally competitive

9 Reunifying academic practice Purposes Contexts Freedoms

10 What have we done that worked? Expansion Long-term partnership and collaboration More emphasis on preparation for HE and retention after admission Recognition of the realities of individual disadvantage and individual benefit

11 What do we need to do? Practice Purpose Preparation Partnership: - barriers, boundaries, bridges

12 What do we need to do? Practice Purpose Preparation Partnership: - barriers, boundaries, bridges Preservation - academic values, academic freedom Particularity

13 What is cultural change? … culture is the result of all the daily conversations and negotiations between the members of an organisation. They are continually agreeing (sometimes explicitly, usually tacitly) about the proper way to do things and how to make meanings about the events of the world around them. If you want to change a culture you have to change all these conversations – or at least the majority of them. And changing conversations is not the focus of most change programmes, which tend to concentrate on organisational structures or reward systems or other large scale interventions. Richard Seel (2009)

14 References Becher T and P Trowler (2001) Academic tribes and territories Buckingham: Society for Research into Higher Education/Open University Press 2nd edn Bourdieu P (1973) Cultural reproduction and social reproduction in Brown R (ed) (1973) Knowledge, education and cultural change London: Tavistock Deal TE and AA Kennedy (1982) Corporate cultures: the rites and rituals of corporate life Harmondsworth: Penguin Fuller SW (2006) The new sociological imagination Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Gibbons M, C Limoges, H Novotny, S Schwartzman, P Scott and M Trow (1994) The new production of knowledge: the dynamics of science and research in contemporary societies Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Gillies D (2008) Quality and inequality: the mask of discursive conflation in education policy texts Journal of Education Policy 23:6 685-699

15 Gorard S, E Smith, H May, L Thomas, N Adnett and K Slack (2006) Widening participation research: addressing the barriers to partyicipation in higher education A report to HEFCE by the University of York, Higher Education Academy and Institute for Access Studies www.hefce.ac.uk/publicationswww.hefce.ac.uk/publications Kettley N (2007) The past, present and future of widening participation research British Journal of Sociology of Higher Education 28:3 333-347 Martin J (2000) Organisation culture: mapping the terrain Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Rubinstein D ed (1979) Education and equality Harmondsworth: Penguin Seel R (2009) New Paradigm consulting website http://www.new- paradigm.co.uk/files/1045.pdfhttp://www.new- paradigm.co.uk/files/1045.pdf Slaughter S and LL Leslie (1997) Academic capitalism: politics, policies and the entrepreneurial university Baltimore MD: Johns Hopkins University Press Slaughter S and G Rhoades (2004) Academic capitalism and the new economy: markets, state and higher education Baltimore MD: Johns Hopkins University Press Watson D (2006) How to think about widening participation in UK higher education Report to HEFCE www.hefce.ac.uk/publicationswww.hefce.ac.uk/publications


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